Compilation of news reports – IAK staff
At least 28 Palestinians, including children and women, are killed throughout Gaza on New Year’s Day in Israeli attacks.
Seventh infant dies from cold in Gaza: Health official
The director of field hospitals in Gaza’s health ministry has told Al Jazeera that the number of infants who have died from the cold in the enclave in recent days has risen to seven.
The director warned that there are not enough blankets or warm clothes to protect the hundreds of thousands of displaced residents living in make-shift tents, many of which have been afflicted by heavy rains in recent days.
Israel’s army has killed at least 1,091 babies in Gaza, media office says
Israeli forces have killed 1,091 Palestinian infants since October 7, 2023, including 238 born and killed during the ongoing war, Gaza’s Government Media Office says.
Since October 7, 2023, Israel has killed at least 17,400 children in Gaza, according to Palestinian officials. That is one child killed every 30 minutes. Thousands more are missing under the rubble, presumed dead.
NOTE: According to a report in the Lancet, by multiplying the reported deaths by five, it is possible to reach a conservative estimate of total deaths (including indirect causes like starvation and lack of medicine). Using current mortality figures, it is reasonable to estimate over 227,000 total deaths in Gaza since October 7th, 2023.
According to a recent report by the UN Human Rights Office of identified fatalities in Gaza, about 44% were children. It is reasonable to estimate that over 20,000 of known direct deaths and 100,000 of the total deaths are children.
Gaza population falls by 6 percent as a result of Israel’s war: Palestinian statistics bureau
The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) says that about 100,000 Palestinians have left the enclave since the war began, and 55,000 are presumed to have been killed by Israel – a number that includes 11,000 who are missing.
The PCBS says that reduction of 160,000 puts Gaza’s population at 2.1 million people, almost half of whom are children under the age of 18.
“[Israel has] raged a brutal aggression against Gaza targeting all kinds of life there; humans, buildings and vital infrastructure … entire families were erased from the civil register,” the PCBS said. “There are catastrophic human and material losses.”
Israel sees net departure of citizens for a second year
More than 82,000 Israelis moved abroad in 2024 and only 33,000 people immigrated to the country, Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics says.
It was the second year in a row of net departures – a rare occurrence in the history of the country, which was founded by immigrants from Europe and actively encourages Jewish immigration.
Israel holding bodies of 198 Palestinians killed in 2024: NGO
A Palestinian NGO, the National Campaign to Retrieve Martyrs’ Bodies, reported Tuesday that the Israeli military is withholding the bodies of 198 Palestinians killed in 2024.
The group noted that the figure constitutes one-third of the 641 bodies held in Israel’s “Cemeteries of Numbers” and morgues, as documented by the campaign.
Child rights organization Defense for Children International said in December that the bodies of 39 Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces have been withheld from their families since 2016. The figure had reached 45 children’s bodies confiscated by Israeli forces but six of those had been returned to their families.
“Israeli authorities’ practice of confiscating and withholding Palestinian bodies is a violation of international humanitarian law and international human rights law,” the organization said.
The so-called “Cemeteries of Numbers” are unmarked graves bordered with stones, each bearing a metal plate with a number instead of the deceased’s name. The numbers correspond to individual files kept by Israeli security authorities.
RELATED READING: Dying to leave Gaza – and to get back in
While we partied, Gaza City flooded with sewage
UN report: Attacks on hospitals during the escalation of hostilities in Gaza (excerpt)
This report presents grave concerns regarding attacks on hospitals, as well as operations within them and in their vicinity, in Gaza covering the period 7 October 2023 to 30 June 2024.
In the context of the ongoing escalation of hostilities in Gaza, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has since early October 2023 documented repeated attacks on hospitals and operations within and in the vicinity of hospitals, leading to sustained combat in and around many hospitals.
This pattern has led to the destruction of most hospitals in Gaza, pushing the healthcare system to the point of almost complete collapse. Attacks on hospitals were reported in each of the areas in which the Israeli military conducted ground operations, starting in November 2023 with an attack on Al Shifa Medical Complex and other hospitals in Gaza City.
