The official death toll in Gaza now stands at 55,000.

According to a pair of reports in the British medical journal The Lancet, the number may be much higher.

Before the war, Gaza’s population was pegged at 2.3 million. These days, mainstream media talk about 2.1 million Gazans. What happened to the remaining 200,000? Fifty to seventy-five thousand have likely been blown to bits by US bombs and missiles, many of them now buried under vast piles of rubble.

Another 150,000 would have died from profound injuries that couldn’t be treated, or from wound infection, infectious disease, chronic diseases that can no longer be treated — because Israel has blocked entry of medicines and vital equipment — and from starvation.

As awful as these figures are, worse is surely in store for little Gaza.

Nearly half of its population are children. Those who physically survive, deeply traumatized, will carry scars for the rest of their lives, both physical and psychological. Many now face a life of disability, under permanent military occupation and siege the international community has shown no interest in ending.

If they bear children, their children will too. A “pandemic of disabilities,” the Commissioner General of UNRWA, the UN Relief & Works Agency, called this.

In late May, a People’s Tribunal on the Gaza genocide, featuring scores of witness accounts and testimony, was held in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Tribunal’s final judgement will be rendered by a ‘Jury of Conscience’ composed of a half dozen judges, following closing hearings in Istanbul in late October.

That judgement, together with personal testimony, civil society submissions, and closing reports from each of the Tribunal’s three Chambers, will be incorporated into a set of public archives that will remain open for continuing submissions.

Last week, the GPM featured a presentation to the Gaza Tribunal by British scholar Penny Green, speaking about the “disabling” tactics Israeli Occupation Forces have deployed over the course of the last 21 months in Gaza. We reached out to Penny Green, for a more in-depth conversation.

Penny Green is Professor of Law and Globalisation at Queen Mary University of London, and the acting chair of the Gaza Tribunal.

Listen to our conversation in today’s podcast. Click play above, or go here.

Watch our complete conversation here: