Misinformation anddisinformation involving the distribution of false, inaccurate or otherwise misleading information has been a prominent and ubiquitous feature of theGaza war.[3] Much of the content has been viral in nature, spreading online with tens of millions of posts in circulation on social media. A variety of sources, including government officials, media outlets, and social media influencers across different countries, have contributed to the spread of these inaccuracies and falsehoods.[4]
The New York Times described the start of the Gaza war as releasing a "deluge of online propaganda and disinformation" that was "larger than anything seen before". It described the conflict as "fast becoming a world war online." According to the NYT,Russia,China,Iran andits proxies used state media and covert influence campaigns on social media networks to support Hamas, undermine Israel, criticize the United States and cause unrest.[5]James Rubin of the U.S. State Department'sGlobal Engagement Center called coverage of the conflict as being swept up in "an undeclared information war with authoritarian countries".[5]
During the conflict, theIsraeli government and Israeli cyber companies have deployed artificial intelligence (AI) tools andbot farms to spread disinformation and graphic, emotionally charged and false propaganda to dehumanize Palestinians, sow division among supporters of Palestine, and exert pressure on politicians to support Israel's actions.[6][7][8]The Intercept reported that: "At the center of Israel’sinformation warfare campaign is a tactical mission to dehumanize Palestinians and to flood the public discourse with a stream of false, unsubstantiated, and unverifiable allegations."[8] One such covert campaign was commissioned by Israel'sMinistry of Diaspora Affairs. The ministry allocated about $2 million to the operation, and used political marketing firm Stoic based in Tel Aviv to carry it out, according officials and documents reviewed by theNew York Times.[6][9] The campaign was started after theOctober 7 attacks, and remained active onX (formerly Twitter) at the time of theNew York Times report in June 2024. At the peak of the campaign it used hundreds of fake accounts posing as Americans on X,Facebook andInstagram to post pro-Israel comments, focusing on U.S. lawmakers, particularly those who are Black and from theDemocratic Party, includingHakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader from New York, andRaphael Warnock, Senator from Georgia.ChatGPT was deployed to generate many of the posts. The campaign also involved the creation of three fake English-language news sites featuring pro-Israel articles.[6] In November 2024, a report by aUnited Nations (UN)committee noted that Western social media companies disproportionately removed content showing solidarity with thePalestinian people relative to content promotingviolence against Palestinians.[10]
On 7 October 2023, deputy head ofHamas's political bureau,Saleh al-Arouri (based in Lebanon), claimed theQassam Brigades had "captured senior officers from theoccupation army" in theOctober 7 attacks.[11] A rumour circulated on social media that one of these officers was Major GeneralNimrod Aloni, the commander of the IsraeliDepth Corps, based on a photograph of a man who resembled him being detained by unidentified armed men.[11] APersian language post by theIsrael Defense Forces (IDF) quoted a post about his capture fromTasnim News Agency and wrote "Tasnim: Distributors of fake news ofIRGC" without either denying or confirming the capture of Aloni.[12][13] Aloni was subsequently seen on 8 October attending a meeting of top Israeli military officials.[14]
An Israeli boy and his sisters killed during Hamas'sattack on Kibbutz Nir Oz on 7 October have been falsely accused of being "crisis actors".[15]
A photo shared by Israel showing the charred corpse of a baby was claimed by many on social media to have beenAI-generated, based on AI detector "AI or Not". The claim was repeated byAl Jazeera Arabic. The company behind "AI or Not" later said that the result was afalse positive caused by the image's compression and blurred name tag; several experts who looked at the photo found it to be genuine. Other social media users claimed, based on a4chan post, that the image had been altered from a similar photo of a dog, though researcher Tina Nikoukhah found that it was actually the dog picture which has been likely "falsified using generative methods".[16][17][18]
The community volunteer paramedic and rescue groupZAKA began collecting bodies immediately after the Hamas attacks, while the IDF avoided assigning soldiers fromHome Front Command who have been trained to carefully retrieve and document human remains in post-terrorism situations.[19] Home Front Command soldiers and volunteers from other organizations accused ZAKA volunteers of spreading horror stories of atrocities that did not happen for self-promotion as well as "releasing sensitive and graphic photos to shock people into donating" and other unprofessional behavior.[19][20]TheTimes of Israel reported that "A volunteer from a different organization told Haaretz that ZAKA also double-wrapped bodies in its own bags after they had already been placed in IDF or other organizations’ bags, creating a mess at headquarters when bodies were placed in the wrong sections."[20]Haaretz reported this double-bagging was done for self-promotion purposes: "At the attack scenes, the question was not only what to photograph but also what exactly to show. In some cases, volunteers from Zaka were seen wrapping bodies already wrapped in IDF bags. The new bag prominently displayed the Zaka logo."[19]
In the aftermath of the initial Hamas assault, witnesses from the Israeli soldiers, the Israeli Forces, and the first responder Israeli organizationZAKA said on French Israeli TV channeli24news that they had seen the bodies of beheaded infants at the site of theKfar Aza massacre.[21][22][23] During US Secretary of StateAntony Blinken's visit to Israel, he said he was shown photos of the massacre by Hamas of Israeli civilians and soldiers, and specifically that he saw beheaded IDF soldiers.[24] U.S. PresidentJoe Biden separately said that he had seen photographic evidence of terrorists beheading children, but the White House later clarified that Biden was alluding to news reports of beheadings, which have not contained or referred to photographic evidence.[25]NBC News called reports of "40 beheaded babies" unverified allegations,[25] adding that they appeared "to have originated from Israeli soldiers and people affiliated with the Israel Defense Force". They also added that "an Israeli official toldCNN the government had not confirmed claims of the beheadings".[25] The allegation mainly "stemmed from a viral Israeli news broadcast clip" and the main X /Twitter accounts propagating the claims werei24NEWS and Israel's official account, even though Israeli Defense spokesperson Doron Spielman told NBC News that he could not confirm i24NEWS's report.[25] As of 12 October,CNN had extensively reviewed online media content to verify Hamas-related atrocities but found no evidence to support claims of decapitated children.[26]
TheAP reported that two ZAKA volunteers made false statements aboutsexual violence and rape on 7 October.[27] Chaim Otmazgin, a ZAKA commander, claimed he found a raped woman due to her pants having been pulled down below her waist. He showed photos to the AP as part of his testimony. However, it was found out later that the body was laying as it was due to being dragged around by Israeli soldiers to check if it wasbooby-trapped. Otmazgin said he publicly corrected himself after learning what had happened.[27]
