Ministry: At least 21,100 Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza since Oct. 7

A total of 21,110 Palestinians have been killed and 55,243 injured in Israeli strikes in Gaza since October 7, the health ministry in Gaza said on Wednesday.

The figures include 195 Palestinians killed and 325 injured in the past 24 hours, the ministry added.

Israeli forces continued to pummel central Gaza by land, sea and air on Wednesday and a telecommunications outage in much of the enclave hit efforts to reach Palestinian casualties.

Since Hamas killed 1,200 people and captured 240 hostages on October 7 in the deadliest day in Israeli history, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has responded with an assault that has laid much of Hamas-ruled Gaza to waste.

Israel says it is doing what it can to protect civilians, and blames Hamas for putting them in harm’s way by operating among them, which Hamas denies. But even Israel’s closest ally the United States has said it should do more to reduce civilian deaths from what President Joe Biden has called “indiscriminate bombing.”