The conduct of hostilities in urban and other populated areas increased the risks of death and injury for civilians, particularly when fighting involved the use of explosive weapons. In 2021, 1,234 incidents involving the use of explosive weapons were recorded in populated areas in 21 States affected by conflict, resulting in 10,184 victims. Of these, 89 per cent were civilians, compared with 10 per cent in other [non-urban] areas.
This came from a British NGO called Action on Armed Violence. For other wars, it is probably accurate.
Unfortunately, their methodology in counting casualties in the current Gaza war weighs towards assuming all casualties are civilians.
They count 14,009 civilian deaths from explosives in Gaza between October 7 and March 20, but they admit that they are reporting nearly all of those deaths as civilian since terrorist deaths are rarely reported.
This figure refers to the number of reported civilians killed or injured by explosive weapon use in Gaza since 07 October 2023, gathered using incident-specific English language media reporting. ...Where a specific breakdown of civilians and combatants was not provided, casualties are reported as civilians with the caveat that combatants may be included in the toll.
Apparently they are basing their numbers on UN-OCHA daily reports where they repeat Ministry of Health reports of specific deadly airstrikes. Those are the only somewhat detailed English-language daily reports I am aware of. OCHA doesn' t investigate to see if there were military targets inside or underneath the houses that are bombed.
But the methodology appears to be sound in other wars, assuming credible English language reporting, which is reasonable given that overreporting civilian casualties has no military value as it does for Hamas, and where military casualties are not silenced as Hamas does.
Which means that if Israel's estimate of 13,000 terrorist killed is even remotely close to true, Israel is doing an unprecedented job of minimizing civilian deaths in urban warfare.
(h/t Irene)
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