Emma Graham-Harrison
The Guardian / January 30, 2026
Israeli military’s U-turn in accepting official figures comes after years of attacking data as ‘Hamas propaganda’.
Jerusalem – Israel’s military has accepted the death toll compiled by health authorities in Gaza is broadly accurate, marking a U-turn after years of official attacks on the data.
A senior security official briefed Israeli journalists, saying about 70,000 Palestinians had been killed by Israeli attacks on the territory since October 2023, excluding those missing.
It is the first time Israel has publicly estimated the toll from the war in Gaza. Previously the government and military had only provided figures for militants Israel claimed to have killed.
Gaza health authorities said the direct toll from Israeli attacks had exceeded 71,660 people, with at least 10,000 presumed buried in the rubble of bombed buildings.
For more than two years, Israeli officials and media had attacked the Palestinian figures as “Hamas propaganda” and dismissed them as “not accurate”.
The abrupt shift in stance raises broader questions about Israel’s defence of its campaign in Gaza. A UN commission, rights groups and scholars have accused Israel of committing genocide in the territory.
“What other accusations could turn out to be true?” the Israeli newspaper Haaretz said after the briefing. “The Israeli public must ask itself what this belated recognition indicates about the army and the government’s credibility regarding Israel’s conduct in Gaza.”
It is also likely to intensify scrutiny of civilian casualties in Gaza. The Israeli military previously claimed to have killed 22,000 militants in Gaza, suggesting that, by its own count, more than two-thirds of the 70,000 dead were non-combatants.
That figure is significantly below the 83% civilian toll indicated by a classified Israeli military database, but well above the 50% casualty rate previously claimed by Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Israel was still reviewing how many of the dead were civilians, The Times of Israel said, but believed the overall toll compiled by Gaza health authorities was “largely accurate”.
A military spokesperson declined to confirm or deny the figure given at the briefing, saying only that “the details published do not reflect official IDF data”.
The Palestinian database does not provide a breakdown of fighters and non-combatants. It does identify most of the dead by name, date of birth and Israeli-issued identity numbers.
Israeli attacks on Gaza health authorities ignored a long track record of reliable record-keeping. During past wars in Gaza the final toll recognised by Israel and observers including the UN was broadly in line with Palestinian data.
There was little coverage or discussion of the death toll in Israeli media. Most major outlets attended the briefing, but with the exception of Haaretz, initially ignored the new figure.
Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper quoted the figure in a report focused on diplomatic manoeuvring between the US, Qatar and Israel. The report quoted an official, saying: “Our estimate is that roughly 70,000 Gazans were killed in the war, not including missing persons.”
The paper’s online outlet, Ynet, later published a short piece on the toll late on Thursday evening. It was not a headline on television news shows.
The Israeli military also said it would open the key Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt on Sunday, for the first time since Israeli forces seized control of the border area nearly two years ago, in May 2024.
Palestinians who left Gaza could now apply to return for the first time since the war began, a spokesperson said. A European Union force would supervise the crossing, but Israel would retain full control of everyone who entered and left, the spokesperson said.
Reopening Rafah has been presented as a central part of US efforts to push Donald Trump’s ceasefire plan for the territory firmly into a second stage. It will only be open to pedestrians, so will not ease shortages of food and shelter aid, medicine and other basic humanitarian goods in Gaza.
Emma Graham-Harrison is The Guardian’s chief Middle East correspondent, based in Jerusalem
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Israeli military accepts Gaza’s death toll exceeding 70,000 for first time
TNA Staff
The New Arab / January 29, 2026
Israel’s military has acknowledged Gaza’s death toll exceeds 70,000, even as rights experts warn the true number may be far higher.
The Israeli military has for the first time acknowledged figures released by Gaza’s health ministry indicating that more than 70,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s genocide on the enclave, Israeli media reported on Thursday.
According to the Gaza health ministry, at least 71,667 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched its brutal military campaign in October 2023, including hundreds killed after a ceasefire agreement came into effect in October last year.
The figures do not include those believed to be buried under the rubble or those who died from starvation, disease or the collapse of Gaza’s healthcare system as a result of Israeli attacks.
Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that military officials now regard the ministry’s death toll as credible, marking a significant shift after years of Israeli government efforts to dismiss Palestinian casualty figures as unreliable.
The figures have long been cited by international humanitarian organisations, including the United Nations, yet many mainstream Western media outlets caveated their reporting of the figure by emphasising that the data had come from Gaza’s “Hamas-run” health ministry.
The death toll reflects Palestinians killed directly by Israeli fire, while Gaza’s health ministry has also reported more than 171,000 wounded, amounting to over eight percent of the territory’s population.
Israeli military officials did not comment publicly on the report, but Haaretz said the army was analysing the data to determine how many of those killed it categorises as combatants or civilians, even though the majority of victims were women and children.
Several independent studies have suggested that the true number of deaths in Gaza is far higher than official figures.
Research published in the medical journal The Lancet in January 2025 estimated that the real death toll could be around 40 percent higher than documented numbers, due to undercounting amid mass destruction, displacement and the collapse of civil registration systems.
Professor Michael Spagat of Royal Holloway, University of London, also estimated that more than 75,000 people had likely been killed by early 2025, at a time when the official toll stood at around 45,600.
Palestinian and international rights advocates say Israel’s acknowledgement of more than 70,000 deaths exposes the scale of destruction in Gaza and undermines long-standing Israeli claims that Palestinian casualty figures were exaggerated.
Human rights experts have repeatedly warned that the documented death toll captures only part of the devastation.
In September 2025, UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, Francesca Albanese, said that some scholars and scientists estimate Gaza’s real death toll could reach as high as 680,000.
Speaking during a UN press briefing in Geneva, Albanese stressed that official counts exclude people buried under rubble and those who died from indirect causes, such as hunger, disease and the lack of medical care caused by Israel’s siege and bombardment.
“In fact, we shall start thinking of 680,000, because this is the number that some scholars and scientists claim is the real death toll in Gaza,” she said, noting that such figures would be difficult to verify without full access to the territory.
Albanese added that, if confirmed, as many as 380,000 of the dead could be children under the age of five.
Violence has continued in Gaza despite the ceasefire. On Thursday, two Palestinians were killed in eastern Khan Younis near areas where Israeli forces remain active, according to local medics.
The developments come as Israel and Hamas prepare to move into the second phase of the ceasefire, following the recovery of the body of the final Israeli captive believed to be held in Gaza.
Israel has said it agreed to reopen the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, which has largely remained closed since Israeli forces seized control of the Palestinian side in May 2024.
However, Israeli officials have sought to impose conditions on the crossing’s operation, including restrictions aimed at ensuring that more Palestinians leave Gaza than are allowed to return.
Rights groups and Palestinian officials have warned that such measures risk turning humanitarian corridors into tools for forced expulsions.
