AG Report 4.3.2024

Is Israel Committing Genocide in Gaza?

I’ve repeatedly noted that The Washington Post news section has become indistinguishable from a Hamas propaganda publication. Editorial member Shadi Hamid provided yet another perfect example last week of the mindset that dominates that organization and has led to their open dishonesty and bias.

Hamid chastised Congressman Brad Sherman (D-CA) for citing Israeli estimates of ~13K Hamas fighters killed while discussing the total alleged Gaza death toll of ~32K. Hamid insisted that the 13K number must be wrong due to its inconsistency with the demographic breakdown provided by the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry (GHM). The instinct to question Israel and trust Hamas unconditionally, as exhibited in this case by Hamid, has defined the Post’s coverage of the conflict. It’s not just wrong on its face but requires ignoring actual data.

The underlying question here is whether Israel is indiscriminately killing Palestinians or committing a “genocide” in Gaza. To properly have that discussion, we need to understand Gaza casualty figures — both where they come from and what they show.

The current figures are all provided by the GHM. In previous conflicts with Israel, GHM has used a system of collecting data from hospitals, ambulance services, and morgues (we can refer to this as the central collection system, or CCS) to come up with casualty figures. Their numbers do not usually distinguish civilian vs. militant casualties, but they do typically provide a demographic breakdown.

Those who defend GHM numbers will point to the fact that in previous conflicts, their estimates have often been consistent with estimates from other sources, though there have been large errors related to demographic breakdowns and the portion of combatants killed when provided. Usually, NGOs also track casualties to confirm the numbers, but that’s not happening in this conflict.

When the current war began, the GHM started by collecting casualties the same way via the CCS. They showed ~9K deaths before Israel launched their ground invasion at the end of October. Then, as the data below shows, the casualty rate dropped significantly in the CCS data after the initial period of fighting in November. What is also clear from the CCS data, as shown below, is the proportion of male casualties (the category most Hamas militants would fit into), which increased significantly over time.

Then in early November, the GHM discretely changed its collection method, adding a new source for data which they called “reliable media” reports. This data source, which had not been used in the past, is essentially reporting from local, mostly Hamas-controlled media outlets regarding casualties and, as it turns out, also allows citizens to self-report casualties online. You can obviously see the challenge of getting accurate data with such a methodology. Still, it gradually took over as the main source of casualty data for the GHM over time. You can see the shift below:

There is no way to check the reliability of the total casualty numbers related to this new methodology, but there is clearly an issue with the data when you compare demographic breakdowns. The portion of male casualties using the traditional CCS system has averaged around 51.7% of total casualties since November 3 and trended above 70% in March. Meanwhile, the average male casualties from the media report methodology during that same period is only 8.4%. That disconnect is impossible to explain and the latter number makes no sense in the context of an ongoing war. What’s even more revealing is that the percentage of female casualties is not that far apart in the two methodologies, but the data for children vs. males is almost flipped. That’s beyond red flag territory.

The reason this disconnect, which Hamid pretends doesn’t exist, is important is that exactly who Israel is targeting is a central question in determining the appropriateness of their military response.

First, it is inappropriate and absurd to compare what is happening to the systematic eradication of Jews and other minorities during the Holocaust. Such a comparison, as suggested by one podcast host recently, requires complete ignorance of the numbers and method of killing during those events. More than a third of the world’s Jews were wiped out during the Holocaust. Nearly a century later, the Jewish population still has not fully recovered. However, plenty of civilians were killed at the same time as the Holocaust during the war effort and are clearly not counted as victims of genocide. So, what’s the difference between civilian deaths in a war and genocide?

The key element for a genocide is not the number of deaths, but rather the intent of those doing the killing. It’s devastating when civilians are killed in war, but it’s only genocide if their deaths are intended as part of a broader and explicit campaign to eradicate that group. No reasonable person thinks allied forces bombing civilian areas in WWII were engaged in a genocide comparable to the Holocaust, or that U.S. actions in Afghanistan or Iraq — despite tens (or hundreds) of thousands of civilians killed — constitute a genocide.

It is for that reason that South Africa was forced to include a bunch of out-of-context and misleading quotes from Israeli officials, often specifically targeted at Hamas, in their ICC complaint to argue the intent element of genocide in Gaza. The Atlantic has a good breakdown with some examples of several of the quotes that were cited.

As John Spencer has noted, Israel’s overall behavior during this war is inconsistent with an intent to wipe out Palestinians in Gaza, especially since they could have wiped out most of Gaza in much less time than this war has lasted if they wanted to. An entity seeking to commit genocide also would not provide advanced warning, evacuation routes, flyers, text messages, and aid to their target.

More importantly, the data speaks for itself. The numbers show the claim of an intentional genocide doesn’t stand up to any level of scrutiny. There are ~2.1 million people in Gaza. There were about 30-40K Hamas fighters at the start of the war. Hamas publicly said several months ago they had lost 6K+ fighters. Israel says the number is closer to 13k. U.S. intelligence estimated a range between 20-30% of Hamas fighters had been killed as of several months ago. ­­

For this discussion, let’s take a conservative estimate of 10k Hamas fighters, which accounts for about 30% of the total deaths based on the total casualty numbers from the GHM. That still means many civilians have died in the war, but it makes it almost impossible to conclude Israel has been indiscriminately killing Palestinians in Gaza. Especially since the typical ratio of civilians killed in other conflicts involving urban warfare has previously been around 80%-90% and Hamas has specifically developed their military infrastructure within the Gaza civilian infrastructure to ensure Palestinian civilian deaths any time they are targeted. Hamas leaders openly admit that they view Palestinian civilian deaths as a victory for their cause. All of that doesn’t even consider the inclusion of natural Palestinian deaths and those that result from direct attacks and misfired rockets from Hamas.

Just consider the math here: if about 1.5% of the population has been killed in Gaza during the war, but conservatively around 30% of those have been militants, how would that be feasible if Israel was just bombing and killing people indiscriminately? If it was just random bombing, you would proportionally need to kill about 30% of the total Gaza population (~630K) to coincidentally take out 30% of the subgroup of Hamas militants.

You can argue that a military action or strategy was wrong or that you don’t believe Israel should be trying to take out Hamas at all given the collateral damage, but the indiscriminate claim just doesn’t stand up to any logical scrutiny. Based on the numbers, the attacks are targeted at Hamas and the evacuations are meant to minimize outside deaths. The outcome, while tragic, is indicative of a complicated war that Hamas started, not a genocide that Israel is intentionally pursuing.

NBC News Appeases Employee Tantrum Over McDaniel Hiring

A few weeks ago, NBC News announced the hiring of former RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel. Immediately after, staffers and personalities threw a public tantrum and the network fired her. I don’t think much of McDaniel, but this isn’t about her. It’s about news organizations allowing left-wing activist employees to veto their business decisions and limit the Overton window of acceptable discourse.

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