OCTOBER 17, 2026 16:06

Towards the end of September, Gaza's Hamas-controlled Health Ministry issued its 2025 mortality report, the first full tally of deaths since the conflict began.

The report listed 24,650 deaths total, with 17,286 blamed on war actions without distinguishing fighters from noncombatants, and 1,584 from accidents. Analyst Eirik Schrøder-Bråtane noted the remaining 5,780 nonviolent deaths aligned closely with Gaza's prewar yearly average for such causes. The ministry also logged 50,227 births.

This occurred in 2025 after Israel paused aid for 11 weeks when Hamas declined to prolong the truce and free additional hostages, following a six-week pause that saw 25,200 trucks bring nearly 450,000 tons of supplies. Israel claimed Hamas diverted and sold goods to fund fighting. By September, Israel tallied over two million tons sent throughout the war.

It was also the year UN officials predicted thousands of infant deaths and the IPC, backed by the UN, announced famine in Gaza City.

Yet the ministry's data revealed no sign of the widespread mortality those alerts implied: no spike in nonviolent deaths tied to hunger, illness, or indirect factors.

Andrew Fox, a former British Army officer and senior fellow at the Henry Jackson Society, claimed in 2024 that Gaza's casualty figures included natural deaths. He later stated the famine claims and similar assertions were refuted by Hamas's own statistics. Those who modeled hundreds of thousands of deaths, he said, ought to face professional consequences.

He added: They will not. They receive a pass.

That stands as perhaps the most reliable forecast made during this conflict.

For years, Israel's critics have issued bold forecasts of mass casualties and firm tallies of atrocities. Headlines spread worldwide. When forecasts prove false or figures unravel, corrections receive little notice.

On May 20, 2025, UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher informed BBC Radio 4 that 14,000 babies in Gaza would perish in the next 48 hours without aid. The UN soon clarified the number referred to about 14,100 projected severe acute malnutrition cases among children under age 5.

Not fatalities. Not infants. Not within 48 hours.

The report indicates some worsening: infant mortality at 15.8 per 1,000 live births and under-five mortality at 33.4, both higher than prewar levels. Still, in the year of the UN alerts, Gaza's infant rate nearly equaled Egypt's peacetime figure of 16.1, and both rates fell below global averages. Conditions declined, yet mass death did not follow.

In February 2024, researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and Johns Hopkins estimated up to 85,750 excess deaths in Gaza over six months under a worst-case war and disease scenario. Activist media ran stories such as Israel Could Kill 85,000 More Gazans in 6 Months, and a lead author told Democracy Now! the escalation scenario matched events in Rafah. That epidemic did not occur.

In Sudan's largely overlooked conflict, the same London School found deaths went uncounted: roughly 26,000 violent deaths in Khartoum State in the first 14 months, exceeding prior national monitors, plus over 61,000 total deaths.

In Gaza, warnings exceeded the fatalities. In Sudan, fatalities exceeded the warnings.

In March 2024, the IPC forecast famine in northern Gaza by late May if fighting and aid limits persisted. By June, its Famine Review Committee found no evidence of famine.

The IPC announced famine in Gaza Governorate in August 2025, despite Israel's methodological objections. Somalia's 2010-2012 famine claimed an estimated 258,000 lives, including 133,000 children under five. At its height, it caused about 30,000 deaths monthly.

Motivation to exaggerate figures

Gaza's Health Ministry, tied to Hamas and motivated to overstate, recorded 455 malnutrition deaths over nearly two years of war, fewer than Somalia's famine claimed in half a day at peak.

By the IPC threshold of two deaths per 10,000 people daily, the declared famine should have caused about 9,000 deaths. Hamas's ministry recorded under 200 across Gaza, fewer than the US sees in four days.

Rafah followed a similar pattern. Before Israel's May 2024 entry, the Palestinian Authority's Foreign Ministry warned an assault would cause the annihilation of about 1.5 million Palestinians. The EU's then-foreign-policy chief Josep Borrell dismissed civilian evacuation: Where? To the moon? Within three weeks, about a million people left Rafah. No annihilation occurred and no apology followed.

The pattern predates this war and runs only one way.

In April 2002, during Israel's Jenin operation, PA negotiator Saeb Erekat told CNN Israeli forces killed over 500. The UN secretary-general's report later counted 52 Palestinian deaths, at least half combatants, plus 23 Israeli soldiers, and deemed the 500 figure unsupported. By then, the Jenin massacre had entered global discussion.

Operation Cast Lead followed the same course. Hamas first admitted fewer than 50 combatant deaths. The later-discredited 2009 Goldstone Report cited a Palestinian Centre for Human Rights count listing just 236 combatants among the dead. In November 2010, Hamas interior minister Fathi Hammad admitted up to 700 from Hamas's military wing and security forces died, near Israel's count of 709.

Overseas, the dead were portrayed as nearly all civilians. At home, they were described as Hamas martyrs.

On October 17, 2023, Hamas health authorities immediately blamed Israel for the Ahli hospital blast and reported nearly 500 dead. US, British, French, and Canadian intelligence assessments found a misfired Palestinian rocket the likely cause; US intelligence estimated the toll at a fraction of the ministry's number. The New York Times later acknowledged its early reporting leaned too much on Hamas claims.

The progressive Left, which claims to follow evidence, seldom questions why so many dire forecasts and assertions about Israel collapse. A rising segment of the populist Right, labeled the woke Right, repeats Hamas figures and UN projections it would dismiss elsewhere.

The approach succeeds because claims and forecasts achieve their impact before scrutiny arrives. Place Israel under pressure. Advocate sanctions or arms limits. Target Israel, but not those committed to its destruction. By the time evidence emerges, the harm is complete.

Tom Fletcher continues leading the UN humanitarian office. The IPC has not withdrawn its 2025 famine declaration. News outlets still feature forecasts prominently and relegate corrections to minor placement.

In most areas, such high-stakes forecasts would trigger review. When Israel is the topic, they lead only to the next failed forecast.

The writer is an attorney, former IDF soldier, and former NYPD officer. He writes widely on Israel, Zionism, antisemitism, and Jewish history. He serves on the board of Herut North America.