XPost: can.politics, soc.culture.usa

One story has been dominating the U.S. and international media cycle
for the past 24 hours. It has been repeated by pro-Israel activists,
Israeli government officials, reporters, and anchors throughout the
U.S. media and even alluded to by the President. The thing is — this
story has not been confirmed in any way. It appears to come from a
single source with a history of espousing calls for genocidal violence
against Palestinians.

You have probably heard the story that Hamas fighters beheaded 40
Israeli children in the Kfar Aza community near Gaza. This story can
be traced back to an article by Bel Trew, a reporter for The
Independent. Trew entered Kfar Aza on October 10, soon after the
Israeli army, and reported on Twitter that gunfire erupted just as
they arrived. She is told by a member of the Israeli military that
children were beheaded, but the article notes, “The Independent did
not see evidence of this.”

The military source of this claim is Major David Ben Zion. According
to his Twitter bio, he is the Deputy Head of the settler leadership organization, the Samaria Regional Council, and a member of the Board
of Directors of the National Fund for Israel, a quasi-governmental
agency used to acquire land in Palestine that is then made available exclusively for use by the Israeli state.

In this video clip, Ben Zion speaks directly to the camera. He says
the soldiers found children with their heads cut off. He is
incorrectly named on-screen in the video but is correctly named in the description below the video on YouTube.

n addition to his role in settler leadership, Ben Zion has a history
of calls to genocidal violence.

Earlier this year, Israeli settlers carried out a so-called “reprisal
attack” on the Palestinian village of Huwwara after an unknown
Palestinian gunman killed two Israeli settlers. As we reported at the
time, Israeli settlers launched a ‘pogrom’ on the night of February
26, attacking Palestinian homes and property in Huwwara, Burin, and
across the Nablus area, burning houses, cars, vandalizing property,
and assaulting Palestinians.

Following the reprisal attack on Huwwara carried out by Israeli
settlers, Ben Zion wrote in a now-deleted tweet:

“Here in Hawara, the blood of our children, the residents of Samaria
who were murdered here an hour ago, is spilled on the road. The
village of Huwwara should be erased today. Enough with the talk of
building and strengthening the settlement, the deterrence that was
lost needs to be restored immediately, and there is no room for
mercy.” (Translation by Google, archived here: https://twitter.com/Louis_Allday/status/1629963086424690689)

And The Independent wasn’t the only outlet to run the story. Later on
October 10, according to the Times of Israel, the IDF took the foreign
press on a tour of Kfar Aza to survey the scene and document the
carnage left by the attacks. Nicole Zedek, a reporter with i24 News,
filed a report repeating the claim that Hamas fighters beheaded
children in the community: “Some soldiers say they found babies with
their heads cut off, entire families gunned down in their beds.” This
article also noted that the bodies of “[a]bout 40 babies and young
children have been taken out on gurneys”.

A similar claim was made in a video posted on CNN’s official
Instagram, where reporter Nic Robertson says men, women and children
were found with their “hands bound…executed, heads cut.” Robinson does
not name his sources in the video report, or clarify if that
information was independently verified by CNN.

It was not long before social media sites filled up with claims that
Hamas fighters had beheaded 40 babies in Kfar Aza.

On October 11, the Israeli journalist Oren Ziv, who was also on the
tour of Kfar Aza, wrote on Twitter, “During the tour we didn’t see any
evidence of this, and the army spokesperson or commanders also didn’t
mention any such incidents.”

He continued: “Soldiers I spoke with in Kfar Aza yesterday didn’t
mention ‘beheaded babies.’ The army’s spokesperson stated: ‘We can not
confirm at this point… we are aware of the heinous acts Hamas is
capable of.’”

We don’t know exactly who the reporters on that tour spoke to, but as
of yet, no independent news publication appears to have verified the
claim made by Major David Ben Zion about finding beheaded children in
Kfar Aza, and the Israeli military has even denied having evidence of
the event.

And other similarly horrific stories that have been reported are also
starting to fall apart. The Los Angeles Times has retracted similarly unconfirmed reports of rape, and reporters are beginning to “clarify”
or retract their statements about this claim of beheadings. We will
continue to follow this story.

Of course, if this horrific event did happen, the world needs to know
about it because it is an indefensible war crime and will color and
inform how we understand the unfolding events.

But If it did not happen, it is also important that the world know
that a member of the Israeli military lied to journalists about such a
gruesome crime and, in the process, helped create a global story with
no bearing in fact beyond the claim of one person whose own history
should put his trustworthiness under deep suspicion.

And regardless of when the truth comes out, it is possible the damage
has been done. As has been the case in many recent examples, in the
rush to war, misreporting or intentional misinformation can help build
support for deadly consequences.


https://mondoweiss.net/2023/10/there-is-no-proof-palestinian-fighters-beheaded-babies-the-only-source-is-a-radical-settler/

Truth is always among the first casualties of war and this one is no
exception. When the jews are involved it becomes 10 times worse.

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