![]() President Joe Biden also repeated the claim during an Oct. 11, a spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told CNN that babies and toddlers were found in Kfar Aza with their "heads decapitated." The next morning, CNN reported that the Israeli government could not confirm the claim that Hamas beheaded babies, contradicting the prime minister’s office’s previous statement. But officials then amended their statements, which increased confusion. Political leaders, first in Israel, then the U.S., gave the beheadings claim more credibility early on. officials repeated the claim, then gave it distance The militant group "has repeatedly said that it does not intentionally target or kill women and children," despite the overwhelming evidence contradicting this claim, Khalil said. Multiple news outlets have reported that women were among the people Hamas kidnapped. 11, Hamas dismissed "the false claims promoted by some Western media outlets, such as Palestinian freedom fighters killing children and targeting civilians," without mentioning beheadings specifically.Įvidence disputed Hamas’ broad rebuttal, however: Women, children and older people were among the thousands killed or wounded in the militant group’s surprise attack, ABC News and The New York Times reported. and United Kingdom, including The Independent, The Daily Mail, CNN, Fox News and the New York Post, repeated the claim that Hamas had beheaded babies, citing Israeli media or the prime minister's office as sources. She did not say Hamas beheaded 40 babies, but several social media posts conflated those reports. 10, Zedeck posted on X that "one of the commanders told me they saw babies’ heads cut off." Thirty-five minutes later, she posted again, saying "soldiers told me they believe 40 babies/children were killed." That’s what they said," Zedeck said during her English-language broadcast from Kfar Aza.Īlso Oct. "The Israeli military still says they don’t have a clear number (of the casualties), but I’m talking to some of the soldiers, and they say what they’ve witnessed is they’ve been walking through these different houses, these different communities - babies, their heads cut off. Reporter Nicole Zedeck of i24 News, an Israeli news channel, said Israeli soldiers told her infants had been killed in the attack. 10, three days after Hamas’ attack on Kibbutz Kfar Aza in southern Israel, the Israel Defense Forces, the nation’s military, allowed news outlets to report from the ravaged site. The claim that Hamas beheaded 40 babies traces back to an Israeli reporter’s on-air comments. and Israeli politicians and media repeated it and walked it back. PolitiFact examined the claim’s origin and documented how U.S. ![]() "Because it is such a shocking claim … it has garnered significant attention as well as attempts to support or rebut," said Osamah Khalil, a Syracuse University history professor specializing in the modern Middle East and U.S. So why did a weakly sourced claim about 40 beheaded babies travel far and wide?Įxperts on disinformation and the Middle East pinpointed the emotional response elicited by violence against children, along with a lack of confirmation from official sources. The confirmed violence is horrible enough. And Hamas took more than 200 people hostage, NBC News reported. In Israel, at least 1,400 people have been killed and 4,500 injured as of Oct. intelligence report estimated between 100 and 300 people died in the Gaza hospital explosion.) 20 that in Gaza, Palestinian health authorities said at least 4,137 people have been killed and more than 13,200 injured - including more than 500 deaths in a hospital explosion. (An Oct. The war’s devastation has intensified in subsequent days. news outlets, such as CNN, Fox News and the New York Post Israeli officials, including the prime minister’s office actor Noah Schnapp and other social media users with large followings. Since the attack, the claim has been widely repeated by politicians including President Joe Biden, Rep. But one particularly disturbing claim - that the Palestinian militant group beheaded dozens of babies - gained prominence in the days after the massacre, amplified at the U.S. ![]() There have been verified reports that Hamas, which attacked Israel on Oct. At the same time, misinformation about the war has thrived. Editor’s note: This story contains references and links to graphic images and videos.įootage of death and destruction in Israel and Gaza is plentiful, disturbing and all too real.
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