‘Maximum 600 Palestinians died in Gaza’

* The IDF should go right back and finish the job. Israeli soldier: “We Want to Finish the Job”

Jan. 22, 2009

The number of Palestinians killed in Operation Cast Lead did not exceed five or six hundred, Lorenzo Cremonesi, a correspondent for Italy’sCorriere della sera reported on Thursday.

Gazan doctor says death toll inflated

* War Is Deceit: Gaza doc says Palestinian death toll inflated

Physician at Gaza’s Shifa Hospital tells Italian newspaper number of dead in Israeli offensive ‘stands at no more than 500 or 600, most of them youths recruited to Hamas’ ranks’. Senior Palestinian Health Ministry official denies claims, IDF estimate on 1,200 casualties in Strip remains unchanged

Ynet reporters

 

Cremonesi based his report on tours of hospitals in the Gaza Strip and on interviews with families of casualties. He also assessed the number of wounded to be far lower than 5,000, the number quoted by Hamas and repeated by the UN and the Red Cross in Gaza.

“It is sufficient to visit several hospitals [in the Gaza Strip] to understand that the numbers don’t add up,” he wrote.

In the European hospital in Rafah, one of the facilities which would presumably be filled with wounded from the “war of the tunnels,” many beds were empty, according to Cremonesi. A similar situation was noted in the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, and in the privately-run Amal Hospital Cremonesi reported that only five out 150 beds were occupied.

Cremonesi interviewed Gazans who echoed Israel’s insistence of how Hamas gunmen used civilians as human shields. One Gazan recalled civilians in Gaza shouting at Hamas and Islamic Jihad men, “Go away, go away from here! Do you want the Israelis to kill us all? Do you want our children to die under their bombs? Take your guns and missiles with you.”

“Traitors, collaborators with Israel, spies of Fatah, cowards! The soldiers of the holy war will punish you. And in any case you will all die, like us. Fighting the Zionist Jews we are all destined for paradise. Do you not wish to die with us?” the religious fanatics of Hamas reportedly responded.

Other Palestinians told Cremonesi of Hamas operatives donning paramedic uniforms and commandeering ambulances. A woman identified as Um Abdullah, 48, spoke of Hamas using UN buildings as launch pads for rockets.

Cremonesi reported that he had difficultly gathering evidence as the local population was terrified of Hamas.

* Anybody surprised?

               __________________________________________________________________________________ 

Tim Blair:

Shy Winners

The first line in a report from ABC Middle East correspondent Ben Knight: 

The political leader of Hamas has declared that his organisation won the recent war in the Gaza Strip. 

And the final line: 

The Hamas leadership is still in hiding. 

(Via J.F. Beck, currently examining claims made by Médecins Sans Mémoires.)

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