Members of ZAKA including Otmazgin and Simcha Greiniman claimed to have photos depicting genital mutilation, including nails and knives inserted into the groin and genitals.[28] These were shared with the UN's Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in ConflictPramila Patten's fact-finding mission, as well asNBC News. Both concluded these claims could not be verified based on the provided photos.[29] However Patten's report concludes that even though the exact scope of sexual violence can not be determined, at least five rapes occurred on 7 October.[29]
Regarding claims that linked Palestinian militants to sexual assaults on 7 October,The Times has remarked that investigations have been hampered by "false and misleading information" spread by "senior [Israeli] political figures and government-linked civil activists".[30] A UN report on these allegations has stated that Israeli authorities have been unable to produce the evidence politicians said existed.[30]
Yossi Landau, another ZAKA volunteer, claimed he found a pregnant woman killed with a fetus removed from her womb. This was also proven to be false.[27] Landau offered to showAl Jazeera journalists images of the scene, but didn't have images which would identify the scene he described.[31][32]
Shortly after 7 October, Cochav Elkayam-Levy, a legal expert from the Davis Institute for International Relations atHebrew University of Jerusalem, former Israeli government lawyer, former member of the military spokesperson's unit and close associate of Prime MinisterNetanyahu's, established the "Civil Commission on October 7th Crimes by Hamas against Women and Children", which aimed to give voice to the victims and their families.[30] In June 2024,The Times reported that Elkayam-Levy spread a "debunked story" about a "pregnant woman and her slaughtered foetus", while also circulating "photographs of murdered female soldiers that turned out to be images of Kurdish fighters in Syria."[30]The Times added: "Elkayam-Levy has nonetheless remained the most prominent public voice on the sexual violence of October 7, winning the country’s highest civilian honour, theIsrael Prize, in April."[30]
In a speech to theRepublican Jewish Coalition on 28 October,Eli Beer, founder of Israeli volunteer-based emergency medical services groupUnited Hatzalah, claimed that Hamas had burned a baby alive in an oven.[33] He attributed the claim to a United Hatzalah volunteer; one of them, Asher Moskowitz, also publicly made the claim.[34] It was repeated by journalist Dovid Efune, commentatorJohn Podhoretz and others, in tweets seen over 10 million times. Israeli journalists and police found no evidence for the claim, and a representative ofZAKA, a first responder organization, said the claim was "false".[33][35][36]
The 7 October attack by Hamas on Israel has become the subject of variousconspiracy theories. These theories claim that the attack, which resulted in approximately 1,200 deaths in Israel, was afalse flag operation conducted by Israel itself, despite the overwhelming evidence provided by multiple sources, including smartphone and GoPro footage capturing the breach of the border by Hamas forces.[37][38]
This misinformation has been proliferating across various social media platforms, where hashtags linking Israel to "false flag" operations have seen a significant increase in usage. This spread of falsehoods was not limited to online spaces; it has manifested in real-world scenarios, including city council meetings and public protests, where individuals have publicly denied the facts of the attack.[37]
Researchers and Jewish community leaders have expressed concern about the ties these conspiracy theories have toHolocaust denial and otherantisemitic beliefs, with denial of the 7 October attacks described as part of a broader pattern of misinformation that seeks to distort historical events and promote antisemitic narratives.[37]
Another unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that emerged following the 7 October Hamas attack suggests that the Israeli government, specifically Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu, had prior knowledge of the attack. Some even claim that Netanyahu issued a "stand-down" order to the Israeli military. The genesis of this theory appears to be fromCharlie Kirk, a right-wing political activist and supporter of U.S. PresidentDonald Trump, whose comments on a podcast fueled these claims. However, these assertions hinge solely on Kirk's personal speculations. Despite a lack of evidence, the theory has been influential in certain circles, especially among those critical of Netanyahu's leadership and Israeli policies.[39][additional citation(s) needed]
Social media accounts based in India have spread pro-Israeli disinformation, with influencers misrepresenting videos purported to show school girls taken as sex slaves, or Hamas kidnapping a Jewish baby. Indian Twitter accounts spread an out-of-context video claimed to represent "dozens of young girls taken as sex slaves by a 'Palestinian' fighter", which was instead showing probably a school trip to Jerusalem. Another clip primarily shared by Indian users was purported to depict a kidnapped baby; however, the video was taken a month earlier and had nothing to do with Gaza. Fact-checker Pratik Sinha said the "Indian right-wing has made India the disinformation capital of the world". The trend forms part of a wider pattern offake news in India with anIslamophobic slant, including disinformation on Palestinians coming from theBJP IT Cell, a department of India's governing party, theBJP.[40]
Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting published images of the capture of commanders ofNagorno-Karabakh by theAzerbaijani army inSeptember 2023 as the capture of Israeli commanders by Hamas.[41][42][43]
Journalist access to the Gaza Strip has been severely restricted by Israel, leading to widespread accusations from media organizations and press freedom groups that the Israeli government is deliberately obstructing independent coverage in order to suppress evidence of its military actions and limit global scrutiny.[44] Since the start of the war, Israel has only allowed limited media access to Gaza through IDF-escorted embeds, during which journalists have no freedom of movement and must submit their content for military review. Critics argue that this level of control results in selectively framed reporting that aligns with the Israeli military's perspective. Some analysts and press freedom organizations have described the resulting coverage as a form of propaganda due to the lack of independent verification and the inability to engage with Palestinian sources.[45]
According to historian and photography expertGerhard Paul, both the Israeli military and Hamas seek to influence Western public opinion, the former by determining which images can be released and denying journalists access, and if exceptions are made only granted under strict military supervision so they can "only see what they are supposed to see." Paul asserts that the Palestinian side, particularly Hamas, does so through the strategic use of emotionally charged imagery, and that many images, while not fabricated, are carefully composed or accompanied by misleading captions. Christopher Resch ofReporters Without Borders emphasizes that not all photographers in Gaza are affiliated with Hamas and warns that characterizing their work as propaganda can endanger them, as such accusations can lead to them being perceived as combatants and targeted accordingly. Resch also stated that, since theOctober 7 attacks, the Israeli government has attempted to cast doubt on the credibility of journalists and photographers reporting from the region.[46]
Following theAl-Ahli Arab Hospital explosion, an X account claiming to be anAl Jazeera journalist said they had video of a "Hamas missile landing in the hospital". Al Jazeera subsequently clarified that they were not associated with the account, and it was later removed.[47] Another X account that promotedpro-Kremlin misinformation claimedThe Wall Street Journal had reported that the explosion was caused by aMark 84 bomb butThe Wall Street Journal had not published such a report.[48][49]
