The Disinformation Bulletin, dated October 20, 2023, prepared by the Center for Countering Disinformation of our Directorate with the theme "Palestine Exclusive", was released.
In the bulletin titled "Palestine", which describes unrealistic posts and manipulation attempts regarding Israel's attacks on Palestine, posts about the shooting of the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in the Al-Zeytoun District of Gaza were included.
The bulletin stated that the claim that "“Hamas, not Israel, carried out the attack", which was raised on some social media accounts, is not true and added: ''The al-Zaytoun neighbourhood in the north of Gaza is an area where hundreds of civilians have been killed in days of intense Israeli bombardment. When the footage of the hospital bombing is examined, it becomes obvious that the ammunition that had the effect of destroying the area was not the type that Hamas had previously employed.''
The bulletin noted that the footage shared by Israeli propaganda accounts with the claim that "Hamas missile hit the hospital" belonged to 2022 and also stated that the Israeli army made threatening statements about the immediate evacuation of hospitals that it claimed were used as shelters.
"The footage was cropped and inverted"
The bulletin emphasised that the footage shared from Israel's official state account on social media with the claim that "the missile that hit the hospital was fired from Gaza" "included manipulation" and added that the footage had been cropped and inverted prior to being shared with the intent to manipulate. Upon analysing the unedited footage, it was concluded that the missiles launched from Gaza were aimed towards Israel, and the hospital that was struck was not in the path of those missiles.
In the bulletin, it was stated that immediately after the bombing of the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza, Hananya Naftali, the former digital media officer of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, shared a post announcing that "the Israeli Air Force has hit a hospital in Gaza" and that Naftali, who deleted the post after a short time, tried to manipulate the world public opinion by sharing posts claiming that "the missile that hit the hospital was fired from Gaza".
The claim that dolls were used for propaganda
The bulletin also reported that the claims that "Palestinians are creating propaganda with a doll” regarding the images of children who lost their lives during Israel's bombardment of Gaza and that "We want the Holocaust" slogans were chanted during the anti-Israel protests organised at the University of Pennsylvania" were untrue.
In the bulletin, it was stated that the photo in the "Israeli army captured Hamas leader" post on some social media accounts belonged to Ruben Vardanyan, one of the former ministers of state of the so-called Armenian administration in Karabakh, who was captured last month, and that the images circulated with the claim that "a pregnant woman was tortured to death by Hamas" have been used to depict "violent incidents between criminal organisations in Mexico" since 2018.
In the bulletin, it was emphasised that the images taken during the routine rotation of the United Nations (UN) troops were shared with the claim that "UN Interim Force is leaving Lebanon" and that the claim made by some accounts that "500 thousand Palestinians are about to be taken to Türkiye; preparations are being made" is not true.
The bulletin also noted that the claim that "Türkiye aids Israel by sending fruits and vegetables" is false and manipulative.
Please click here to access the whole bulletin.