{"id":38237,"date":"2024-12-16T11:36:48","date_gmt":"2024-12-16T19:36:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=38237"},"modified":"2024-12-16T11:37:42","modified_gmt":"2024-12-16T19:37:42","slug":"congress-keeps-trying-to-hide-the-true-gaza-death-toll","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2024\/12\/16\/congress-keeps-trying-to-hide-the-true-gaza-death-toll\/","title":{"rendered":"CONGRESS KEEPS TRYING TO HIDE THE TRUE GAZA DEATH TOLL"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A little-noticed provision in the annual defense bill would bar the Pentagon from citing the Gaza Health Ministry as an authoritative source.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Jessica Washington<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

December 12 2024, 4:34 p.m. (TheIntercept.com)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"EDITORS<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A man carries the body of a child who was rescued from the rubble toward a Health Ministry vehicle following Israeli bombardment on a four-story house in the north of Gaza City on Oct. 26, 2024. Photo: Omar Al-Qattaa\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n\n\n\n

TUCKED INTO A<\/strong> $895 billion Pentagon bill making its way through Congress is a little-noticed provision to further conceal the death toll in Gaza \u2014 the latest effort by U.S. policymakers to cast doubt on casualty figures reported by Palestinian health officials. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The House approved this year\u2019s National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, on Wednesday and sent it to the Senate for a vote, despite Democratic objections over a GOP proposal<\/a> to prohibit transgender children on military health insurance from receiving gender-affirming care. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The death toll provision of the must-pass bill, which passed 281-140<\/a> with 81 Democratic votes, has received significantly less attention. It would bar the Pentagon from publicly citing as \u201cauthoritative\u201d casualty data from the Gaza Health Ministry, effectively concealing the full extent of the death toll in Gaza in the military\u2019s public communications. The data from Palestinian authorities has been the only consistent and reliable count <\/a>of the death toll out of Gaza over the last 14 months, with Israel consistently denying<\/a> human rights workers access to the enclave and preventing foreign media journalists from entering. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is an alarming erasure of the suffering of the Palestinian people, ignoring the human toll of ongoing violence,\u201d said Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., in a statement to The Intercept.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MOST READ<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"\/<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Charles Hall Insisted He Wanted the Death Penalty. Now He\u2019s Asking Biden for Mercy.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Liliana Segura<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Reading List of Luigi Mangione, Suspect in Brian Thompson\u2019s Killing<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Matt Sledge, Nikita Mazurov<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Don\u2019t Believe This Cryptic Video Purportedly Uploaded by Luigi Mangione<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nikita Mazurov<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The provision<\/a> does not explicitly cite the Gaza Health Ministry; instead, it says that the Pentagon cannot \u201ccite as authoritative in public communications, fatality figures that are derived by United States-designated terrorist organizations, governmental entities controlled by United States-designated terrorist organizations or any sources that rely on figures provided by United States-designated terrorist organizations.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, the target is clear. Politicians in the United States have repeatedly cast doubt on the numbers provided by the Gaza Health Ministry because it falls under the jurisdiction of Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization. Earlier this year, the House of Representatives passed legislation<\/a> explicitly prohibiting the State Department from citing data from the Gaza Health Ministry. And President Joe Biden previously told reporters<\/a> that he had \u201cno confidence in the number that the Palestinians are using,\u201d despite his own State Department reliably using those numbers for years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

International human rights bodies, including the United Nations, have long relied on the data <\/a>from the Gaza Health Ministry and considered it credible and in line with their own findings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn the past, the five, six cycles of conflict in the Gaza Strip, these figures were considered as credible, and no one ever really challenged these figures,\u201d the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees chief, Philippe Lazzarini, told<\/a> reporters at a press conference last year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The NDAA rider extends the prohibition to any sources that rely on Health Ministry data, which includes most leading human rights organizations and the United Nations. 

Read Our Complete CoverageIsrael\u2019s War on Gaza<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The legislation comes shortly after Amnesty International declared that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza<\/a>, noting as a factor in their decision the immense death toll in the besieged Strip. In the first year of Israel\u2019s ongoing assault on Gaza, the military had killed 44,835 people in Gaza, according t<\/a>o the Health Ministry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, the legislation will move to the Democratic-controlled Senate, likely for a vote next week. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., has already come out in opposition, arguing that at a time when Americans are struggling paycheck to paycheck<\/a>, Congress should not be giving a $900 billion handout to the military-industrial complex. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe do not need a defense system that is designed to make huge profits for a handful of giant defense contractors while providing less of what the country needs,\u201d\u00a0said<\/a>\u00a0Sanders on the Senate floor on Wednesday. \u201cWe do not need to spend almost a trillion dollars on the military, while half a million Americans are homeless, children go hungry, and elderly people are unable to afford to heat their homes in the winter.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

CONTACT THE AUTHOR:<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Jessica Washington<\/a>jessica.washington@theintercept.com<\/a>@jessica_m_wash<\/a>on X<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A little-noticed provision in the annual defense bill would bar the Pentagon from citing the Gaza Health Ministry as an authoritative source. Jessica Washington December 12 2024, 4:34 p.m. (TheIntercept.com) A man carries the body of a child who was rescued from the rubble toward a Health Ministry vehicle following… Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38237"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38237"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38237\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38238,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38237\/revisions\/38238"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}