In November 2023, a video appearing to show a nurse at theAl Shifa hospital went viral. She claimed that she was unable to treat patients because Hamas had taken over the entire hospital and were stealing fuel and medicine, with the video ending with her pleading for all Palestinians to leave Al Shifa. Many were quick to point out the falsehood in the video, as none of the documented doctors and nurses at the hospital recognize the woman depicted, and a reported Israeli accent and inability to speak clear Arabic.[50][51] Additionally, according to Esther Chan fromRMIT FactLab's CrossCheck, an analysis byopen-source investigators had determined that the video was likely doctored to artificially include fake sounds of explosions.[52] The video was originally posted on theMinistry of Foreign Affairs of Israel's Arabic Twitter account and it was boosted byEdward Haïm Cohen Halala, who has reported ties to the Israeli government, and has a popular social media presence with an Arabic following.[53][54][55]
Analyses conducted byBBC Verify andLogically Facts found that usage of the Pallywood term had increased onsocial media platforms following theOctober 7 attacks,[56][57] with BBC Verify finding a peak of 220,000 uses onTwitter in November 2023.[57] Logically Facts also found that most usages of the term came from the United States, followed by India and Israel.[56] During theGaza war,conspiracy theories involvingonline influencers mocking victims and claiming that Palestinians are using "crisis actors" went viral on social media, often citing the "Pallywood" term.[58][56] Israel's official Twitter account accused Gazans of placing live people in body bags before deleting the Tweet, whileAIPAC promoted similar content.[58] Many of theviral videos used to "prove" that crisis actors exist have been disproven.[58][59] The term often results inanti-Muslim hate speech and was especially popular after Israel announced plans to increase itsaerial bombardment of Gaza.[58] A video showing a Palestinian child killed during an October 11 Israeli airstrike onZeitoun was falsely claimed to be staged using a doll. The claim was promoted by official Israeli government social media accounts, including the X accounts of Israel's embassies in France and Austria, as well as pro-Israel and anti-Hamas accounts.[60][56]
In November 2023,Saleh Aljafarawi, a Palestinian blogger and singer who lived in Gaza, was falsely accused by several pro-Israeli figures, including the country's official Twitter account, of being a "crisis actor".[61][62][63] The false accusation claimed that Aljafarawi pretended to be injured and hospitalised in a video while a social media post the next day showed him in good health. However, the included video actually depicted a Palestinian teenager wounded in a raid onTulkarm in July 2023, who was falsely presented as Aljafarawi.[61] In the same month, Israeli diplomatOfir Gendelman circulated a clip from a Lebanese short film, claiming that it was proof that Palestinians were faking their suffering and calling it an example of "Pallywood". Gendelman subsequently deleted the post after it was fact-checked.[57][64] In early December 2023,The Jerusalem Post published an article falsely claiming that a dead 5-month-old Palestinian baby from Gaza was a doll.The Jerusalem Post later retracted the report with a statement on X, saying, "The article in question did not meet our editorial standards and was thus removed".[65][66][57] The false claim was also promoted by others such as Israel's officialTwitter account,Ben Shapiro,Hen Mazzig,Yoseph Haddad andStopAntisemitism.[67]
Israel's 2024Rafah offensive led to a resurgence of Pallywood claims.[68] Online posts misrepresented behind-the-scenes footage from the Palestinian drama seriesBleeding Dirt as showing "crisis actors" in Rafah.[69][70][68][71] Marc Owen Jones wrote in a 2025 research paper, "As Israel'skilling of thousands of Palestinian children and babies became harder to hide, high-profile Israeli accounts and media outlets claimed that Palestinians were fabricating casualty numbers and staging the killing of babies. The so-called 'Pallywood' narrative – a derogatory term suggesting that Palestinians stage scenes of suffering for propaganda purposes – has been a recurring theme in disinformation campaigns against Gaza."[72]
In August 2025, German newspapersBild andSüddeutsche Zeitung published articles questioning the authenticity of photos from the Gaza Strip, withBild accusing Anas Zayed Fteiha, aphotojournalist working for Turkey'sAnadolu Agency, of staging his photos of theGaza Strip famine. The articles were cited by Israel'sMinistry of Foreign Affairs as evidence of Pallywood.[73] Fteiha denied the accusations and accusedBild of repeated breaches ofjournalistic ethics. He stated, "The photo they published to distort me is entirely real. It was taken during the filming of a documentary documenting the famine in Gaza, as children were scrambling for food or water. Everything in it was real, not staged or directed." Israelifact-checking organizationFakeReporter also rebutted several claims made in theBild report.[74][75]
Also in August 2025, sociologist Ron Dudai analysed the widespread denial among Israelis of Israeli atrocities in the Gaza war as being a part of the longstanding Pallywood strategy, noting that while in earlier iterations it consisted of elaborate work to create conspiracy theories to deny atrocities as in the case of Muhammad Al-Durrah, in the Gaza War era, "the intricate conspiracy theories of the past have given way to a cruder form of denialism that scholars call conspiracism — the reflexive dismissal of any evidence that contradicts one’s interests as fabricated. Documentation is simply dismissed with a single word: 'Fake'."[76] He notes the examples of the denialism about mass starvation and what he terms theongoing Gaza genocide, stating:
Israel’s ongoing genocidal campaign in Gaza may be the most thoroughly documented atrocity in recent history, measured both by the sheer volume of evidence and the speed of its circulation. Smartphones and social media — which were still a world away during the genocides in Bosnia and Rwanda — allow events to be captured instantly, from countless angles, and shared globally in real time, with traditional media still playing a not-insignificant supporting role. And yet, faced with an unending flood of photos and videos of dead civilians, starving children, and entire neighborhoods reduced to rubble, much of the Israeli public — and a significant portion of Israel’s supporters abroad — responds in one of two ways: either it is all fake, or else the Gazans deserved it. Often, paradoxically, it is both at once: "There are no dead children in Gaza, and it’s good that we killed them."[76]
On 25 March 2024,Al Jazeera took down its video of a woman named Jamila al-Hissi who said that Israeli soldiers had "raped women, kidnapped women, executed women, and pulled dead bodies from under the rubble to unleash their dogs on them" during theirsiege of Al-Shifa Hospital. Former managing director ofAl Jazeera, Yasser Abu Hilalah, wrote on X, "Hamas investigations revealed that the story of the rape of women in Shifa Hospital was fabricated." Abu Hilalah reported that al-Hissi "justified her exaggeration and incorrect talk by saying that the goal was to arouse the nation's fervor and brotherhood".[80]
TheGaza Health Ministry's (GHM) figures are used by most humanitarian agencies and widely cited in media sources; they are considered to be reliable by many experts and have been verified by several independent bodies, but have been challenged by Israeli and US agencies.[81][82][83] Analyses challenging the GHM figures have in turn been rejected by experts.
