[114] In the Gambia v Myanmar Rohingya genocide case, France and the United Kingdom (among others) affirmed that the "number of victims killed" is not a "focus" of the assessment, given that "circumstances may be such that the perpetrator cannot, or decides not to, avail itself of the fastest or most direct means" of destruction.

[145] Professor of economics Mike Spagat analysed the ministry's reports and found an urgent need for a transparent methodology to reconcile its top-line death numbers—34,535 as of 30 April—with its detailed breakdowns summing to 24,653 on the same date.

[125] A February 2025 study published in The Lancet estimated that life expectancy in the Gaza Strip between October 2023 and September 2024 decreased by 34.9 years, excluding indirect deaths, such as from malnutrition or disruption to health services.

[146] Rasha Khatib, Martin McKee, and Salim Yusuf published in the correspondence section of The Lancet an estimate of the number of deaths that the conflict may indirectly cause in the coming months and years.

Indirect Palestinian deaths from disease are expected to be much higher due to the intensity of the conflict, destruction of health care infrastructure, lack of food, water, shelter, and safe places for civilians to flee, and reduction in UNRWA funding.

[151] According to a 2 October 2024 letter[152] to president Joe Biden, vice president Kamala Harris, and others by 99 American healthcare workers who had served in Gaza since 7 October 2023, the most conservative estimate based on the available data was that at least 62,413 people in Gaza had died from starvation (based on starvation standards by the United States-funded Integrated Food Security Phase Classification), most of them young children, and at least 5,000 people had died from lack of access to care for chronic diseases.

[176] On 11 March 2024, 12 Israeli human rights organisations signed an open letter accusing Israel of failing to abide by the ICJ ruling to prevent genocide by facilitating the delivery of humanitarian aid.

[180][181][h] The proposed plan included orders for all residents of northern Gaza to leave within a week; the implementation of a full siege on water, food, and fuel; and then the arrest or killing of all who remained.

The report alleges that Israel intentionally damaged and targeted solar panels powering treatment plants, a reservoir, and warehouses, while blocking repair materials and fuel for generators, cutting electricity supplies, and attacking workers.

[197] Amnesty pointed to the attitudes and behavior of Israeli soldiers involved in the demolitions of these sites in videos posted on social media as evidence that these actions demonstrated genocidal intent.

"[179] As of 25 August 2024, the United Nations estimated that most of Gaza's 2.2 million people were confined to a humanitarian area of roughly 15 square miles (39 km2), which causes crowded conditions and a critical lack of basic services, like clean water, and diseases spreading widely across the population, such as Hepatitis C.[220] Since 7 October 2023, the IDF has been accused of using excessive force against dozens of schools[222] and hospitals;[223] theft;[224] cruel and unnecessary desecration and mutilation of deceased Palestinians;[118] and making no, or an inadequate, distinction between Hamas forces and civilians.

[242] Segal and Daniele also point to previous comments by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, former Knesset member Ayelet Shaked, and Smotrich, who in February 2023 called for the destruction of Palestinian villages in the West Bank.

[243] Genocide scholar Shmuel Lederman detailed how these comments by Smotrich, alongside others denying Palestinian nationhood and calling for their destruction or removal from territory claimed by Israel, was in the forefront of political discussions by Hamas leadership in Gaza before the events of October 2023.

"[m] Noah Lanard of Mother Jones called verses discussing Amalek among the Bible's most violent and wrote that they have a long history of being used by Jews on the far-right, such as Baruch Goldstein, to justify killing Palestinians.

"[295] Legal scholar Nimer Sultany highlights statements by various Israeli army commanders leading ground operations in northern Gaza that call for depopulation and a "scorched earth" approach.

[310] In late 2024, The Guardian reported a continuing split in the field with "with many keeping to the sidelines·"[311] Raz Segal, who called Israeli acts a "textbook case of genocide" early on, said the war "exacerbated the fundamental fissure that has long divided the community.

[333] Holocaust historian Amos Goldberg has said that Israel's actions in Gaza exhibit all the elements of genocide, citing explicit intent from high-ranking officials, widespread incitement, and a pervasive dehumanisation of Palestinians in Israeli society.

[337] Genocide scholar Mark Levene applied A. Dirk Moses's analysis that "absolute securitization lends itself to collective targeting of human groups, more precisely civilians, regardless of issues of ethnos or genos".

[338] In January 2024, Levene detailed how Israel's actions are ethnic cleansing at the very least, in line with the Israeli intelligence ministry's policy paper for a forcible and permanent transfer of all Gazans, supported by Netanyahu's government.

[341] The sociologist and genocide scholar Uğur Ümit Üngör views the 2023 Israeli assault on Gaza as continuation of a history of "asymmetrical power relations, and annihilatory attitudes towards civilians".

[351] In January 2024, a number of prominent Israelis, represented by human rights lawyer Michael Sfard, sent Israel's attorney general and state prosecutor an open letter detailing examples of "the discourse of annihilation, expulsion and revenge".

[361] On 13 November 2023, the German philosopher and social theorist Jürgen Habermas and three of his colleagues at Goethe University Frankfurt published a statement in which they said that attributing genocidal intent to Israel's actions in Gaza was a misjudgment.

[317] In an interview with the editor-in-chief of Jewish Currents on her decision to publish Raz Segal's work, the New Left Review opined that disagreement over use of the term "genocide" stemmed partly from tensions between the goals of being "emotionally powerful" and "analytically precise".

[372][373] In an application filed on 29 December 2023, South Africa argued that Israel's actions "are genocidal in character because they are intended to bring about the destruction of a substantial part of the Palestinian national, racial and ethnical group".

[50][374] South Africa requested that the ICJ issue a legal order on an interim basis (i.e., before hearing the merits of the application) requiring Israel to "immediately suspend its military operations in and against Gaza".

[392] A federal judge dismissed the case Defense for Children International-Palestine et al v. Biden et al on 31 January 2024, saying the Constitution prevented his court from determining foreign policy, which is reserved to the government's political branches, but he wrote that "as the ICJ has found, it is plausible that Israel's conduct amounts to genocide"[393] and also commented that he would have preferred to have issued the injunction and urged Biden to rethink U.S. policy, writing that the court "implores defendants to examine the results of their unflagging support of the military siege against the Palestinians in Gaza".

[417][418] CAIR-Florida Executive Director Imam Abdullah Jaber said in a statement: "This chilling call for genocide by an American lawmaker is the direct result of decades of dehumanization of the Palestinian people by advocates of Israeli apartheid and their eager enablers in government and the media.

[440] Additionally, James Denselow, Head of Conflict and Humanitarian at Save the Children UK, said, "By failing to push for a permanent end to the fighting or speak out against the weaponisation of aid, Rishi Sunak and his government are complicit in the horror that is unfolding.

"[526] On 26 March, Pakistan's OIC representative said that Israel's desire for a "final solution to the Palestinian question is plain for all to see, as its forces encircle Rafah like vultures and its ravenous land grab continues unabated".

"[565][287] UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation Pedro Arrojo said that based on article 7 of the Rome Statute, which counts "deprivation of access to food or medicine, among others" as a form of extermination, "even if there is no clear intention, the data show that the war is heading towards genocide".