A leaked Israeli military database shows civilians make up 83% of Gaza’s war dead, a ratio experts say is among the highest in decades of warfare.
A classified Israeli military intelligence database indicates that five out of six Palestinians killed in Gaza have been civilians, a civilian-to-combatant death ratio described by conflict experts as one of the highest seen in modern warfare.
A joint investigation by The Guardian, +972 Magazine, and Local Call revealed that as of May 2025, Israeli intelligence recorded 8,900 named fighters from Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad as dead or “probably dead.”
Over the same period, Gaza’s health authorities reported 53,000 deaths from Israeli attacks. This means combatants accounted for only 17 per cent of the toll, leaving 83 per cent as civilians.
“That proportion of civilians among those killed would be unusually high, particularly as it has been going on for such a long time,” said Therése Pettersson of the Uppsala Conflict Data Program.
The ratio is higher than in most recent wars, with comparable levels of civilian deaths only in atrocities such as the Rwandan genocide, the Srebrenica massacre, and the 2022 siege of Mariupol.
Israel did not dispute the existence of the database but dismissed figures reported as “incorrect” without clarification. Some Israeli soldiers and retired generals admitted civilian deaths far outstrip official claims.
Retired Gen. Itzhak Brik said: “There is absolutely no connection between the numbers that are announced and what is actually happening. It is just one big bluff.”
Human rights groups and genocide scholars argue the data strengthens claims that Israel is committing genocide, citing indiscriminate killing, mass displacement, and starvation in Gaza.