Abraham Wyner, aPennsylvania professor of statistics, wrote inTablet that the GHM casualty figures were "faked".[84] Wyner's article was analyzed by professor Joshua Loftus of theLondon School of Economics, who concluded Wyner's article was "one of the worst abuses of statistics I’ve ever seen".[85]Columbia professor Les Roberts said that GHM numbers were accurate and probably even an underestimate.[86] Wyner's main argument was that from 26 Oct – 10 Nov, the number of deaths per day is 270 with "strikingly little variation".[84]CalTech statisticianLior Pachter responded that Wyner hadcherrypicked a particular period, outside of which thevariance was higher; and even within Wyner's picked timeframe the daily deaths had astandard deviation of 42.25 andvariance of 1,785.[87][88] Wyner also said that there were peculiarities in the data, such as a strongnegative correlation between the daily death counts of men and women.[84] In response,Marine Corps professor James Joyner quoted an opinion that GHM updates total deaths immediately, but there is a lag in updating the proportion of women and children, making time correlations "meaningless".[89]
In October 2024 the research groupAction on Armed Violence (AOAV) published a report based on the GHM's latest data concluding that at least 74% of the at the time 40,717 Gazan fatalities identified by the Ministry were civilians, and that this is likely to be an underestimate.[90] TheHenry Jackson Society's Andrew Fox published a report on 13 December 2024 alleging that the Gaza Health Ministry inflated the number of civilians deaths caused by Israeli attacks. According to the report there were significant errors in the data, with men being registered as women, adults as children, and natural deaths counted as killed by Israeli attacks, which were intentionally inserted to inflate the civilian death toll.[91] ProfessorMichael Spagat of AOAV responded by noting that such errors were marginal and random, as Fox only identified 2 adults registered as children, 3 "natural deaths", and misclassified sex cases affect 0.5% of the overall figures. Moreover, these errors went in both directions in roughly the same amount (67 men listed as women, 49 women listed as men, and age adjustments were spread widely across sex and age category). Spagat thus concluded that these were routine and minor calculation errors that do not affect the GHM's overall data on civilian deaths.[92]
In January 2025 apeer-reviewed analysis of deaths due to traumatic injury in theGaza war between October 2023 and 30 June 2024 was published in the medical journalThe Lancet, estimating over 70,000 deaths from traumatic injuries as of October 2024, with 59.1% of them being women, children and the elderly. It also noted that its findings "underestimate the full impact of the military operation in Gaza, as they do not account for non-trauma-related deaths resulting from health service disruption, food insecurity, and inadequate water and sanitation."[93]
According toinformation security experts interviewed by theNew York Times,Iran,Russia,China, Iran'sproxies,Al Qaeda and theIslamic State have been conducting massive onlinedisinformation efforts focused on "[undercutting] Israel, while denigrating Israel's principal ally, the United States".[5] Researchers have documented at least 40,000bots or fake social media accounts, as well as strategic use ofstate-controlled media outlets likeRT,Sputnik andTasnim.[5] An analysis byHaaretz found that hundreds of fake accounts on social media were targetingDemocratic Party lawmakers with spam messages repeating Israeli government accusations relating toUNRWA andHamas.[94]
ARussian disinformation campaign known asDoppelganger has pushed false information about the war using fake websites that mimic the appearance of news sources such asFox News,Le Parisien andDer Spiegel.[95][96]
In June 2024, Israel'sMinistry of Diaspora Affairs was revealed to have paid $2 million to Israeli political consulting firmStoic, to conduct a social media campaign, fueled by fake accounts and often employing misinformation, targeting 128 American Congresspeople, with a focus onDemocratic andAfrican-American members of theHouse of Representatives. Websites were also created to provide young, progressive Americans with Gaza news with a pro-Israel spin. Among the objectives of the campaign was amplifying Israeli attacks onUNRWA staffers and driving a wedge between Palestinians and African-Americans to prevent solidarity between the two groups. The campaign also took aim at people inCanada, who were exposed toIslamophobic content smearingCanadian Muslims and implying that pro-Palestinian protesters aimed at imposingSharia law. Messages were also directed to people in theGulf Arab countries, arguing that humanitarian concern for Palestinians was a wasteful distraction from local affairs.[97][98]
In August 2025,Xaviaer DuRousseau and other American and Israeli social media influencers went on a paid trip to Gaza by thediaspora affairs ministry to film and share content from the distribution sites. According toHaaretz, the aim of the campaign is to "reveal the truth" about the conditions in Gaza.[99] DuRousseau stated on Twitter, "There is enough food at this aid base to feed every person in Gaza for at least a week, but the UN, Hamas, etc refuse to distribute the food efficiently. Instead, it sits here to spoil and be stolen. How’s that Israel’s fault?".[100]
According to theNew York Times, many images and videos that circulate onsocial media pretending to be from the Gaza war are in fact from other conflicts, such as theSyrian civil war; and even of natural disasters, such as arecent flood in Tajikistan.[101] Pro-Hamas accounts have also misrepresented footage from theSyrian civil war as showing children being killed in Gaza.[102]
A video of aCNN broadcast from near theIsrael-Gaza border[103] with audio added to suggest the network had faked an attack went viral on social media.[104][105]
During the early stages of the war, a video described as"Hamas executes people by throwing them off a roof of a building!" was shared widely on social media.[106] But the video did not depict Hamas, or any other group based inPalestine, it was a misrepresented video ofISIS in Iraq, from 2015.[106] A July 2015 report fromAl Arabiya, included identical images and that were originally shared by ISIS, and showed the execution of four gay men by ISIS inFallujah, in Iraq.[106]
In February 2024, Israel's official X account posted a 30-second video listing thehumanitarian aid it claimed to have provided for Gaza. However the video included footage showing tents and equipment that was actually filmed in March 2022 and depicted a camp inMoldova forUkrainian refugees. The same account later deleted the video, and stated that "the photo was for illustrative purposes and we should have stated that in the video."[107][108]
Videos falsely linked to the war included a video of children in cages posted on 4 October,[109][110] footage from 2020 of Iranian lawmakers chanting "Death to America",[111][112] and photos of theCairo Tower in Egypt appearing to be lit with thePalestinian flag spread on social media, which turned out to be a modified version of the tower in 2010.[113] Footage from video gameArma 3 has been presented as war footage.[114][115][116][117]
On 8 October, a video supposedly of Hamas thanking Ukraine for supplying them with weapons was shared by an X account linked to the RussianWagner Group. It was viewed over 300,000 times and shared byAmerican far-right accounts. The next day, former Russian presidentDmitry Medvedev tweeted, "Well,NATO buddies, you've really got it, haven't you? The weapons handed to the Nazi regime in Ukraine are now being actively used against Israel."[118][119][120] On 10 October, another video was released falsely claiming to be made by the BBC and purported to quote theinvestigative journalism websiteBellingcat to confirm the sale of weapons between Ukraine and Hamas. Both the BBC and Bellingcat confirmed that the video was a fake and the claim was false.[119][121][122]
