US President Joe Biden stressed in his speech on Wednesday that he believes Israeli strikes in the besieged Gaza Strip have caused civilian casualties but expressed scepticism about the official casualty figures reported by Gaza's Health Ministry.
Biden expressed scepticism about the death toll in Gaza during a White House press conference. However, he did not provide reasons for his doubts. When reminded that thousands of Palestinian children had been killed in Gaza, he was asked whether this indicated that Israel was not heeding U.S. calls to minimize civilian casualties.
Biden responded, "What I've been told is that I can't verify the accuracy of the Palestinian reports regarding the number of casualties. I'm certain that innocent lives are being lost, and regrettably, that's an unfortunate consequence of warfare. But I have reservations about the figures released by the Palestinians."
The remarks followed a statement from a spokesperson for the Biden administration's National Security Council, who expressed doubts related to the Gaza Health Ministry's data, citing its affiliation with the Palestinian resistance movement.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, the largest Muslim non-governmental organization in the United States, strongly criticized Biden's comments as "shocking and inhumane." CAIR found Biden's controversial comments about the Palestinian casualty figures deeply troubling.
