TEHRAN - The total death toll from Israel’s 14-month war of genocide on the Gaza Strip has passed a grim milestone of 45,000.

The Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza said on Monday that 45,028 people have been killed and 106,962 others have been wounded since Israel launched war on the enclave on October 7, 2023.

The ministry added that the real toll is higher because thousands of bodies are still buried under rubble or in areas that medics cannot access. 

Some 17,000 children are among those who have been killed by the Israeli attacks in Gaza. 

The death toll amounts to roughly 2 percent of the Gaza Strip’s entire 2.3 million population. 

Israel’s weekend strikes killed dozens of Palestinians across Gaza. 

A Sunday overnight Israeli strike in Gaza City’s eastern Shijaiyah neighborhood hit a house. Rescuers recovered the bodies of 10 people from under the rubble, including a family of four; two parents and their two children. 

More than a dozen people, including six children and two women, were also killed in a separate strike on a school in the southern city of Khan Younis on Sunday. 

A spokeswoman for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) said she met with children injured in Sunday’s strike on the school-turned-shelter. 

They included a 17-year-old girl who suffered a severe leg injury and shrapnel wounds. She survived along with her twin sister and three other sisters, Louise Wateridge told the Associated Press. 

Their mother died and Wateridge said one of the sisters described “how their mother’s bones were crushed under the rubble. There was nothing they could do to save her.”

According to AP, Wateridge also met with two siblings aged 2 and 5 at Nasser Hospital where the casualties were taken. Both children have severe head and body injuries, with 2-year-old Julia losing sight in her eye. “There is nothing we can do. We are already waiting for the next attack,” Wateridge quoted a doctor as saying. 

Israel has not only massacred Palestinians but it has also hindered the provision of essentials such as food to the Gaza Strip, in particular to the north of the enclave. The regime has used starvation as a method of warfare to further its nefarious objectives. 

Wateridge has already issued an alert over imminent famine in the northern Gaza Strip.

The UN special rapporteur on the right to food said in February that the obstruction of essentials such as food by Israel amounts to war crimes.  

“Intentionally depriving people of food is a war crime. Israel has announced its intention to destroy the Palestinian people, in whole or in part, simply for being Palestinian. In my view as a UN human rights expert, this is now a situation of genocide. This means the state of Israel in its entirety is culpable and should be held accountable – not just individuals or this government or that person,” Michael Fakhri told the Guardian in late February. 

But Israel has turned a blind eye to calls to stop its genocidal war on Gaza. 

 The International Court of Justice (ICJ) found in January this year that there was a risk of violation of the rights of the Palestinian people to protection from genocide.

It ordered Israel to “take all measures within its power” to desist from killing Palestinians in contravention of the genocide convention, to prevent and punish the incitement of genocide, and to facilitate the provision of “urgent basic services”.

Last month, pre-trial judges at the International Criminal Court (ICC) also issued arrest warrants for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former war minister Yoav Gallant for committing war crimes, crimes against humanity and using starvation as a method of warfare among other inhumane acts.

In defiance of the ICC’s ruling, American officials have recently met with Gallant in the US. 

Israel launched war on Gaza after Hamas carried out a surprise military operation in southern Israel on October 7. 

More than 1,100 people were killed and about 250 others were taken captive in the operation dubbed Al-Aqsa Storm that caught Israel off-guard. 

Dozens of the captives are still held inside Gaza. 

Hamas freed more than 100 captives following a swap deal with Israel in November 2023.

Several captives were freed during Israel’s brutal attacks on Gaza and the rest have lost their lives as a result of the regime’s strikes on the enclave. 

Netanyahu stands accused of derailing talks aimed at ending the war and ensuring the release of the captives. 

He has vowed to achieve “total victory” over Hamas by “destroying” the resistance group. 

About 14 months into the onslaught, Netanyahu has failed to make good on his promise as Palestinians have put up resistance against the regime.  

Israel’s crimes in Gaza have deepened the regime’s international isolation. Israel will ultimately have to end the Gaza war. But the complicity of Israel’s Western supporters, in particular the United States in the regime’s genocide will go down in history.