Social media users on both sides of the war sharedbehind-the-scenes footage of an actor lying in fake blood from a 2022 Palestinian short film, alleging it was evidence that the other side was creating propaganda.[123][124][118] A video of Egyptianparatroopers flying over theEgyptian Military Academy that was falsely claimed to show Hamas militantsinfiltrating an Israeli music festival went viral on X inIndonesia.[125]
An AI-generated video of modelBella Hadid supposedly apologising for her past remarks and expressing support for Israel circulated on social media.[126][127][128]
Viral claims that the IDF had destroyed Gaza'sChurch of Saint Porphyrius on 9 October were debunked by the church.[129][130] Subsequently,an Israeli airstrike hit the premises of the church on 19 October, killing 18.[131]
In October 2023, disinformation experts uncovered an account on X that published false reports aboutQatar threatening to cut off its gas exports if Israel continued to bombard the Gaza Strip.[132]
The public diplomacy of Israel, known ashasbara, is the country's efforts to communicate directly with citizens of other nations to inform and influence their perceptions, with the aim of garnering support or tolerance for the Israeli government's strategic objectives.Hasbara was formally introduced to theZionist vocabulary byNahum Sokolow.[133]Hasbara (Hebrew:הַסְבָּרָה) has no direct English translation, but roughly means "explaining". It is a communicative strategy that "seeks to explain actions, whether or not they are justified".[134] As it focuses on providing explanations about one's actions,hasbara has been called a "reactive and event-driven approach".[135][136] In 2003,Ron Schleifer calledhasbara "a positive-sounding synonym for 'propaganda'".[137]
During the Gaza war, theIsraeli government and Israeli cyber companies have deployedartificial intelligence (AI) tools andbot farms to spread disinformation and graphic, emotionally charged and false propaganda.[6][7][8] InThe Intercept, investigative journalistJeremy Scahill wrote, "At the center of Israel’sinformation warfare campaign is a tactical mission to dehumanize Palestinians and to flood the public discourse with a stream of false, unsubstantiated, and unverifiable allegations."[8] He added that "Israel’s hasbara campaign is reminiscent of the Bush administration’s monthslong carnival of lies, sanitized and promoted by major media outlets, about alleged weapons of mass destruction in Iraq."[8] Writing foropenDemocracy, British academicPaul Rogers stated, "Israel must maintain the pretence of an orderly war with few civilians killed. Netanyahu's government is lying, but it would be naive to expect otherwise. Lying is what many powerful states routinely do, particularly in wartime."[138]
In June 2024, Israel'sMinistry of Diaspora Affairs was revealed to have paid $2 million to Israeli political consulting firmStoic, to conduct a social media campaign, fueled by fake accounts and often employing misinformation, targeting American Congresspeople, with a focus onDemocratic andAfrican-American members of theHouse of Representatives. Websites were also created to provide young, progressive Americans with Gaza news with a pro-Israel spin.[97][98]
On multiple occasions, analyses have found issues with claims by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). In October 2023, aFinancial Times analysis on abombing of Palestinians evacuating Gaza City found that "most explanations aside from an Israeli strike" could be ruled out, though the IDF blamed the attack on Palestinian militants.[139][140]
In October 2023, shortly after theAl-Ahli Arab Hospital explosion, Israeli sources published audio purporting to show two Hamas militants in a phone call claiming responsibility for the act and blaming it on a malfunctioning rocket.[141]BBC andCNN said they could not verify the recording.[142] BritishChannel 4 News reported on aforensic analysis of the alleged Hamas operative audio released by the IDF, concluding that it was digitally manipulated. Two Arabic language journalists said that the recording did not appear authentic, because the "language, accent, dialect, syntax and tone" were not credible.[143]Channel 4 News also reported on a preliminary audio assessment performed by a sonic analysis company called Earshot, which concluded that the audio recording had been edited to fuse two channels that were recorded separately, one for each speaker.[144] In November 2023, analysis by theBBC found that a video released by the Israeli military following theAl-Shifa Hospital siege had been edited despite IDF claims to the contrary.[145]
On 4 December 2023,Haaretz reported on Israeli claims about beheaded babies, stating that these "unverified stories [had been] disseminated byIsraeli search and rescue groups,army officers and evenSara Netanyahu".[146][147][a]Haaretz journalists Nir Hasson and Liza Rozovsky related the chronology of the news items about "beheaded babies" and "hung babies" and concluded, "this story is false."[146] They quoted Ishay Coen, a journalist for theultra-Orthodox websiteKikar HaShabbat, who admitted he made a mistake by unquestioningly accepting the IDF's statements.[146] "Why would an army officer invent such a horrifying story?", Hashabbat asked, adding, "I was wrong."[146]
In December 2023, an analysis byThe Washington Post confirmed reports byHuman Rights Watch that Israel had usedwhite phosphorus in an attack on Lebanon,[149][150] directly contradicting the IDF.[151] In January 2024, after an Israeli airstrike killed journalistHamza Dahdouh, the IDF called Dahdouh a "suspect" who was hit while driving with a "terrorist"; however,The Washington Post found "no indications that either man was operating as anything other than a journalist that day".[152]
After reports spread thata mother and daughter were killed by Israeli snipers in December 2023 in a church where a number ofPalestinian Christians sheltered, the Israeli army denied targerting the compound. They claimed instead there was Hamas activity in its vicinity and Israeli soldiers shot back.[153] Catholic officials and Member of British ParliamentLayla Moran, who maintained contact with refugees in the church, stated, on the contrary, that no Palestinian belligerents were in the area and that the two women had been killed by the Israeli army, who were the ones preventing the refugees from leaving.[154][155][156]
In November 2023, a video posted by the IDF showedDaniel Hagari, inside theAl-Rantisi Children's Hospital, where he claimed that the IDF had found Hamas weapons and technology, as well as a "list of terrorist names" in Arabic with the title "Operation Al-Aqsa Flood", showing each agents' rota guarding the hostages. However, a translation of the document showed that it contained no names but instead a calendar of the days of the week.[157] After the questioning of the veracity of the claim, an Israeli spokesperson backtracked, but CNN, while removing the segment, did not provide an editors' note acknowledging the change or the dispute over the initial video.[158]
In regards to the March 2024Flour massacre, aCNN investigation said that "Mark Regev, the Israeli prime minister’s special adviser, initially told CNN that Israeli forces had not been involved." However the IDF said soon after that "soldiers had not fired directly on Palestinians seeking aid, but rather fired 'warning shots' in the air."[159]Al- Jazeera reported evidence of a "large number" of gunshot wounds from a United Nations team, medical professionals and witnesses.[160] TheNew York Times also reported that witness accounts differed from the Israeli military account who described extensive shooting after thousands massed aroundaid trucks.[161] IDF drone footage edits out the events causing the crowds to disperse and rejected aCNN request for the full unedited footage.[162] The CNN investigation cast doubt on other IDF claims such as the timing of shooting.[162] Several days after the attack, a senior crisis response adviser atAmnesty International stated, "There is concrete evidence that contradicts whatever statements are being made by the Israeli authorities".[163]
