(NewsNation) — As the death toll rises in the war against Hamas, some fear Palestinian civilians will bear the brunt of Israel’s defense tactics following unprecedented attacks on Israel earlier this month.

Hamas — a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization — and Palestine are not synonymous.

After decades of Israeli occupation, many Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank likely support a mission toward freedom and liberation, said Laurie Brand, a professor emerita of political science and international relations and Middle East Studies at the University of Southern California.

However, that doesn’t mean all Palestinians in Hamas-controlled territory support the organization’s tactics, she added.

“We don’t know what the percentage is of people in Gaza who reject the way Hamas carried out these attacks on October 7, but I think it’s safe to say that one would certainly find people there who did not support that,” Brand said.

President Joe Biden on Wednesday made a renewed call for a two-state solution, calling on Israel to “do everything in its power, as difficult as it is, to protect innocent civilians.” He also called out “extremist settlers attacking Palestinians in the West Bank.”

“Hamas is hiding behind Palestinian civilians and is despicable and not surprisingly cowardly as well,” Biden said. “However, that does not lessen the need for (Israel) to operate and align with the laws of war.”

Earlier, the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Lynn Hastings, said all of Gaza, not just Hamas, is at risk.

“They have said they want to destroy Hamas, but (Israel’s) current trajectory is going to destroy Gaza,” Hastings said during an exclusive UN News interview last week.  

Gaza has been under Hamas rule ever since it won a majority of seats in a victory against the Palestinian Authority during a 2006 election steeped in decades of conflict between Israel and Palestine and discontent with Fatah, the previous majority political party. The people of Gaza haven’t had an opportunity to elect a new leading political group since.

After the attacks on Israel, many civilians already struggling under Israeli occupation had no means to flee and have been left to endure the still-unfolding violence and destruction, Brand said.

“No children are in school,” she said. “Basically, half of the population has been forced to flee from its home, and with a population of 2.3 million where the poverty level was already well over 50%, the conditions that people were living in already were severely compromised.”

Well into the third week of fighting, the Israel-Hamas war has claimed the lives of more than 1,400 people in Israel, according to The Associated Press. More than 4,300 Palestinians have been killed, the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza has said.

With no fuel and limited food and water, the U.N. says Gaza’s health care system has collapsed. Resources are wearing thin, and movement in and out of Gaza remains especially challenging.

“Specifically with regard to the situation in Gaza now, I don’t think most people can fully appreciate what it means to be living under a situation like they are, where basically food is running out, water’s running out, and there’s no real end in sight,” Brand said. “And you’re continuing to be bombed.”

Israelis have surely suffered as a result of the attacks too. Israeli Ambassador Gilad Erdan condemned the attacks at a United Nations Security Council emergency meeting on October 8, accusing Hamas of carrying out “blatant, documented war crimes.”

“Grandparents and the elderly, among them Holocaust survivors who endured the Nazis, were violently dragged from their homes, this time by Hamas and taken into Gaza,” he said, according to AP reports at the time.

Officials have warned of rising antisemitic and Islamophobic sentiments and attacks worldwide as fighting intensifies.

London police recorded a 1,353% increase in antisemitic offenses this month compared to the same period last year, according to Reuters. Islamophobic offenses were up 140%.