- Les Décodeurs
- Israel-Hamas war
ByAssma Maad, William Audureau and Samuel Forey(Jerusalem, correspondent)
9 min read Lire en français
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NewsOn October 10, official Israeli accounts relayed a sordid but unfounded allegation. Six months later, it continues to circulate, fueling accusations of Israeli disinformation.
Following the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, which claimed around 1,160 victims, images of the massacre flooded social media and news outlets around the world.
But amidst this flood of accounts of murder, looting and mutilation, one rumor took on extraordinary proportions: 40 decapitated babies were allegedly found in the Kfar Aza kibbutz, one of the communities most impacted by the attack. This story, and its variants, went viral like never before, going as far as being mentioned by the White House. However, in the horror of this massacre, in which 38 minors including two infants were killed, there were never 40 decapitated babies. Not in Kfar Aza nor in any other kibbutz, the Israeli government press office confirmed to Le Monde.
How did this false information come about? Can it be compared to the Kuwait incubator affair, a fabricated tale of kidnapped and massacred babies that was partly used to justify the first Gulf War? Le Monde's investigation sheds light on a rumor born organically, out of a mixture of emotion, confusion and macabre exaggeration. Israel has done nothing to fight it and has more often tried to instrumentalize it than deny it, fueling accusations of media manipulation.
The origins
Tuesday, October 10, 1 pm
Three days after the Hamas attack, the army invited dozens of foreign journalists and correspondents, including Le Monde, to Kfar Aza, where Hamas terrorists killed more than 60 civilians. Richard Hecht, Israel's top army spokesman and co-organizer of the visit, wanted to "show the international press that what happened here is unprecedented."
The territory had only been recaptured by the army a few hours ago, and corpses were still everywhere: Israeli victims wrapped in body bags, Hamas fighters lying where they fell and a pervasive smell of death, testified a dozen journalists, rescue workers and soldiers interviewed by Le Monde.
Samuel Forey, correspondent for Le Monde in Jerusalem and co-author of this article, took part in the press visit to Kfar Aza on October 10.
"We're not part of a military unit, it's a press visit, under escort (...) As is often the case in conflict zones, the tight control loosens up after a while. We can talk to any soldier who wants to. We can enter houses already inspected by the army, as the others may be booby-trapped.
The tour ends. It lasted an hour and a half. I go back to Jerusalem. My editor at Le Monde calls me. Did I see any beheaded babies? I tell him I saw the news on social media on my way home, but nothing seemed to confirm it. None of the soldiers told me anything about it – I spoke to half a dozen of them. As I sit at my desk, I can see the media frenzy. I don't think this story is probable. The soldiers had been at the kibbutz since at least the day before. Such an atrocious event would have been documented, and not confided by some soldiers to some journalists.
I contact two first-aid organizations deployed at the time of the attack. None of them mentions any beheadings – without saying they didn't happen. As of October 11, the date of publication of my article, I cannot confirm any beheadings. So I don't do it. But the powerful image takes precedence over reality. In particular, it is used to portray Hamas as the embodiment of absolute evil – which deserves a similar response. I don't want to minimize the violent acts by this Palestinian Islamist movement. I want to document them as accurately as possible.
The problem is that while the image of decapitated babies serves a certain Israeli propaganda purpose, it also serves its enemies to deny other abuses, such as sexual violence – which has been proven – or the fact that victims were burnt alive; or even to refute the massacre as a whole. This was the gist of my message published on X, the day after the visit to Kfar Aza. Some time later, I noticed that my post was no longer accessible in France and certain other European countries. Since then, the story about the beheaded babies has turned out to be false information."
Itai Veruv, the general who led the counter-attack, drew many parallels with the death camps. He mentioned a provisional death toll of between 100 and 150. Funeral ceremonies were sometimes held in full view of the cameras. Some reporters confided to Le Monde a feeling of unease at the dramatization of the massacre site.
Because of the risk of explosive booby traps, journalists could only enter a few houses. The only Israeli corpses they saw were in body bags, all adult-sized. On the ground, according to the journalists present, the general staff made no mention of dead babies. But reporters were free to question the soldiers and first-aid workers present, whose accounts were murkier and disturbing.
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