Afterbombing a tent camp in Rafah in an area that Israel had designated as a "safe zone" for civilians, killing 45 people, Israeli officials initially told their American counterparts that they believed their airstrike ignited a nearby fuel tank, creating a large fire.[164] In one video, an unnamed Gazan narrator said the explosion was caused by a "Hamas jeep loaded with weapons".[165] Later, the IDF suggested that a militant warehouse containing ammunition or "some other material" in the area caused the fire. It also released an Arabic phone call in which they clearly say that the Israeli missile was not responsible for the fire, that the fire was caused by secondary explosions, and the secondary explosions came from an ammunition warehouse.[166] However, James Cavanaugh, a specialist who worked at theATF, said the fire did not indicate "some giant stash that exploded."[167] TheNew York Times viewed numerous videos and did not find evidence that a significant secondary explosion was ignited.[168]
The Israeli army also denied responsibility for the killing of 5-year-oldHind Rajab, her family and thePalestine Red Crescent Society paramedics sent to rescue her, saying that their forces were not in firing range on the day of the girl's death. However, bothAl Jazeera andThe Washington Post concluded, based on investigation of satellite imagery, that Israeli armored vehicles were indeed in the area at the time.[169][170]
In March 2025, Israelkilled 15 paramedics from the Palestine Red Crescent Society and buried them in a mass grave along with their ambulances.[171][172] The IDF initially claimed, "several vehicles were identified advancing suspiciously toward IDF troops without headlights, or emergency signals, their movement was not co-ordinated in advance. Thus, IDF troops opened fire at the suspected vehicles."[173] However, after video evidence emerged showing the ambulances were clearly marked and using both headlights and flashing emergency lights, the IDF called their initial account "mistaken."[174]
On 19 March 2025, Israel attacked a UN guest house inDeir al-Balah, killing one UN worker. Israel initially denied having attacked the guest house, but subsequently admitted responsibility in April 2025.[175]
An investigation published by+972 Magazine found that 3D animations of Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, and Iran published by the Israeli army used existing visuals from third-party sources. An animation showing a supposed Hamascommand center under Al-Shifa Hospital had been previously used by the army prior to the war to claim there was a tunnel under an UNRWA school. An animation of the Mushtaha Tower used images published by theScottish Maritime Museum.[176]
In other instances, Israeli forces' claims have been questioned based on an apparent lack of evidence. In December 2023, Israel stated there was a Hamas tunnel network connected to theAl-Shifa Hospital; however, a report byThe Washington Post found "There is no evidence that the tunnels could be accessed from inside hospital wards".[177] Over the course of the war, repeatedIsraeli attacks on hospitals were justified by the Israeli military's claims that the hospitals were used by militants.[178] TheAssociated Press, however, stated that after months of investigations, it found that Israel had provided "little or even no evidence" of a significant militant presence near theal-Awda,Indonesian, orKamal Adwan hospitals prior to their raids.[179]
In January 2024, Israel claimed that12 UNRWA staff members had participated in the 7 October attack on Israel; however, theFinancial Times,Sky News,Channel 4, and other news outlets all stated that Israel's claims were not proven by the intelligence documents they reviewed.[180][181][182][183]
In February 2024, the IDF stated Hamas was stealinghumanitarian aid, leadingDavid M. Satterfield, a senior U.S. envoy, to say there was no evidence to support Israel's claims.[184]
In July 2024,Bild and theJewish Chronicle published stories based on what they claimed wereinternal Hamas documents, alleging that Hamas leaderYahya Sinwar opposed a Gaza ceasefire and used negotiations as psychological warfare. The documents were later found to be fabricated, and four Israelis, including an aide to Netanyahu, were arrested for falsifying and distributing them. The fake documents also claimed Sinwar was planning to smuggle himself and Israeli hostages through thePhiladelphi corridor into Egypt. At the time, Netanyahu was refusing to withdraw Israeli forces from the area and falsely claimed that Hamas, not Israel, was sabotaging ceasefire negotiations.[183]
In September 2024, the IDF stated it was launching an investigation into the release of forged Hamas documents that were leaked to the international press, apparently in an attempt to sway Israeli public opinion against ahostage-ceasefire deal.[185]
In December 2024, theNew York Times reported that at least 24 UNRWA employees were members of Hamas orPalestinian Islamic Jihad, with most allegedly part of Hamas’s armed wing. The report was based on “secret Hamas military plans” that purportedly identified schools as strategic sites. The Times did not mention that prior allegations had been disproven, but acknowledged it could not verify the records, which were provided by the Israeli military, noting they resembled previous Hamas documents. When Drop Site News asked which documents the Times was referring to, they did not respond. UNRWA spokesperson Tamara Alrifai criticized the story, saying it fed into a narrative of UNRWA being a Hamas front, despite repeated debunking of such claims. She added, “UNRWA shares the lists/names of its staff in the occupied Palestinian territory with the government of Israel every single year, so it is astonishing that a country with some of the highest intelligence and military security in the world has not come back to a UN agency with concerns about staff until the war started.”[183]
In February 2024,Volker Türk, the UN human rights chief, stated that the United Nations had been the subject ofdisinformation attacks, saying, "The UN has become a lightning rod for manipulative propaganda and a scapegoat for policy failures."[186]
United Nations (UN) Director-GeneralAntonio Guterres has accused Israel of spreading misinformation about the war in Gaza in an attempt to lower the credibility of the UN.[187]
"I've heard the same source many times saying that I never attacked Hamas, that I never condemned Hamas, that I am a supporter of Hamas. I asked for a statistic to be made by our colleagues. I have condemned Hamas 102 times, 51 of them in formal speeches. The others in different social platforms. So, I mean, the truth in the end always wins." United Nations Director-GeneralAntonio Guterres.[187]
A fake memo that purported to show President Biden authorizing $8 billion in aid to Israel circulated on social media[188][189] and was cited in articles by Indian news outletsFirstpost andOneindia.[189]
In September 2024,CNN hostsJake Tapper andDana Bash falsely accused U.S. House RepresentativeRashida Tlaib of stating that Michigan Attorney GeneralDana Nessel was unable to do her job because of her religion—something Tlaib never stated.[190] Bash and Tapper were repeating claims first made by Nessel in a social media post criticizing a racist caricature suggesting Tlaib was a member ofHezbollah.[191] Steve Neavling, theMetro Times journalist who conducted the original interview with Tlaib, called the claims against her "spurious".[192]
