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Daily Casualties - Gaza

The numbers we publish here are not fully representative of the human toll of Israel's actions in Gaza. Read more about other factors you should consider.

This dataset provides daily values for those killed and injured in the Gaza Strip since October 7th, 2023.

There are currently 408 days of reports from 2023-10-07 to 2024-11-17 and we update the list daily as new reports are released.

Usage

The dataset is available as a single JSON array with an object for each report date. You can also download in CSV format below.

casualties_daily.json casualties_daily.csv

Minified

https://data.techforpalestine.org/api/v2/casualties_daily.min.json

Unminified

https://data.techforpalestine.org/api/v2/casualties_daily.json

The file is updated in the morning (eastern time).

Report Fields

Each daily report in this JSON array will have the following fields for Gaza.

(optional fields will be omitted from the JSON if there is no value reported)

field namevalueoptional
report_datedate in YYYY-MM-DDno
report_sourceone of mohtel, gmotel, unocha or missing (see below)no
report_periodone of 24, 48, or 0, representing the hours length of the reporting periodno
massacres_cumcumulative number of multiple fatality eventsyes
ext_massacres_cumsame as massacres_cum but extrapolated (see below)no
killedkilled persons on the given report dateyes
killed_cumcumulative number of killed persons to the report dateyes
killed_children_cumcumulative number of children killed to the report dateyes
killed_women_cumcumulative number of women killed to the report dateyes
ext_killedsame as killed but extrapolated (see below)no
ext_killed_cumsame as killed_cum but extrapolated (see below)no
ext_killed_children_cumsame as killed_children_cum but extrapolated (see below)no
ext_killed_women_cumsame as killed_women_cum but extrapolated (see below)no
injuredinjured persons on the given report dateyes
injured_cumcumulative number of injured persons to the report dateyes
ext_injuredinjured persons on the given report dateno
ext_injured_cumcumulative number of injured persons to the report dateno
civdef_killed_cumcumulative number of emergency services killed to dateyes
ext_civdef_killed_cumsame as civdef_killed_cum but extrapolated (see below)no
med_killed_cumcumulative number of medical personnel killed to the report dateyes
ext_med_killed_cumsame as med_martyed_cum but extrapolated (see below)no
press_killed_cumcumulative number of journalists killed to the report dateyes
ext_press_killed_cumsame as press_martyed_cum but extrapolated (see below)no

Update Interval

We update this dataset everyday, but some values are updated less frequently (typically at least once a week):

  • killed_children_cum
  • killed_women_cum
  • civdef_killed_cum
  • med_killed_cum
  • press_killed_cum

If there's no updated value for the given report date, the last reported value is used (since all of these fields are cumulative). This necessarily also applies to their corresponding ext_-prefixed fields.

Daily Sources

There are four source values for daily casualty reports we use to build the time series:

The primary source is the Ministry of Health. The numbers they report only include those they can connect directly to an act of war. For example:

[The] Ministry of Health has a policy of recording only direct casualties of war, such as those caused by missile strikes or war-related injuries. There are other deaths indirectly caused by the war, but we do not add them to the list of martyrs. For example, children who die due to malnutrition, lack of care, or because their mothers gave birth under difficult conditions and carried them in poor health, resulting in the birth of an underdeveloped infant who dies after a few days or lacked proper feeding, these cases are documented but not recorded as martyrs.

For more detail on how the ministry gathers their numbers, read this Dropsite interview with Dr. Zaher al-Wahaidi from which the above excerpt is taken.

Our methodology is to prioritize official sources for this dataset in order to best align the reporting time periods (mohtel falling back to gmotel). When communications were cut to Gaza, gmotel would provide reporting but in some cases neither would. Reports were also stopped during the humanitarian pause.

Extrapolated (ext_ fields)

Since official numbers weren't always available, and it can be useful to have a timeseries where all dates have values, we're providing the same official fields in extrapolated form using the following methodology:

  • if the missing field was a cumulative one and we had an official report for a daily killed or injury count, we calculate the cumulative using the daily increment
  • if the missing field was a daily increment and we had cumulative counts, we subtracted the reported cumulative count from the prior period for the missing daily count
  • if we were missing both sets of numbers for a given reporting period we average the difference between surrounding periods