Month After War on Gaza: Palestinian Deaths Top Russia-Ukraine War Toll

A damaged road after Israeli forces stormed the Jenin camp in the West Bank on Sunday (Reuters)
A damaged road after Israeli forces stormed the Jenin camp in the West Bank on Sunday (Reuters)
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Month After War on Gaza: Palestinian Deaths Top Russia-Ukraine War Toll

A damaged road after Israeli forces stormed the Jenin camp in the West Bank on Sunday (Reuters)
A damaged road after Israeli forces stormed the Jenin camp in the West Bank on Sunday (Reuters)

The number of deaths one month since the start of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza reached frightening numbers as the situation becomes increasingly horrifying, portending more victims.

Israel announced the war could be extended for several months, perhaps even a year.

Palestinian sources confirmed that the number of Palestinians killed in one month exceeded the number of deaths in the Ukraine war, which reached 9,806 victims over nearly two years.

Palestinian health authorities said the death toll from Israeli strikes had exceeded 10,328, while Israel estimates their number at more than 20,000, including 4,237 children and 2,716 women, in addition to 25,956 injuries.

More than 120,000 homes were destroyed and about 1.2 million citizens were displaced.

In the West Bank and East Jerusalem, Israel killed 220 people, arrested 2,215 others, and demolished 120 homes.

According to Israeli reports, the number of deaths is more than that of the 1967 war that Israel fought against three Arab armies, with 779 deaths, including 850 civilians and 5,500 injuries.

The Israeli government evacuated 115,000 residents, while about 109,000 decided to leave from 29 settlements surrounding the Gaza Strip and 22 others on the Lebanese border.

According to the Israelis, the war began in response to Hamas attacks on Israel on Oct. 7, and the capturing of 240 Israelis and foreigners as hostages.

Israel officially declared war on Hamas to “annihilate” the movement and terminate its ability to rule and its military capabilities.

Tel Aviv admitted it had taken a new form of warfare, bombing Gaza without mercy from afar, using the air force, navy, artillery, and tanks to destroy any place where Hamas leaders or any of its armed members were located, even if it was crowded among civilians.

It claims Hamas leaders are using civilians as human shields. As a result of these claims, Israel has bombed hospitals and schools.

Three weeks into this terrible bombing, the Israeli army began a ground operation searching for Hamas leaders and kidnapped Israelis.

Israel insists that the attack has nothing to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and that the movement is pursuing a brutal path in its war against Jewish civilians and even Muslim Arabs.

In response, Palestinians say Israel has been insisting on besieging the Gaza Strip for 16 years, and from time to time, launched a military operation in which it destroys the enclave, killing thousands of Palestinians and exacerbating the economic and social situation there.

They said Israel continues its occupation of the West Bank and Judaization of Jerusalem with massive settlement projects, violating the sanctity of al-Aqsa Mosque. It carries out widespread arrests and degrades prisoners.

Moreover, Tel Aviv allows settlers to carry out bloody criminal attacks on Palestinians and denies their rights.

- The hysteric Israeli response

Palestinians said the Hamas attack came within the framework of resistance to the occupation’s projects, describing the Israeli response as hysterical because Tel Aviv did not imagine Palestinians were capable of penetrating their fortified defenses and carry out a successful military attack.

They added that Israel wants to implement its old plans to destroy Gaza and deport its people to Egypt, with the hope of expelling the Palestinians from the West Bank to Jordan later.

Palestinians called the war the second Nakba, saying the Israeli army drops a thousand tons of explosives every day to implement those goals, with the support of the US administration and Western governments.

The US and the West are not fulfilling their moral and humanitarian duty to deter the Israeli war of annihilation, they stressed.



Israeli Strikes Damage Hospital in Lebanon

File photo: Destroyed houses that were hit in an Israeli airstrike in Saksakiyeh village, south Lebanon, Friday, April 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
File photo: Destroyed houses that were hit in an Israeli airstrike in Saksakiyeh village, south Lebanon, Friday, April 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
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Israeli Strikes Damage Hospital in Lebanon

File photo: Destroyed houses that were hit in an Israeli airstrike in Saksakiyeh village, south Lebanon, Friday, April 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
File photo: Destroyed houses that were hit in an Israeli airstrike in Saksakiyeh village, south Lebanon, Friday, April 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

A hospital in the coastal Lebanese city of Tyre was damaged by Israeli airstrikes on nearby buildings that wounded 11 people, the health ministry said on Saturday.

The director of the Lebanese Italian Hospital told the state-run National News Agency (NNA) that it would "remain open to provide the necessary medical care" despite the damage.

Strikes destroyed two buildings nearby, an AFP correspondent saw, shattering windows and causing suspended ceilings to collapse in the hospital, the facility's management said.

A series of attacks hit the Tyre region on Saturday, including one on its port that struck a small boat and damaged others moored nearby, the AFP correspondent said.

Israel has been carrying out strikes across Lebanon and launched a ground invasion in the south after Hezbollah entered the war in the Middle East on the side of its backer Iran on March 2.

Tens of thousands of people have left Tyre, but around 20,000 remain, including 15,000 displaced from surrounding villages, despite Israeli evacuation warnings covering most of the city and a broad swathe of southern Lebanon.

The NNA also reported that Israeli forces abducted a man in Shebaa, near the Israeli border in the east, at around 3:00 am on Saturday.


