Palestinian Death Toll In Gaza Surpasses 25,000 With No End In Sight

Israeli soldiers overlook the Gaza Strip from a tank, as seen from southern Israel, Friday, Jan. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)

Israeli soldiers overlook the Gaza Strip from a tank, as seen from southern Israel, Friday, Jan. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)

RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — The Palestinian death toll from the war between Israel and Hamas has soared past 25,000, the Health Ministry in the Gaza Strip said Sunday, while the Israeli government appeared far from achieving its goals of crushing the militant group and freeing more than 100 hostages.

The level of death, destruction and displacement from the war already is without precedent in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Yet Israeli officials say the fighting is likely to continue for several more months.

The slow progress and the plight of the hostages held in Gaza has divided ordinary Israelis and their leaders even as the offensive threatens to ignite a wider war involving Iran-backed groups in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen that support the Palestinians.

The United States, which has provided essential diplomatic and military support for the offensive, has had limited success in persuading Israel to adopt military tactics that put civilians at less risk and to facilitate the delivery of more humanitarian aid. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also has rejected U.S. and international calls for postwar plans that would include a path to Palestinian statehood.

GAZA DEATH TOLL CLIMBS AMID BLISTERING OFFENSIVE

The war began with Hamas’ surprise attack in southern Israel on Oct. 7, during which Palestinian militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took around 250 hostages back to Gaza.

Israel responded with a blistering three-week air campaign and then a ground invasion into northern Gaza that laid waste to entire neighborhoods. Ground operations are now focused on the southern city of Khan Younis and built-up refugee camps in central Gaza dating back to the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation.

Israel continues to carry out airstrikes throughout the besieged territory, including areas in the south where it told civilians to seek refuge. Many Palestinians have ignored evacuation orders, saying nowhere feels safe.

RAFAH, GAZA – JANUARY 21: A view of a wrecked vehicle is seen after Israeli drones conduct airstrike over Rafah, Gaza on January 21, 2024. (Photo by Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty Images)

RAFAH, GAZA – JANUARY 21: A view of a wrecked vehicle is seen after Israeli drones conduct airstrike over Rafah, Gaza on January 21, 2024. (Photo by Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Since the war started, a total of 25,105 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, while another 62,681 have been wounded, the Health Ministry reported Sunday. The death toll included the 178 bodies brought to Gaza’s hospitals since Saturday, Health Ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qidra said. Another 300 people were wounded in the past day, he said.

The overall toll is thought to be even higher because many casualties remain buried under the rubble from Israeli strikes or in areas where medics cannot reach them, Al-Qidra said.

The Health Ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its figures but says around two-thirds of the people killed in Gaza were women and minors.

The ministry is part of the Hamas-run government, but its casualty figures from previous wars were largely consistent with those of U.N. agencies and even the Israeli military.

The Israeli military says it has killed around 9,000 militants, without providing evidence, and blames the high civilian death toll on Hamas because it positions fighters, tunnels and other militant infrastructure in dense neighborhoods, often near homes, schools or mosques.

The military says 195 of its soldiers have been killed since the start of the Gaza offensive.

The war has displaced some 85% of Gaza’s residents from their homes, with hundreds of thousands packing into U.N.-run shelters and tent camps in the southern part of the tiny coastal enclave. U.N. officials say a quarter of the population of 2.3 million is starving as only a trickle of humanitarian aid reaches them because of the fighting and Israeli restrictions.

ISRAELIS INCREASINGLY DIVIDED

Netanyahu has vowed to keep up the offensive until Israel achieves “complete victory” over Hamas and returns all the remaining hostages. But even some top Israeli officials have begun to acknowledge that those goals might be mutually exclusive.

Hamas is believed to be holding the captives in tunnels deep underground and using them as shields for its top leaders. Israel has only managed to rescue one hostage since the war began, and Hamas says several have been killed in Israeli airstrikes or during failed rescue operations.

A member of Israel’s War Cabinet, former army chief Gadi Eisenkot, said last week that the only way to free the remaining hostages was through a cease-fire. In an implicit criticism of Netanyahu, he said claims to the contrary amounted to “illusions.”

Hamas has said it will not free more hostages until Israel ends its offensive. The group also is expected to make any further releases conditional on securing freedom for thousands of Palestinians imprisoned in Israel, including high-profile militants involved in attacks that killed Israelis.

Israel’s government has ruled that out for now, but it faces rising pressure from families of the hostages, who are pushing for another exchange, and from Israelis frustrated by the security failures that preceded the Oct. 7 attack and by Netanyahu’s handling of the war.

Thousands of people gathered in Tel Aviv over the weekend to call for new elections.

Netanyahu’s far-right coalition partners are meanwhile pushing him to step up the offensive, with some calling for the “voluntary” emigration of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from Gaza and the re-establishment of Jewish settlements there. Israel withdrew soldiers and settlers from the territory in 2005, two years before Hamas seized power from rival Palestinian forces.

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Magdy reported from Cairo.