Israelis and Palestinians Killed in the Current Violence

At least 4,897 Palestinians and 1,062 Israelis
have been killed since September 29, 2000.

American news reports repeatedly describe Israeli military attacks against the Palestinian population as “retaliation.” However, when one looks into the chronology of death in this conflict, the reality turns out to be quite different.

Source: B'Tselem, The Israeli Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. (Visit their statistics page.) Their statistics cover through November 30, 2008.

These numbers include civilians and combattants killed by members of the opposing nationality (and therefore, do not include Palestinians killed by an explosive device that they set or was on their person, Israelis killed in 'friendly fire' incidents, etc.). The numbers also do not include the sizable number of Palestinians who died as a result of inability to reach medical care due to Israeli road closures, curfews, etc.

The figure for Palestinian deaths is extremely conservative, since it is difficult for B'Tselem to report on deaths in the Palestinian territories. The Palestine Red Crescent Society, internationally respected for its statistical rigor, reports significantly higher numbers of Palestinian deaths. We do not doubt the reliability of their data, and only use B'Tselem's more conservative numbers because they collect data on both populations.

In the past we used the statistics provided by Israel’s military for the number of Israelis killed, but they have not updated their statistics page since early in 2006. In addition, there is reason to believe that their numbers may have been somewhat inflated.

* The Palestinian people do not have a military, so the usual classification of civilian is not being used. Instead B'Tselem provides data on the number of Palestinians who did not participate in hostilities, a significantly more stringent qualification that the one used to identify Israeli civilians. We do not know how many of the Israelis listed as civilians participated in the hostilities. Many settlers who illegally have taken over parts of the West Bank (and used to live in parts of the Gaza Strip) are heavily armed and there have been numerous reports of their brutal attacks on their Palestinian neighbors.

Gaza Casualties
June 28 - October 27, 2006

Source: Physicians for Human Rights, quoted by BBC

Causes of Deaths of Israeli Soldiers
2005

Source: Israeli newspaper Ma’ariv, Oct. 10, 2005, p. 6.
Note: The paper also reported that since 1992, 459 Israeli soldiers have committed suicide.