Has the West been taken in by Hamas’ lies and anti Israeli narrative?

[OpheliaWasntMad]

https://nypost.com/2026/09/21/opinion/journalist-admits-anti-israel-narrative-driving-protests-is-based-on-hamas-lies/

This journalist admits that his reporting from Gaza was not accurate because he was afraid of retaliation from Hamas.
Why have so many believed every report from Gaza journalists?

While acknowledging the horrible devastation of death, I feel I should point out that one reason for the high child mortality is that their households are larger. If the household of any of my family or friends were bombed or starved out, it would be a matter of one or two children dying, but in Palestinian homes, generally more than that, it seems. Same with adults. And I don't think that it can be logically said that anyone is targeting children for starvation.

What was happening in Gaza was people were being told to evacuate from x area so people were leaving their homes and staying with relatives in y where it was supposed to be a 'safe zone' then the 'safe zone' was bombed. Or people's homes were destroyed so they were staying with extended family or friends who still had a home and then that home was bombed too.

It was a whole thing where people were shuffled from a to b to c then bombed anyway. From very early on in the conflict 100s of 1000s of people were displaced and extended family and friends opened their homes to who ever needed it. Whole bloodlines were wiped out by Israels bombing not because their families were different than yours but because they cared for each other and tried to help each other.

@OpheliaWasntMad
”The child-death data in Gaza’s 2025 mortality rates are even more striking. According to the Ministry of Health, malnutrition caused 4.1 per cent of infant deaths in 2025. But in 2021, two years before Hamas ignited this conflict with its fascistic pogrom, malnutrition was the cause of 4.4 per cent of child deaths. How come death by malnutrition fell as an overall proportion of infant fatality even as Israel was ‘intentionally starving children’?”

This is a simple maths error on your part. A drop in the % of child deaths by one cause does not mean that fewer children have died of the cause from one year to the next or that food was not scarce.

In the context of around 10,000 children being killed by warfare in 2025 compared to 67 in 2021, the 4.4% of 2021 is a much smaller number than 4.1% of 2025. The only reason it is at 4.1% is because of magnitudes more deaths from the war itself. You need to look at what # and % of total children have died by these causes to make a real comparison between years..

By the way, when did Palestinians/Arabs ever warn Israelis about an impending attack?

I mean to answer to your question right before Oct 7. I don't really see what that has to do with my post though? Are you saying that it was a kindness to displace Palestinians multiple times, tell them that somewhere was safe and then bomb them?

You didn't seem to understand why there were so many people in every building so I was just explaining it to you. Unless you, your family and your friends arent very close and loving you all would have offered shelter to each other too, meaning all of you could have been killed just like families Palestine.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/infant-mortality-rate-by-country

There are many many counties papers like the Guardian could be visiting to report on child portability mainly in Africa but including Afghanistan and Yemen. A disproportionate focus from the useful idiots in the press on Gaza to support the fallacious genocide argument is unnecessary and just supports an upswell of ill feeling against Israel and Jews more widely.

No, you don't seem willing to acknowledge that Palestinian families are larger. It's not a lot arithmetically, but it's substantial in real terms.

According to the internet:
Average number people Palestinian family: 4.8 people
In a British family: 2.4 people

PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, frequently stated that "the womb of the Arab woman is my strongest weapon," viewing a growing Palestinian population as a guarantee for a future majority in historic Palestine.

Hamas Religious and Ideological Framing
The Concept of Ribat: Hamas leaders frequently frame the act of staying in Palestine and raising large families as ribat—a religious duty to guard Islamic land. Within this framework, having many children is viewed not just as a civic duty, but as a religious imperative to sustain the "Axis of Resistance."
Acceptance of Loss: Hamas ideology places a heavy emphasis on the glorification of martyrdom. Leaders like the late Ismail Haniyeh frequently stated in speeches that the loss of life in conflict is countered by the high birth rate of the Palestinian people, arguing that the sacrifice of children or family members is a necessary price for national liberation.

Sadly it seems children are not only weaponised as human shields/sacrifices, as well as child soldiers, in Palestinian society but also as ACTUAL weapons.

I can't imagine the mindset of anybody who supports a society like that tbh, especially in the Western world.

Huge difference in being part of that society and subject to brainwashing and indoctrination from birth so knowing no different, than observing from the comfort of a Western lens and condoning it probably because conflict is against Jews.

Infant mortality in 18th century England were about 20% significantly greater than any reported rates in Gaza. This suggests a functioning maternity system of some sort in Gaza (though obviously not perfect)...It does not suggest genocide. My daughter is doing geography and she has learnt high birth rates were historically to partially counteract infant and child mortality.

In many places (and we can include Gaza in this) the requirement for large families should over the broad sweep of time should reduce with medical improvement and we see this in many developed countries where birth rates are probably less than 2 per woman. As people have pointed out there is a political reason for the high birth rate amongst Paelatinians and that is in politics and society numbers matter....if your population grows quickly then your political influence grows.

Of course a lot of these women in Gaza so not have the agency to argue against having multiple children due to culture and faith so can be perceived as victims of an overarching political ideology (out number the Jews?) as well as the infants being born.

I think there is a lack of understanding of non western perspectives at the heart of the west falling for dangerous narratives.

@mids2019 Is your argument that Israel was justified in killing as many children as they did because there were more of them than there should be and it couldn’t be helped? Because they had higher birth rates for political reasons?

If I have understood correctly- some nice victim blaming!

There were children that were victims of war simply because Gaza has a concentrated population which is skewed towards youth demogrpahically. No one has ever shown that the IDF systematically set out to kill children as an aim and do so I am sure you can see is partly blood llibel, a slur that wants to associate Jews with infant killing. It is these sort of simple erroneous narratives like 'Ilrael kills babies' that shapes the narratives that lead to do much anti senitism.

You have not understood correctly so think you should retract your accusation of victim blaming.

Mids was not saying that Israel was "justified" in killing all the children that died in the war. They were making a comment on the demographic of the population in Gaza. It is factual that there are a lot of babies and children in Gaza because of the high birth rate.

The fact that more children were present should have meant more care was taken to minimise children’s deaths. It means that they should have checked that areas were evacuated prior to bombing and reviewed tactics if there were too many children killed.

What do you think of the concerns raised by Naza documentary?

“One Israeli intelligence source describes being able to hack the phone of a 12-year-old Palestinian girl in order to figure out when her father – the actual target – might return home. At that point, the house could be bombed.”

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/oct/16/naza-israel-film

How is this minimising children’s deaths?