One Thousand 9/11s

After the October 7th atrocity with 1,200 Israelis killed, some commentators in America and Israel compared it to 9/11.  The actual numbers of the murdered were fewer on October 7th than 9/11.  However, proportional to Israel’s population of about 9.5 million compared to a US population of about 282 million on 9/11/2001, Israel suffered the equivalent of about 14 9/11s on October 7th.  In this article, I am considering civilian casualties only and consider all victims of these two one-day events, even reservists, police, firemen, or the few actually in military service, as civilians.

Then I compared Ukraine’s civilian casualties. The Russo-Ukraine war is different militarily from the Israel-Gaza war.  On the Ukrainian side, there are many times as many military deaths as civilian deaths.  On the Russian side, military deaths may be as high as 99% of all Russian deaths.  About 11,500 Ukrainian civilians have died out of a population of about 38 million.  The Ukrainian civilian losses, spread over the 2-plus years of war, are the equivalent of about 29 9/11s.  Another way to view this is that Ukraine has had half as many civilian casualties as Gaza and about 17 times as many inhabitants.  Thus a Gazan civilian has been about 34 times as likely to die as a Ukrainian civilian.

The Gazan civilian casualties are harder to estimate. The total dead per the Gazan Health Ministry is 32,000, but this total does not differentiate between terrorists/militants/fighters and civilians. The IDF estimates that about 10,000 terrorists have been killed and also estimated a 2 to 1 ratio of civilian deaths to terrorist deaths.  This gives about 20,000 dead civilians and a 30,000 total which is close to the Gazan number.  American and British military experts on urban warfare have suggested that the 2 to 1 ratio is too low and a 3 to 1 ratio or a 4 to 1 ratio is more accurate.  These higher ratios would make the civilian death toll much higher.  Also, there are a large number of uncounted Gazan dead buried under massive piles of rubble.

Using the 32,000 dead total and the IDF’s 2 to 1 ratio, just over 21,000 Gazan civilians have been killed out of a total population of 2.2 million.  That gives a Gazan equivalent of about 920 9/11s.  I estimate that this Gazan equivalent to 9/11 is growing by 6 or 7 per day.  Also, deaths from famine and disease are just beginning to rise rapidly.  April 7th is the half-year anniversary of the October 7th atrocity and massacre. Shortly after April 7th, we will reach the astonishing, obscene total of the equivalent of One Thousand 9/11s in Gaza.