Biden says he has ‘no confidence’ in Palestinian death toll

President Joe Biden said yesterday that he has “no confidence” in the death toll being provided by Palestinian officials, who say more than 6,500 people, including 2,700 children, have been killed by Israeli retaliatory strikes in the Gaza Strip since the Oct. 7 terrorist attack by Hamas.

“I have no notion that the Palestinians are telling the truth about how many people are killed,” Biden said at a joint news conference with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. “I’m sure innocents have been killed, and it’s the price of waging a war.” 

Biden said Israel should be “incredibly careful” to minimize civilian casualties, but that he had “no confidence in the number that the Palestinians are using,” without saying why.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Muslim civil rights and advocacy group based in Washington, condemned Biden’s remarks as “dehumanizing” and called on him to apologize.

“Journalists have confirmed the high number of casualties, and countless videos coming out of Gaza every day show mangled bodies of Palestinian women and children,” executive director Nihad Awad said in a statement.

He added that CAIR had received 774 complaints, including reported bias incidents, since the war began, a spike the group says is “driven at least in part by irresponsible rhetoric from government officials.”