Death toll from Israel's war on Gaza rises to 61,709 as missing people, bodies recovered from rubble added to list

The Gaza Government Information Office also informed that more than 6000 Palestinians detained by the Israeli army from Gaza during the genocidal war have been subjected to brutal torture.
A mother cries for her daughter, who was killed in the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip in Deir al-Balah, Sunday, Dec. 3, 2023.
A mother cries for her daughter, who was killed in the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip in Deir al-Balah, Sunday, Dec. 3, 2023.(File | AP)
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The updated official death toll of Palestinians killed by Israel's genocidal war on Gaza stands at 61,709, according to the Gaza Government Information Office. The death toll includes 14,222 Palestinians estimated missing under the rubble and another 18 bodies recovered from under the destroyed buildings.

Speaking at a press conference at Gaza City’s al-Shifa Hospital, Salama Maarouf, Head of the Gaza Government Information Office informed that among the updated death toll are 17,881 children, including 214 newborn infants.

"This genocidal war has killed more than 61,709 people. 47,487 were brought to hospitals, while 14,222 remain missing under the rubble or on roads. The number of injured has exceeded 111,588," Maarouf told reporters standing amid the remains of the territory's largest hospital which was razed to the ground by the Israeli army.

Maarouf also stated that more than 6000 Palestinians detained by the Israeli army from Gaza during the war have been subjected to brutal torture.

The updated death toll is in line with a study published earlier this month by the Lancet medical journal which estimated the number of Palestinians killed during the first nine months of Israel's genocidal war on the strip to be 40 per cent higher than that recorded by Gaza's Health Ministry.

Responding to the significant increase in the death toll even with a fragile ceasefire in effect, Amnesty International’s Secretary General Agnes Callamard said that "it would not come as a surprise to anyone who has monitored and investigated Israel’s invasion over the last 15 months."

Stating that the lower figures reported earlier by the Gaza Health Ministry was enough for the world to react, Callamard expressed hope that the revised death toll will "add to the urgency and severity of what has been done against Palestinians of Gaza."

"Genocide is not predicated on the number of victims, it is based on the act being committed — including creating conditions of life that are meant to decimate a population,” Al Jazeera cited Callamard as saying.

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