Indonesia Slams 'Unacceptable' Peacekeeper Casualties in Lebanon

FILE PHOTO: UNIFIL vehicles drive on a main road in Qlayaa, amid escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, as the US-Israel conflict with Iran continues, in Qlayaa, southern Lebanon, March 27, 2026. REUTERS/Karamallah Daher/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: UNIFIL vehicles drive on a main road in Qlayaa, amid escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, as the US-Israel conflict with Iran continues, in Qlayaa, southern Lebanon, March 27, 2026. REUTERS/Karamallah Daher/File Photo
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Indonesia Slams 'Unacceptable' Peacekeeper Casualties in Lebanon

FILE PHOTO: UNIFIL vehicles drive on a main road in Qlayaa, amid escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, as the US-Israel conflict with Iran continues, in Qlayaa, southern Lebanon, March 27, 2026. REUTERS/Karamallah Daher/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: UNIFIL vehicles drive on a main road in Qlayaa, amid escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, as the US-Israel conflict with Iran continues, in Qlayaa, southern Lebanon, March 27, 2026. REUTERS/Karamallah Daher/File Photo

The Indonesian government on Saturday slammed as "unacceptable" an explosion that injured three of its peacekeepers in Lebanon within days of three other blue helmets from the Southeast Asian nation being killed.

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said three peacekeepers were wounded in a blast that occurred inside a UN facility near Adaisseh on Friday afternoon, and rushed to hospital.

Two were seriously wounded.

The UN Information Center in Jakarta said the "origin of the explosion" was unknown but identified the injured soldiers as Indonesian.

"Repeated attacks or incidents of this kind are unacceptable," the Indonesian foreign ministry said in a statement.

"Regardless of their cause, these events underscore the urgent need to strengthen protection for UN peacekeeping forces amid an increasingly dangerous conflict situation."

The government urged the UN Security Council to investigate the events and "to immediately convene a meeting of troop-contributing countries to UNIFIL to conduct a review and take measures to enhance the protection of personnel serving with UNIFIL".

Friday's incident came just days after an Indonesian peacekeeper died when a projectile exploded on March 29 in southern Lebanon, where Israel and Hezbollah have been fighting since Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war.

A UN security source told AFP on condition of anonymity Tuesday that fire from an Israeli tank was responsible for that attack.

A day later, two more Indonesian peacekeepers died after an explosion struck a UNIFIL logistics convoy, also in southern Lebanon.

The father of one of the two fallen soldiers, 33-year-old Zulmi Aditya Iskandar, said this week he was shocked that peacekeepers were losing their lives in the conflict.

"We were really sad and regretful, because this is a UN troop, a peacekeeping troop, not deployed for war," 60-year-old Iskandarudin told reporters at his house in West Java province.

The bodies of the three peacekeepers are scheduled to arrive in Jakarta on Saturday evening, according to the military.

The Indonesian National Armed Forces has said it will deploy more than 750 personnel to Lebanon next month as part of the scheduled UNIFIL peacekeeping troop rotation.


Strike Kills One Iraqi Fighter near Syria Border

Mourners attend the funeral of members of Iraq's Hashed al-Shaabi, who were killed in an airstrike in the town of al‑Qaim near the Syrian border, amid heightened regional tensions due to the US-Israel conflict with Iran, in Baghdad, Iraq, March 12, 2026. REUTERS/Stringer
Mourners attend the funeral of members of Iraq's Hashed al-Shaabi, who were killed in an airstrike in the town of al‑Qaim near the Syrian border, amid heightened regional tensions due to the US-Israel conflict with Iran, in Baghdad, Iraq, March 12, 2026. REUTERS/Stringer
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Strike Kills One Iraqi Fighter near Syria Border

Mourners attend the funeral of members of Iraq's Hashed al-Shaabi, who were killed in an airstrike in the town of al‑Qaim near the Syrian border, amid heightened regional tensions due to the US-Israel conflict with Iran, in Baghdad, Iraq, March 12, 2026. REUTERS/Stringer
Mourners attend the funeral of members of Iraq's Hashed al-Shaabi, who were killed in an airstrike in the town of al‑Qaim near the Syrian border, amid heightened regional tensions due to the US-Israel conflict with Iran, in Baghdad, Iraq, March 12, 2026. REUTERS/Stringer

An attack killed one fighter from the former paramilitary coalition Hashed al-Shaabi on Saturday, the alliance said, blaming the US and Israel.

Iraq has been dragged into the war between the United States, Israel and Iran, with strikes targeting both US interests and pro-Iran groups in the country, reported AFP.

"This treacherous attack resulted in the martyrdom of one PMF fighter and the wounding of four others, as well as a member of the ministry of defense," said a short statement from the group, which is also known as the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), adding it was a "Zionist-American attack".

The PMF is a coalition of armed groups -- formed in 2014 to fight extremists-- that is now part of Iraq's regular army, but also contains pro-Iran factions who have a reputation for acting independently.

PMF positions have been repeatedly targeted since the outbreak of war, with the group consistently blaming the attacks on the US and Israel.

According to the group's statement, the latest attack targeted a position in western Anbar province of the 45th Brigade, which belongs to the US-blacklisted, pro-Iran Kataeb Hezbollah group.

Kataeb Hezbollah is part of the umbrella movement known as the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which has been claiming daily attacks since the start of the war on US interests in Iraq and the region.

The Pentagon has said helicopters have carried out strikes against pro-Iran armed groups in Iraq during the war.

Washington has strongly denied claims it has targeted Iraqi security forces.