Disinformation about the war has spread on social media platforms, particularly X (formerly known asTwitter).[193][194][195][86][84] The European Union warnedElon Musk andMark Zuckerberg that X andMeta were hosting disinformation and illegal content about the war, with potential fines of up to 6% of the companies' global revenue according to theDigital Services Act.[196][197][198][199]
In response to the reports, X's CEOLinda Yaccarino told EU internal market commissionerThierry Breton that it had "taken action to remove or label tens of thousands of pieces of content" and removed hundreds of accounts linked to Hamas.[200]
According toNewsGuard, "at least 14 false claims related to the war garnered 22 million views across X,TikTok, andInstagram within three days of the Hamas attack."[201] On 13 October, the EU opened an investigation into X about the spread of disinformation and terrorist content related to the war.[202][203]
On 14 October,Center for Countering Digital Hate CEO Imran Ahmed said his group was tracking a spike in efforts to push false information about the war, adding that U.S. adversaries, extremists,Internet trolls and engagement farmers were exploiting the war for their own gain. Graham Brookie, senior director of theAtlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab, said that his team had witnessed a surge in terrorist propaganda, graphic content, false or misleading claims andhate speech, with much of the content being circulated onTelegram.[204] An Israel-based company that analyses social media, said that one in five accounts taking part in conversations about Hamas' attacks were fake, adding that they had found approximately 40,000 such accounts on X andTikTok.[205]
According toAP's David Klepper, pictures from the Gaza war have "vividly and painfully illustratedAI's potential as apropaganda tool, used to createlifelike images of carnage... digitally altered ones spread on social media have been used to make false claims about responsibility for casualties or to deceive people about atrocities that never happened."[206]
The New York Times described the start of the Gaza war as releasing a "deluge of online propaganda and disinformation" that was "larger than anything seen before". It described the conflict as "fast becoming a world war online" and stated thatRussia,China,Iran andits proxies had used state media and covert influence campaigns on social media networks to support Hamas, undermine Israel, criticize the United States and cause unrest.[5]James Rubin of the U.S. State Department'sGlobal Engagement Center called coverage of the conflict as being swept up in "an undeclared information war with authoritarian countries".[5]
On 9 October, X said there were more than 50 million posts on the platform about the conflict.[86] Elon Musk recommended two accounts that previously promoted a false claim about an explosion nearthe Pentagon for updates about the war.[207][194]
On 10 October, researchers found that a network of 67 X accounts was coordinating a campaign of pushing false information about the war.[208] The accounts have been posting near-identical content, sharing false information with both pro-Palestine and pro-Israel narratives.[209]
According toWired, the community fact-checking system of X,Community Notes, has in some instances contributed to the spread of disinformation instead of correcting it.Wired cited an incident where a video uploaded byDonald Trump Jr. of Hamas shooting at Israelis was inaccurately tagged as a false video from several years ago as an example of the unreliability of Community Notes.[210] Fake accounts pretending to be a BBC journalist andThe Jerusalem Post promoted false information about the war prior to X suspending them.[211][84]
On 12 October, the Tech Transparency Project reported that Hamas was using premium accounts on X to push propaganda.[212][213] X said it has banned Hamas and removed hundreds of accounts affiliated with Hamas.[214]
On 13 October, onThe World radio program, Rebecca Rosman reported that disinformation on X was being monetized by paid-verified users with "new-content" recommendation preference, resulting in millions of views.[215]
According to a report byNewsGuard on 19 October,verified users on X were behind 74% of the 250 most-engaged posts between 7 and 14 October that promoted false or unsubstantiated information about the war. NewsGuard also found that only 79 of the 250 posts were flagged by Community Notes.[216][217][218][219][220]
On 28 October, commentatorJackson Hinkle posted on X thatHaaretz had reported that the Israeli government inflated the death toll for theOctober 7 attacks.Haaretz stated that Hinkle's post "contain[ed] blatant lies" and was not substantiated by their reporting on the attack.[221] Hinkle also claimed that the image of a Jewish baby burned alive by Hamas on 7 October "was created by artificial intelligence". He was subsequentlydeplatformed from YouTube.[222][223][224]
Syrian YouTuberMaram Susli claimed that footage showed Israeli military helicopters firing on Israelis escaping the 7 Octobermassacre at the supernova festival, carried by Hamas. However, footage resulted to be from Israeli attacks on Hamas positions in Gaza three days later.[225] She also posted a photograph of a woman carrying a child's toy car down the stairs of a largely destroyed building suggesting it was Gaza after Israeli attacks. The picture was actually an award-winning photograph taken inHoms during theSyrian civil war.[226][227][228][229]
An investigation byProPublica andColumbia University'sTow Center for Digital Journalism found that verified accounts promoting misinformation about the conflict saw their audience grow significantly during the first month of the conflict, and that Community Notes had failed to scale sufficiently, with 80% of the debunked tweets reviewed not being clarified with a note.[230][231]
On 12 October, theEU warnedTikTok about illegal content and disinformation on its platform.[232][233] On 15 October, TikTok said it had taken action to remove "violative content and accounts".[234] It also said it had established a command center for the conflict, updated its automated detection systems to detect violent content and added moderators who speakArabic andHebrew.[234][235][236] A TikTok video promoting conspiracy theories thatHamas's attack had been orchestrated by the media was viewed over 300,000 times.[236]
By mid-November 2023,RepublicanU.S. RepresentativeMike Gallagher had claimed that TikTok was "intentionally brainwashing" American youth into supportingHamas, citing the spike in pro-Palestinian content following the outbreak of hostilities betweenIsrael and Hamas. In response to criticism, TikTok issued a press release on 20 November asserting that younger Americans, particularlyMillennials andGeneration Z, tended to be more sympathetic to the Palestinians than to Israel, citingGallup polling data dating back to 2010. TikTok also claimed that its algorithm did not take sides but operated in apositive feedback loop based on user engagement. The company also denied favouring "one side of an issue over another" or intentionally promoting pro-Palestinian hashtags such as "#freepalestine," which had attracted 25.5 billion views by 14 November. By comparison, "#standwithisrael" had attracted 440.4 million views. TikTok's press release also stated that it had removed 925,000 videos related to the conflict for violating community standards, including promoting Hamas, had hired moderators fluent in Arabic and Hebrew to parse content, and begun removing fake accounts created in response to the Israel-Hamas conflict.[237]
According to aTheMarker report,neo-Nazi propaganda,antisemitic content, andcalls for the destruction of Israel were all circulating on TikTok throughout the war.[238]