At the end of June 2024, 22 out of 38 hospitals across Gaza had been rendered non-functional, according to the Ministry of Health of the State of Palestine (Palestinian MOH).
The healthcare system in Gaza was grossly inadequate even before 7 October 2023. The 17- year blockade of Gaza in the context of Israel’s 57-year occupation, combined with the destruction caused by repeated escalations of hostilities since 2008, during which Israeli forces regularly bombed Gaza, had created broad dependence on external aid and heavily restricted access and movement of people and goods in and out of Gaza, including those essential for healthcare.
This created the conditions for endemic shortcomings in healthcare provision and recurring violations of Palestinians’ human rights in Gaza, including their rights to life4 and health…(read full report here).
Daniel Meron, Israel’s permanent representative to the UN in Geneva, has described a damning UN human rights agency report on attacks on Gaza’s hospitals as made up.
West Bank: Israeli demolitions, land seizures, and more in 2024
Israel has demolished 970 Palestinian homes and establishments, issued demolition orders to 765 others and seized 53,055 dunums (53 square kilometers) in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, in 2024, a Palestinian report has revealed.
The West Bank, including occupied East Jerusalem, covers a land area of 5,655sq km (2,183sq miles).
The report issued by the Land Research Center said the Israeli occupation army and settlers uprooted and damaged 59,163 trees – 52,373 of which were completely destroyed, closed 955 roads and entrances in various areas of the West Bank, including placing 76 iron gates outside villages and towns.
It also revealed that the Israeli occupation displaced 38 Palestinian Bedouin communities, including 355 families consisting of 2,209 individuals, and established 25 illegal pastoral settlement outposts, threatening thousands more dunams with confiscation.
In 2024, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich issued a decision to expropriate Palestinian land south of Hebron, while seven settlement outposts were established on land classified in ‘Area B’ of the occupied West Bank, five of them in Bethlehem Wilderness lands, a nature reserve according to the Oslo Agreement and its annexes.
RECOMMENDED READING: An interview with B’Tselem: ‘Israel is an apartheid state’
West Bank: Palestinian government suspends Al Jazeera channel’s operations
The Palestinian government has suspended all operations of the Doha-based Al Jazeera channel in the occupied West Bank, including network broadcasts and office activities, according to a decision announced by the ministerial committee on Wednesday.
The committee, made up of officials from the Ministries of Culture, Interior, and Communications, also temporarily halted the work of Al Jazeera’s journalists, staff, teams, and affiliated channels “until the network’s legal status is clarified,” according to Palestinian news agency Wafa.
The suspension comes after Palestinian authorities claim that Al Jazeera “aired content deemed to incite violence, spread misleading reports, and attempt to interfere in Palestinian domestic affairs.”
The ministerial committee emphasized that the suspension is temporary and will remain in effect until Al Jazeera “complies fully with Palestinian laws and regulations.”
![Israeli soldiers close Al Jazeera television’s office in Ramallah, West Bank on September 22, 2024. [Issam Rimawi – Anadolu Agency]](https://israelpalestinenews.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/9-22-e-300x200.jpg)
Netanyahu doesn’t know the meaning of “ceasefire”
Israel will continue fighting in Gaza even if a ceasefire-prisoner swap deal is reached with Hamas, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said yesterday.
Netanyahu’s office added that any solution that would lead to Hamas remaining in Gaza is unacceptable, noting that the issue of the day after in the Strip is still under discussion.
The policy set by the prime minister is that “neither Hamas nor the Palestinian Authority will have civilian control in the Strip, including the distribution of humanitarian aid,” Netanyahu’s office told Yedioth Ahronoth.
According to the paper, an Israeli official said yesterday that Tel Aviv wants a partial deal that does not include stopping the war and withdrawing the Israeli army from the Gaza Strip.
Does Netanyahu know the meaning of “withdrawal”? Is Israel backing out of the Lebanon ceasefire terms?
Confirming what many observers have concluded, Israeli paper Israel Hayom says Israel may decide to stay in south Lebanon beyond the 60-day withdrawal period specified in a ceasefire.
