Oct. 27 (UPI) — As its credibility is questioned by the Biden administration and the Israeli military, the Hamas-controlled Palestinian Ministry of Health released a list identifying the 6,747 people it says were killed in Gaza during Israel’s 20-day war against the militant organization.
It said in a statement accompanying the figures that its doors “are open to all institutions to examine the healthcare system … so that the world knows that behind every number is a human story with a known name and identity, and our people are not faceless entities that can be ignored.”
Israel has been incessantly bombing Gaza in its war against Hamas since the militant group killed some 1,400 Israelis in a surprise attack on Oct. 7.
Palestinian health officials have been daily releasing a death toll of those killed in Israel’s bombardment of the enclave. On Thursday, as questions have been raised about its figures’ validity, the ministry released a document that gives a death toll of 7,028, with all but 281 having been identified by name, age, gender and identification number. By gender, 3,899 are female and 2,813 are male. There are also 2,665 deceased children, according to the ministry.
The report was released a day after U.S. President Joe Biden dismissed the ministry’s death toll during a joint press conference alongside Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
The U.S. leader has publicly said he has asked Israel to minimize civilian casualties during its war in Gaza, and when asked Wednesday if the health ministry’s figures say the Middle Eastern country is ignoring his request, Biden said: “I have no confidence in the number that the Palestinians are using.”
On Thursday, John Kirby, the National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications, explained during a press conference in Washington that the ministry is run by Hamas and anything it reports can’t be taken “at face value.”
He said the Biden administration “would not dispute that” thousands of Palestinians have ben killed but that “what we’re saying is that we shouldn’t rely on numbers put forth by Hamas and the Ministry of Health.”
Israel Defense spokesman Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus further attacked the credibility of the ministry during his Thursday morning update on X, accusing it of having previously lied to inflate Palestinian death tolls.
However, Omar Shakir, with Human Rights Watch’s Israel and Palestine director, told The New York Times that his international human rights group finds the ministry’s death tolls consistent with other figures it has seen.
Shakir added that focus on the ministry’s credibility was a distraction from the brutal war.
“Our focus should be on how to prevent further mass atrocities, instead of debating whether or not the number is exactly accurate or not,” he said. “We know that Palestinians are being killed in unprecedentedly high numbers, and that needs to end.”
In its statement Thursday, the Palestinian health ministry chastised the Biden administration for adopting Israel’s position without scrutiny and of “speaking in the language of the criminal occupier and shamelessly casting doubt on the accuracy of the numbers announced by the Ministry of Health.”
