But we might be in luck for later historical searches. Unlike Sunnis, many Shiites bury their dead in cemetaries with headstones much as Christians do (which is why Sunnis sometimes call Shiites “grave worshipers”) and if most of the casualties are Shiite, cemetary surveys can be done later.

But word is starting to leak out about overstatement of civilian casualties and understating of Hezbollah’s. There is a report to be aired on Fox shortly on the subject. They keep teasing it before commercial breaks but I have no idea when it is going to air.

The CIA World Factbook says that 26.5% of Lebanon’s population is ages 0 to 14. This is roughly in line with the UN estimate of one third of the fatalities being children. I agree that 45% seems awfully high — could be true, but seems unlikely.

I don’t think the figures we are going to get anytime soon are going to allow you to judge whether there are a disproportionate percentage of military age males. Any estimate under present conditions is going to have too wide a range of uncertainty.

Tribes Turn on Taliban

July 24, 2006: American commanders believe their operations have disrupted Taliban plans, and done a lot of damage to the Taliban leadership. Without providing many details (for security reasons, as the campaign is still going on), it was pointed out that the Taliban have been unable to execute a coherent plan. If the Taliban appear to be flailing about, they are. Every week, one or more Taliban groups are cornered and destroyed by American, NATO or Afghan forces. These operations yield documents and prisoners (for interrogation.) The information gathered in that way would provide an accurate picture of what shape the Taliban are in, and apparently that shape is kind of bent at the moment.

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What I am suspecting is that Hezbollah fighters are being lumped into civilian casualties. This would become evident if the number if males 16-50 are higher in the casualty count than in the general population.

Here’s a partial answer to your question: the UN estimates that a third of the fatalities have been children. One NGO estimates much higher: 45%. Here’s my source: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/article_1182627.php/Charity_says_more_children_killed_in_Lebanon_than_thoughtm (I also read the one-third estimate in El Mundo of Madrid (in Spanish), attributed to the Lebanese Minister of Culture, but the article doesn’t pop up on a Google search — I don’t know why.)

Hezbollah is as much a slave to certain realities as Israel is. Hezbollah committed itself to a course of action designed to produce a desired result. When Israel responded differently than anticipated, Hezbollah was astute in recognizing that and attempted to turn Israel’s response to its advantage. I believe this will also fail as Israel as found a strategy that will both meet her objectives and not play into Hezbollah’s plans. If that is so, then Hezbollah stands to lose quite a lot (more) in the coming week and will have nobody to blame but themselves.

Another data point I would be interested in if anyone happens to stumble across it is the demographic breakdown of Lebanese “civilian” casualties by age/sex. I have been unable to locate such a breakdown but the UN might have such a number someplace.