A total of 20,748 Palestinian students and 1,058 educational and administrative staff have been killed in Gaza and the occupied West Bank during three years of Israel’s genocidal war, the Palestinian education ministry said on Wednesday.
In a statistical report on Israeli violations against the education sector, the ministry said the figures cover students and staff at schools and universities, alongside thousands of injuries and arrests.
The killings have accompanied a sweeping destruction of Gaza’s education system. Previous documentation shows that all 12 universities in the enclave have been damaged or destroyed over the years, while the vast majority of schools have also sustained damage, leaving hundreds of thousands of students without regular access to education.
UN experts have described the systematic destruction of educational institutions, personnel and intellectual life as “scholasticide.”
The term refers to the destruction of the institutions and systems through which a society preserves knowledge, educates younger generations and maintains its intellectual life.
The destruction has extended beyond classrooms, with libraries, laboratories, archives and other educational facilities also damaged or destroyed.
Gaza
In Gaza, 19,189 school students and 1,386 university students have been killed, according to the ministry.
Another 28,586 school students and 3,082 university students were injured.
The ministry said 805 educational and administrative staff at schools and 246 university personnel were killed.
Another 3,298 school staff members and 1,493 university staff were injured.
Occupied West Bank
In the occupied West Bank, 134 school students and 39 university students were killed, while 871 school students and 283 university students were injured, according to the report.
Israeli forces also detained 416 school students and 481 university students.
Seven educational and administrative staff at schools were killed and 26 others injured, while Israeli forces detained more than 176 teachers and school employees and 21 university staff members.
Since Israel launched its genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023, more than 74,000 Palestinians have been killed and over 175,000 injured in in the enclave, while around 90 percent of the Palestinian territory’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed.
Over the same period, Israeli forces and illegal settlers have intensified attacks across the occupied West Bank, killing 1,210 Palestinians, injuring around 13,350 others and detaining more than 24,600.
