President Joe Biden said he has “no confidence” that the death toll provided by Palestinian authorities is accurate.
The Palestinian Health Ministry, which is overseen by Hamas, claims that 6,546 Gazans have been killed since Oct. 7, with 17,439 wounded. They also claim that another 100 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed over the same period, with 1,650 wounded. However, Biden cast doubt on the veracity of those figures on Wednesday when presented with the figures by PBS correspondent Laura Barrón-López.
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“In the 18 days since Hamas killed 1,400 Israelis, the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry says Israeli forces have killed over 6,000 Palestinians, including 2,700 children,” Barrón-López said. “You’ve previously asked Netanyahu to minimize civilian casualties. Do these numbers say to you that he’s ignoring that message?”
“What they say to me is I have no notion that the Palestinians are telling the truth about how many people are killed,” Biden responded.
“I’m sure innocents have been killed, and it’s the price of waging a war,” he continued.
“I think we should be incredibly careful… Israel should be incredibly careful to be sure that they’re focusing on going after the folks that are propagating this war against Israel. And it’s against their interest when that doesn’t happen. But I have no confidence in the number that the Palestinians are using.”
The casualty figures given by Palestinian health authorities came under renewed scrutiny after the blast at Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital, which the Palestinian Health Ministry initially blamed on the Israel Defense Forces. The initial claim that over 500 Palestinians were killed in the blast caused a wave of anti-Israel and anti-American riots to erupt across the Middle East, only for later evidence to show that the number of dead was likely far lower and the explosion was probably not caused by Israel.
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The IDF said two Hamas operatives could be heard discussing the explosion and the fact that it was not caused by Israel in an intercepted call it released. A spokesperson said Hamas decided to capitalize on the anger that would result from the situation with a false media campaign blaming Israel.
Biden agreed with the IDF’s assessment of the situation that Hamas attempted to lay blame on Israel for the explosion, even though the blast did not originate from Israel.
