Advocates are once again urging Canada to acknowledge a genocide in Gaza, as a recent report revealed that Israeli forces have killed mainly civilians in the Israel-Hamas conflict. The investigation, jointly conducted by Israeli-Palestinian publications, including +972 Magazine, Local Call, and The Guardian, utilized a classified Israeli military intelligence database. The report disclosed that by May 2025, Israeli intelligence documented 8,900 deceased or “likely deceased” fighters from Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. During the same period, Gaza health authorities reported 53,000 Palestinian fatalities due to Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) attacks, with fighters listed in the database comprising just 17% of the total deaths, indicating that 83% of the deceased were civilians.
While CBC News has not independently verified the data, the civilian death toll highlighted in the investigation surpasses that of many other recent conflicts. The Uppsala Conflict Data Program noted that in the Sudanese civil war, approximately half of the fatalities were civilians, while in Russia’s conflict in Ukraine, the civilian death rate is around 10%.
Experts suggest that the 83% civilian death figure may be an underestimate as it aligns with the IDF’s narrow definition of militants. The findings corroborate previous studies and reports, which also indicated discrepancies in civilian death counts provided by Israeli officials. The IDF disputed the report’s accuracy without offering alternative figures.
Airwars, a UK-based nonprofit tracking civilian casualties in conflicts, documented a significant civilian death toll in Gaza post the 2023 Israel-Hamas conflict. The organization reported an unprecedented number of civilian deaths, particularly among children, in Gaza.
Advocates like Michael Bueckert and Fatema Abdalla have urged the Canadian government to recognize the situation in Gaza as genocide. The ongoing violence in Gaza has drawn international condemnation, with allegations of war crimes and genocidal acts by Israeli forces. Despite denials from Israel, various sources have raised concerns about the severity and humanitarian impact of the conflict on civilians in Gaza.