The failure to withdraw in 60 days would be yet another violation of the US and France-backed ceasefire agreement reached on November 27 between Lebanon and Israel.
Israel has already violated the agreement hundreds of times.
But what would Israel’s failure to withdraw from South Lebanon mean after this 60-day period? Here’s what you need to know (read the article in full here).
Israel’s Military Says Mental Distress, Suicide are High Among Soldiers
Thousands of Israeli soldiers have stopped serving in combat roles due to mental distress since October 7, 2023, the Israel Defense Forces said on Thursday.
The data published by the IDF also shows an alarming rise in suicides among soldiers, from 17 in 2023 to 21 in 2024 – the largest single year total since 2011.
Out of the 21 soldiers who took their own lives in 2024 were 12 reservists, seven were in compulsory duty and two career soldiers.
IDF data shows that suicide is the second-leading cause of death in the Israeli army, following operational duty but ahead of illnesses and accidents.
Over the past two years, 807 soldiers were killed in operational duty – 512 during 2023 and 295 last year. 11 soldiers were killed during the last year as a result of acts of Palestinian resistance, a rise in comparison to four who were killed a year prior.
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IMEMC Daily Reports
Mondoweiss: Mapping the genocide in Gaza
We have made over 140 attempts in two months to reach besieged civilians in North Gaza. Almost zero access.
We need to reach the survivors of this horrific destruction, especially now last hospitals have been taken out: pic.twitter.com/XUIBgOGt5R
— Tom Fletcher (@UNReliefChief) December 31, 2024
View this post on Instagram
Sila, a newborn baby from #Gaza, died from the freezing cold in a tent.
She was one of seven infants who have died from hypothermia in in recent days.@UNICEF is delivering winter clothes and blankets, but the needs of families are immense.Gaza’s children need a ceasefire NOW! pic.twitter.com/uXlapjD0Ng
— UNICEF Palestine (@UNICEFpalestine) December 31, 2024
STATISTICS OCTOBER 7, 2023 – JANUARY 1, 2025:
Palestinian death toll from October 7, 2023 – January 1, 2025: at least 46,417* – 45,581 in Gaza; in the West Bank, Israeli soldiers and/or settlers have killed at least 836 Palestinians (~172 of them children).
Thousands of those killed in Gaza have yet to be identified, and an estimated 11,000 more are still buried under rubble.
According to a report in the Lancet, by multiplying the reported deaths by five, it is possible to reach a conservative estimate of total deaths (including indirect causes like starvation and lack of medicine). Using the latest figure from AFP (45,581), it is reasonable to estimate at least 227,905 total deaths in Gaza since October 7th, 2023.
According to a recent report by the UN Human Rights Office of identified fatalities in Gaza, about 44% were children. It is reasonable to estimate that 20,056 of known direct deaths and 100,278 of the total deaths are children.
Since Israel launched an extermination campaign in northern Gaza in early October, over 4,000 Palestinians have been killed or are missing and another 12,000 wounded.
Palestinian injuries from October 7, 2023 – January 1, 2025: at least 114,938 (including at least 108,438 in Gaza and 6,500 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how many Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]
Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – January 1, 2025: ~1,595 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 417*** (or 391) military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza (updated: Dec. 17); 43 military and civilians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel) and~10,000 injured.
NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries of Israelis on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.
ADDITIONAL STATISTICS: Since October 7th, 2023:
- At least 50 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (at least 30 of them from Gaza).
- At least 43 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition (at least 37 of them children)**.
- About 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million population are currently displaced.
- About 345,000 Gazans are currently experiencing catastrophic levels of food insecurity.
*The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.
Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.
**Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.
***The figure does not include the reportedly 59 Israeli soldiers – nearly 17% of the total Israeli military deaths – killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents.
† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.
Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.
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- The Failure of the Two-State Solution – Refugees
- Born in the heat of war, dead from the cold: Gaza’s children are freezing to death
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- US diplomat resigns from State Department over Gaza genocide
- The BBC can’t be trusted to report on the war in Gaza
