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Due to the severity of the situation and the fast flowing news cycle, we have decided to create a general megathread for discussion regarding the conflict.
Informal/Satirical news sources are not allowed on the main feed of the community but you are free to post them in this thread.
Please remember that all community and instance rules apply to this thread hence keep is civil.
IDF misinformation from the start of the conflict until now:
1. Hamas beheaded forty babies
Context: the reports of Hamas beheading babies came from an interview by i24 News of an IDF commander. This quickly spread through Western media outlets such as CNN, NBC, MSNBC, FOX News, the Telegraph, Daily Mail, etc. I haven't done a comprehensive sweep of who picked up the story and who didn't (and of course now it's much harder to do so because of retractions, edits, my lack of direct TV access, and SEO), but from what I can tell AP News and Al Jazeera have been relatively reliable.
Lack of evidence: 6 days ago, Anadolu (Turkish state-owned media) reported that: Israeli army says it does not have 'confirmation' about allegations that ‘Hamas beheaded babies’. This was later confirmed by other sources.
Misinformation: 5 days ago, Biden stated "I never really thought that I would see, have confirmed, pictures of terrorists beheading children,” said Biden, who described Saturday’s attack as the “deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust”. The White House later posted a retraction of this claim: "A White House spokesperson later clarified that US officials and the president have not seen pictures or confirmed such reports independently,” The Post reported on Wednesday.
2. Shani Louk, claimed to be naked, dead, and sexually assaulted
Context: images circulated online about a video purporting to show Shani Louk, a German national attending the Nova EDM festival, on the back of a truck, face-down. Claims that she appeared to be naked, dead, and sexually assaulted circulated on the same media sources discussed above.
Misinformation: given the videos we have, we know with a decent amount of certainty that the video being shown is of Shani Louk. However:
A. She's clearly not naked in the video and you can see that she is wearing black shorts as well as boots. A top is also visible (but she is face-down, so we can't see much of it). Neither her shorts nor her boots appeared to have been removed. From what I can tell, she was initially wearing a long skirt that was likely lost in the chaos.
B. Her family claims that she is alive and receiving medical attention at a hospital in Gaza, which does explain why they would be transporting her. There is visible blood on the back of her head, but she does not seem to be bleeding profusely when the video was taken.
C. I will not comment on whether or not she was sexually assaulted.
3. 260 dead Israelis at EDM festival
Context: many news sources independently verified that 260 bodies were pulled from the EDM festival. Many sources reported that this was an act of terror with no strategic objective and a massacre of innocent civilians.
Lack of context: Nova was held in Kibbutz Re'im, mere minutes from Gaza, and also mere minutes from the IDF Gaza Division's Re'im base. Tanks are clearly visible in videos leaving the festival, as are armed personnel. Hebrew-language interviews of released prisoners are providing more insight into these attacks, but I do not speak Hebrew so I will refrain from commenting on this further. Hamas has claimed that fighters were told to avoid harming or killing civilians.
Potential misinformation: Hamas claiming that fighters were told to avoid harming civilians does not mean that Hamas fighters did not harm civilians, obviously.
Potential misinformation: the reports indicate that 260 bodies were found, but their origin has not been confirmed. We know that armed personnel discharged their weapons against Hamas fighters (and vice-versa). How many of the dead are civilians, IDF, armed security, or Hamas?
Much of the media coverage on this conflict has been used to spread misinformation, even from traditionally "reliable" sources in the Western sphere. As a result, I would strongly recommend supplementing coverage of these events with those outside the Western sphere. The journalism being done is lazy.
If you ever wonder why no one cares about the people of Gaza, read your post again.
Apparently their supporters write paragraphs upon paragraphs about how they they did in fact "not behead" the babies but just murdered them. Start armchair medical analysis about a girl that was shot and kidnapped how she was not really naked and bleeding while we all have seen the video of her being taken into Gaza with the local people spitting on her body. Also trying to somehow declare that all the murdered people at the festival are not the fault of Hamas but the IDF based on vague statements of supposed witnesses and Hamas itself? Mixed with your beliefs about how IDF is supposed to be organized or work?
Why do Palestinians and Israelites hate each other?
Tl;dr Israel showed up and kicked Palestinians out, Palestinians want their land back. Ensue 80 years of complications
Hey fella: they "showed up" from where, and why?
There were always Jewish people in the area who were often treated as second class citizens by a Muslim majority, btw.
When the west promised Israel to the Jewish people around the globe and the population already living there, many other Arab/Muslim countries were also already gladly exiling their Jewish population as well.
It wasn't "just the west".
With the promise of a state and Zionism as a religious driver they stomped the people already living there, although these people were simultaneously promised their own state called Palestine.
Hamas and other groups surrounding the area, for example the Hisbollah from Iran, hate Jewish people and see them as literal enemies of Allah. Since Palestinians in Gaza want to end being controlled by Israel, Hamas was able to get in power. They want a pure Muslim country, with Israel gone, and some Palestinians and Palestinian activists around the world agree with them. Though, not all. Some want a two state solution.
The current leader of Israel and some of the Israelis didn't accept the borders to the Palestinian areas in the past and today. Although they claim to not occupy Gaza, most people disagree since they control the access to the place (together with Egypt) and especially Gaza was left in a poor state because of it, basically depending on the mercy sometimes and sometimes not shown by Israel. Some Israelis, again, don't agree with this and want a two state solution.
If you look at a map you can easily see the problem. Gaza is caught in a tiny corner between Egypt and Israel. The other part of Palestine is the Westbank. With Israel taking up more and more space in the middle over the last ~70 years Palestine is now divided.
This was the original two state plan btw:
The hatred between the two groups grew in part because they are uneven. And there were several wars and other violent incidents between the two states. Israel is getting supported mostly by the west, and therefore has a huge military force. Palestine is getting supported mostly by some Muslim countries but since access is difficult they don't have a big military, instead rely on groups like Hamas.
Israel grew in part because Jewish people all around the globe were killed and exiled throughout history and fled to Israel. The west basically promised them Israel as compensation. But there was always a Jewish population in the area. Even before the conflict.
Also, Jerusalem is a whole other can of worms since both groups want that city very very much.
Beneath it all lies a complicated history of the whole area before it was Israel/Palestine (you would have to start with reading up on Transjordan or Kerak, going all the way back to the ancient world). And to make it even more complicated, the internet is littered with propaganda, fake news and one-sided reports from both sides.