Some 1,945 Palestinians have been killed since the intifada erupted on September 29, 2000, according to a defense establishment report. These include 365 people (18 percent) who had nothing to do with terrorist activity: 130 (7 percent) children under the age of 16 and 235 (11 percent) adults, many of them women and elderly people.
The casualty figures, which are not published officially, are lower than those compiled by the Palestinian organizations and human rights groups.
According to the report, 441 of those killed were Hamas and Islamic Jihad activists (about 22 percent), 324 were Fatah and Tanzim activists (about 17 percent), 329 were Palestinian Authority security forces (about 17 percent) and 69 (4 percent) were from the Popular Front, Democratic Front, Fatah Abu Mussa and Ahmed Jibril.
Some 22 percent - 417 - of those killed were not identified with any group but were suspected by the security establishment of being involved in terrorism. These include Palestinians killed while carrying out terrorist attacks apparently independently, without acting for any terror organization.
Military sources said yesterday that it is not clear in all the cases that the civilian casualties were killed by Israeli fire, and some may have been hit by Palestinian fire during exchanges of gunfire. This includes, for example, some of those killed in the Jabalya refugee camp in Gaza last week. The IDF claims they were killed by a Palestinian explosive charge, while the Palestinians say these civilians were hit by an Israeli tank shell.
Commenting on the number of children killed, the sources said in some cases they were youths throwing fire bombs. A few children who died were involved in operating firearms. An IDF investigation regarding the death of an 11-year-old boy in Nablus some two months ago indicated the boy was killed when an improvised explosive charge he was about to throw on soldiers, went off in his hands.
In any case, a security source said, "there is no justification for the death of Palestinians under the age of 16, even if they were throwing Molotov cocktails. These cases require investigation.
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