After Many Denials, IDF Accepts Gaza Health Ministry's Death Toll: Report

The figures – widely confirmed as accurate by several international organisations, governments, media outlets, and researchers – have never before been officially acknowledged by Israel.

The Wire Staff

The figures – widely confirmed as accurate by several international organisations, governments, media outlets, and researchers – have never before been officially acknowledged by Israel.

after many denials idf accepts gaza health ministry s death toll report

Palestinians stand next to a tent set up on the rubble of buildings destroyed during Israeli air and ground operations in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, in Gaza City, Tuesday, Dec. 30, 2025. Photo: AP/PTI.

New Delhi: After years of disputing the Gaza Health Ministry’s death toll data, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) have accepted the estimate that over 71, 000 Palestinians have been killed during the Israel-Gaza war, Haaretz has reported. The figures – widely confirmed as accurate by several international organisations, governments, media outlets, and researchers – have never been officially acknowledged by Israel.

Prior to last year’s ceasefire, Israel said that it had killed 1,600 fighters since the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on southern Israel, along with 22,000 combatants, notes the BBC. The Gaza Health Ministry reports that 71, 667 people have been killed since the beginning of the war, including 492 people after a ceasefire agreement had been finalised in October 2025.

According to Haaretz, IDF sources confirmed that the total number given by the ministry is largely accurate, not including missing residents who are potentially buried under rubble. The IDF added that it is analysing the data to break down how many of those killed were combatants and how many civilians.

The Ministry’s tally only includes casualties resulting from direct Israeli fire – identifying 90% of the bodies by name and identification numbers – and does not record the number of Palestinians who have died of starvation and diseases exacerbated by the war.

Several media outlets, including the Haaretz and the Middle East Eye, have reported that a vast majority of people killed are civilians, owing to the IDF’s practice of largely avoiding battlefield confrontations and opting for aerial attacks and artillery shelling. International organisations working on Gaza have also confirmed this, and many experts have agreed that Israel's actions in Palestine are nothing short of genocidal.

In June 2025, a study by Michael Spagat et al. concluded that as of January 2025 approximately 75,200 Palestinians had died during the war, even higher than the Ministry’s then count of around 55,000 dead. Other research published in The Lancet also suggested a 40% higher death toll than the reported numbers, leading to speculations that the Health Ministry’s data may even be vastly conservative.

This article went live on January thirtieth, two thousand twenty six, at fifty-eight minutes past two in the afternoon.

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