In April 2025,Drop Site News, citing data and documents leaked bywhistleblowers and multiple independent sources fromMeta, reported that Meta Platforms has been engaging with Crackdown on posts critical of Israel or showing support to the Palestinian people. Drop Site's data showed that Meta complied with 94% of Israeli government takedown requests since the beginning of theGaza war, with Israel being largest originator of takedown requests globally. A further 38.8 million posts acrossFacebook andInstagram were automatically removed, suppressed, or their authors banned, Drop Site said, to silencecriticism of Israel.[239]
TheAl-Qassam Brigades, Hamas's military wing, had around 200,000 followers onTelegram at the time of Hamas's attack. According to the Digital Forensic Research Lab, its following has tripled since then, with its posts being viewed over 300,000 times.[214][240] The Digital Forensic Research Lab found that Hamas relies on Telegram to send statements to its supporters.[240]
According to political analyst and researcher Arieh Kovler, many Israelis follow official-sounding Telegram channels that share out-of-context videos and unverified rumors.[240]
In a statement, Telegram said it was "evaluating the best approaches and... soliciting input from a wide range of third parties" and that it wished to be "careful not to exacerbate the already dire situation by any rush actions".[240]
In October 2023,Arma 3 developerBohemia Interactive said in a statement, "With the tragic events currently unfolding in the Middle East, we feel it is vital to share once again our statement concerning the use of Arma 3 as a source of fake news footage. It's disheartening for us to see the game we all love being used in this way. While we have found ways to tackle this issue somewhat effectively by closely cooperating with leading fact-checking agencies, sadly we can't mitigate it entirely."[241]
In November 2023,Center for Countering Digital Hate CEO Imran Ahmed said that misinformation about the war was as difficult to track asCOVID-19 misinformation and misinformation about the2020 United States presidential election.[242] Propaganda researcherPekka Kallioniemi stated thatCOVID-19 vaccines,U.S. support for Ukraine and the Gaza war are "part of the same disinformation package", and that the same people spreading disinformation about COVID-19 and vaccines and about theRussian invasion of Ukraine were spreading pro-Hamas disinformation.[243] That December,BBC Verify journalist andfact-checker Shayan Sardarizadeh said he had never witnessed a prior conflict "where so much disinformation is posted with the direct intent of dehumanizing real victims of war on both sides. Dead or injured women and children, civilians, hostages, prisoners; no-one is being spared."[244]
In January 2024,McDonald's CEOChris Kempczinski said, "Several markets in the Middle East and some outside the region are experiencing a meaningful business impact due to the war and associated misinformation that is affecting brands like McDonald's."[245] The boycotts started afterMcDonald's Israel announced it had donated free meals to IDF soldiers involved in the war.[246]
In February 2024,Bellingcat founderEliot Higgins said, "I think the intensity of online discourse around Israel and Palestine is really kind of much worse than I've seen in any of the conflicts. People are not looking to establish the truth in many cases, but basically just look for things to bash each other over the head online. It's really just about people arguing their positions, their opinions, and not really establishing the exact truth around what's happening."[247]
Speaking about Israel's decision not to allow foreign journalists into Gaza, UN secretary-generalAntonio Guterres stated, "Denying international journalists entry into Gaza is allowing disinformation and false narratives to flourish."[248] The technology director of theInstitute for Strategic Dialogue stated, "The corrosion of the information landscape is undermining the ability of audiences to distinguish truth from falsehood on a terrible scale."[249]
An IDF source told the JC the Hamas claim about Commander Aloni was "unclear and unconfirmed".
In the meantime, Zaka volunteers were there. Most of them worked at the sites of murder and destruction from morning to night. However, according to witness accounts, it becomes clear that others were engaged in other activities entirely. As part of the effort to get media exposure, Zaka spread accounts of atrocities that never happened, released sensitive and graphic photos, and acted unprofessionally on the ground.
The unit's soldiers, as well as volunteers from other organizations, accused ZAKA volunteers of spreading stories of horrors that didn't happen, releasing sensitive and graphic photos to shock people into donating, and being unprofessional in a bid for screen time.
This conspiracy has been around for years, but mentions of Pallywood spiked dramatically after Oct. 7, 2023, far surpassing previous peaks for the term during past Israeli military offensives in Gaza and the West Bank.
The so-called 'Pallywood' narrative – a derogatory term suggesting that Palestinians stage scenes of suffering for propaganda purposes – has been a recurring theme in disinformation campaigns against Gaza.
Used everywhere, by everyone, the count produced by the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health has been the subject of several controversies since the war began. In a bid for transparency, the publication in September of a list of the names of the victims paradoxically rekindled criticisms. But many experts and media organizations agree that the figures are reliable, and maybe even underestimated.
Patcher writes: "Again, the baseline model for count data posits a Poisson distribution on the numbers, which in this case would represent a variance of 270. A compound Poisson process makes more sense in this case, and such a process would have even higher variance. Here we see exactly that, a variance of 1785, which is more than 6x what one would see in a Poisson process. If the author thinks the variance should be even higher than *that*, he needs to provide an argument for why, and point to historical data. Of course in this case the variance is even higher, because he appears to have "cherry" picked the 15 days."
Additionally, commenter Ken M adds this insight: "If you look at the numbers, it's very clear that they update fatalities faster than the update #women or #children (and they don't specify #men, that is just (#fatalities – #women-#children)). On some days fatalities update but there is no change in the #w or #c; on other days the increase in (#w+#c) exceeds the increase in #f. In other words, in the conditions of war, it is hard to get information. The Gazan Ministry of Health (GMH) makes a list of the name and ID # of every identifiable death; Israel maintains the registry of ID #'s so GMH can't fake that. That's why their numbers come out accurate. But in real time, they may get a number of fatalities from a hospital and get the names, which allow identification of #w or #c, only later, maybe much later. And if they get the list of names, they have to go through the registry to determine who is a child or an adult, and maybe for ambiguous names who is a woman or a man, and that probably takes time too. So #w and #c get updated with arbitrary lags, sometimes multiple days worth may suddenly get updated at once. So looking at day-by-day movements of these #'s is meaningless."
Following Saturday's large-scale attack by Hamas militants on Israeli targets, including the killing and hostage taking of civilians, misleading footage purporting to show the military escalation of the conflict flooded social media — including a slew of clips from Arma 3, a hyper realistic open-world combat video game that allows users to customize gaming scenarios.
Israel claims the Islamic Jihad failed missile was fired from here, a cemetery very close to the hospital, but look again at the video of the event, the trajectory of the missile doesn't line up with that location... Confusingly the Israeli presentation also says the missile was fired from a location down on the southwest, it can't be both.
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