Palestinians mourn the death of their relatives at the Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah on July 1, 2024, following Israeli bombardments in the central Gaza Strip.Omar Ashtawy/APA Images/ZUMA
On July 5th, The Lancet, one of the most famous medical journals in the world, published a letter from researchers with estimates of the death toll in Gaza from Israel’s nine-month invasion.
Factoring in a possible ratio of four indirect deaths to each direct death, researchers Dr. Rasha Khatib, Dr. Martin McKee, and Dr. Salim Yusuf wrote that “it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186,000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.” That is nearly five times the 38,000 dead reported by the Gaza Health Ministry, the only organization conducting regular counts of the dead on the ground. That number is equivalent to 8 percent of Gaza’s population.
Now, researchers are saying what is hard to stomach: The horrific number of dead presented daily as a result of Israel’s campaign in Gaza could be a severe........