Propaganda is flying around like crazy in this conflict and I think it's time for our community to come together and try to separate the truth from misinformation and chaff. Similar to my last post on the al-Ahli Hospital Massacre, we're going to go with the following format:
For top-level comments, post the claim being made as well as who made the claim (please cite as close to the original source as possible) and, if possible, the date/time that claim was made.
For other comments, please try to either prove or debunk claims using multiple sources and verifiable information.
just gonna sneak in here to say thank you @zephyreks@hexbear.net for this thread
@zephyreks@hexbear.net this is an amazing resource. Thank you so much for compiling this.
Translated by people online - translation may be unreliable
[2023/11/15] Haaretz has released a list of 1175 confirmed casualties
This list is continually updated. Per this list there are 1175 casualties (1087 from October 7th): 771 civilians, 59 police, 332 IDF, and 13 emergency services. Some number of these casualties are foreign, non-Israeli migrant workers.
Is there a pattern to how the civilians were killed? I scrolled a bit and many of them do not have a cause of death.
The numbers seem pretty solid around 750-800 Israeli civilian deaths. The question now seems to be which side fired the shots and whether they were avoidable. Some people on Hexbear have suggested it was poorly trained IDF shooting indiscriminately which caused many of the deaths, but so far that just seems to be speculation.
I don't think there's anything concrete as far as numbers go, but we do have an Israeli news source giving a few interesting tidbits (emphases mine):
As the pilots struggled to differentiate between terrorists and civilians, the decision was made to prioritize the immediate halt of the influx of Hamas terrorists and the potentially dangerous Gaza mobs breaching the border.
What would they be prioritizing this over? Presumably, making sure the person they're targeting is a combatant before firing.
The initial pace of the strikes against the thousands of infiltrators was staggering, with the pilots eventually slowing down their attacks and meticulously selecting targets.
This implies a haphazard, "kill anything that moves" approach was employed at first.
Hamas terrorists deliberately played a cunning game with the helicopter pilots and special forces operatives. briefings revealed that the terrorists were advised to advance cautiously into the settlements and military outposts, to walk and not run, in order to appear like they were Israeli. This deception tactic persisted for some time until the Apache pilots realized that all constraints should be disregarded.
Constraints in this case would likely be silly little things like making sure your target isn't a civilian before shooting.
No surprise. Israeli settlers aren't really valued by Israel for anything other than their names and numbers in eviction proceedings.
Translated from an article by Yedioth Ahronoth that I cannot find because I do not speak Hebrew.
I think this is the article: https://www.ynet.co.il/news/article/b111niukzt
Translated by Middle East Observer
Yasmin Porat, a survivor from Kibbutz Be'eri, corroborates the claims from Tuval Escapa in an interview with Israeli media channel Haboker Hazeh. A transcript of her interview is available from Electronic Intifada.
[2023/10/17] Haaretz has released a list of Israeli's killed on October 7th
This list separates losses into "civilians", "emergency services", "IDF", and "police."
By my count, there are 93 civilians, 5 emergency services workers, 171 IDF, and 41 police on this list.
Regarding the "by Hamas" part:
The document in question: https://www.moh.gov.ps/portal/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/%D8%AA%D9%82%D8%B1%D9%8A%D8%B1-%D9%86%D9%87%D8%A7%D8%A6%D9%8A-%D8%A8%D8%A7%D8%B3%D9%85%D8%A7%D8%A1-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B4%D9%87%D8%AF%D8%A7%D8%A1-1.pdf
https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/415610_WEST-BANK-AND-GAZA-2022-HUMAN-RIGHTS-REPORT.pdf
Edit: Added State Department report
[2023/11/11] A video first posted on X by "Open Source Intel" has been circulating that shows a supposed nurse from al-Shifa condemning Hamas and claiming that Hamas is stealing the hospital's food, fuel, and medicine. It has since been deleted.
[2023/11/12] Video of woman claiming Hamas stole medicines from Gaza hospital ‘clearly staged’: Digital media expert
[2023/11/15] Video of 'nurse' denouncing Hamas occupation of Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza is fake
Still amazed IDF doesn't seem to keep any native Arabic speakers on staff lmao
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
I've been trying to avoid active commentary, but this is just plain silly. An MRI machine isn't a tarp to hide weapons under. It's an incredibly complex and dangerous piece of machinery whose operation is impacted by the presence of metals in the vicinity. The MRI magnet is on as long as the MRI is powered: it's standard procedure to not allow metals within the room an MRI machine is in. MRIs are basically never turned off because quenching can harm the superconducting magnets (don't ask me how, I don't know). There are records of guns being discharged by an MRI machine and there are records of people being hit in the face when a knife is magnetized by the MRI. Out of all the places in a hospital, the MRI room is the worst place to store guns and weapons (especially explosives...), though I imagine modern flak jackets would be fine because they're made of soft fibers.
Sources seem to suggest that MRI scans were being conducted in al-Shifa:
MRIs are basically never turned off because quenching can harm the superconducting magnets (don't ask me how, I don't know).
According to a brief google, the MRI's magnets are super conducting, so they keep going if the machine is sitting there. Hypothetically, you could unplug the machine and wander it around, though the coils would heat up after a while and stop super conducting (at which point the coil would rapidly heat up and lose its charge as it now has resistance). Liquid helium is used to keep the coils cool and can be vented. The cooling system can also be shut off, but would take a while to start back up and cool everything down to operational levels. I imagine the system (other than the exterior vents) are probably very well insulated, so it doesn't take much power once its cooled (at least maintaining below superconductivity).
If the MRI was being used day to day, you would (could) not keep guns there. The IDF could easily claim that the MRI had been turned off for a while or something.
The magnet material is real fragile and letting it over heat can damage it and make it less effective. Here in the US I have seen it said that turning a machine off and on can cost tens of thousands of dollars in material and time to get it back up to operating after powering it down
Yeah, I've accidentally snapped rare earth magnets under their own power before. I could totally believe a big rare earth magnet would crack under thermal stress.
Apparently there's both permanent magnet MRIs and liquid-helium cooled copper magnet MRIs, both of which can cost tens of thousands in various failures. But if you don't have any source of electricity what are you going to do?
The IDF deleted the relevant video lol so they weren't super confident about this one
[2023/11/17] Tweet, not primary source: BBC admits at least one gun is inserted behind the MRI machine between the IOF's own video and BBC's escorted visit
[2023/11/16] IDF releases video they claim shows a tunnel they uncovered at Al Shifa hospital. The interior is not shown.
[2023/11/16–17] Users in the same thread point out the tunnel's resemblance to a septic tank [link, link, link]
[2023,11,8] IDF earlier claimed that a water reservoir at Sheikh Hamad hospital was a Hamas tunnel
As far as I remember, apparently a video of helicopter gunships accidentally shooting down Israeli civilians in the concerts wasn't showing that at all, at least according to israellycool, a Zionist website...
https://www.israellycool.com/2023/11/09/libel-debunked-israeli-helicopters-shot-and-killed-concert-goers/
That being said, I don't believe according to it that "In other words, everything about the tweet was false."
I say this, because then why did the article writers of Y net admit it in the text self that the military pilots did confuse between Israeli civilians and Hamas fighters, until a certain point...
(context: the 'debunker' used the y-net article that mentioned friendly fire as a main topic, which was also used by Megatron, the original purveyor of the friendly fire claim)
https://archive.is/IIOLg
I'm open to any additions to critiquing and countering this counter-claim
The evidence for that claim was more from statements made by IDF officials and soldiers IIRC