Lebanese Casualty Counts Seen as More Credible Than Gaza’s, Israelis Say

Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Khiam on Oct. 13, 2024, amid the continuing war between Hezbollah and Israel. AFP via Getty Images

News Analysis

As the Lebanon–Israel war continues, with Israel attacking Hezbollah targets in south Lebanon, Beirut, and elsewhere, casualties are mounting.

Unlike the rising death toll in Gaza, however, the official count from Lebanese authorities is in general more accepted by Israel and appears to be used readily by the Israeli military.

As of Oct. 28, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry, 2,710 people in Lebanon had died since Hezbollah began attacking Israel on Oct. 8, 2023.

In Gaza, Hamas-controlled health authorities have long been accused by Israel and some observers of fudging and outright fabrication in an effort to inflate the count.

But with the Lebanese numbers, how much influence Hezbollah has on casualty counting is a much more open question. While the Iran-financed terrorist group controls nearly half of the Lebanese Parliament, with many loyalists in the government bureaucracy, it doesn’t comprehensively run Lebanon in the way that Hamas runs Gaza.

“I think (Lebanese casualty figures) are generally reliable, much more reliable than figures provided by the Ministry of Health in Gaza,” Kobi Michael, a senior research fellow at Israel’s Institute for National Strategic Studies and Misgav Institute, told The Epoch Times.

There are still some problems with the numbers from Lebanon, according to Michael.

“Lebanon doesn’t distinguish between Hezbollah and civilians that are killed. They count them all as civilians,” he said.

The same thing happens in Gaza, where the Hamas-controlled health ministry doesn’t indicate how many of the roughly 43,000 killed in the war are members of Hamas or other terrorist groups. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has stated that at least 17,000 are. By some estimates, more than three-quarters of all deaths there are Hamas members or their families.

IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi told soldiers on Oct. 19 while meeting with them that at least 1,500 Hezbollah operatives had been killed, according to Michael.

“And he meant military, but Hezbollah has civilian operatives as well,” Michael said.

With about 2,700 total casualties according to the Lebanese government, that means that more than half were from the terrorist group, and of the 1,200 remaining, some were civilians in Hezbollah, he said.

“You live in an apartment and your apartment is used for storing weapons for Hezbollah. You are a legitimate military target. You are killed when we attack. You were warned to leave. You preferred not to leave,” Michael said.

“From the IDF’s point of view, you are a Hezbollah operative. You gave Hezbollah your apartment to use for terror purposes.”

A firefighter stands amid the smoldering debris at the site of overnight Israeli airstrikes that targeted the neighborhood of Kafaat in Beirut's southern suburbs on Nov. 1, 2024. AFP via Getty Images

One indication that Israel is minimizing collateral damage is the gender breakdown. The health ministry stated that of the 2,710 killed, 532 were women and 157 children. The remainder, 2,021, were men.

That nearly 75 percent of those killed were men suggests Israeli success at targeting Hezbollah fighters and minimizing the collateral damage that civilian deaths represent.

When the Allied coalition fought ISIS in Fallujah and Mosul in Iraq, collateral damage was far higher, with five or even 10 civilians for each enemy fighter killed.

Israel’s attack wherein about 1,500 Hezbollah operatives’ pagers and cellphones blew up was an example of precise targeting, Michael said.

Israeli soldiers inspect a Hezbollah attacking position tunnel found during an operation during an IDF-embedded media tour to the southern Lebanon operation zone near Naqoura, Lebanon, on Oct. 13, 2024. Amir Levy/Getty Images

“It’s the most accurate attack in the history of warfare,” Michael said. “Any person who carries a Hezbollah pager is a Hezbollah operative. Otherwise, why carry it?”

There have been instances of dramatically inflated death tolls being reported and then rolled back but only after the much higher number had spread through the press.

The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA) found a serious instance committed by an Israeli publication, the left-leaning Haaretz.

Sourcing “Israeli officials,” it erroneously reported on Sept. 27 that the airstrike that day killing Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah also killed about 300 Lebanese.

Haaretz repeated the number on Sept. 28, according to CAMERA.

But according to the Lebanese Ministry of Health on Sept. 29, CAMERA stated, six people were killed—far fewer—and 91 injured. The Carnegie Endowment also reported much lower casualties, which included those killed in other bombing raids that night.

While Haaretz corrected its error, the damage was done, according to CAMERA, as other foreign media publications cited the inflated figure of 300 killed.

CAMERA examined similar problems in 2006, when the IDF also fought Hezbollah. It found Hezbollah’s casualties very underreported and civilian deaths overestimated. Foreign press continued using the inflated figures for months.