TRUTH MASSACRED

Always keen to make Israel look bad, Antony Loewenstein links to a video at Raw Story – given the source and linker this is bound to end badly – showing numerous Palestinians horrifically mangled by an explosion. Loewenstein's brief post attributes responsibility for the devastation:

A graphic account of Israel’s “defensive” war in Gaza.

Yes, the pictured carnage does result from an explosion but has nothing to do with Israel. The video, grabbed from Live Leak, is now claimed to show the aftermath of the 2005 explosion of a pickup truck filled with Qassam rockets being shown off during a parade of military might in Gaza. This hoax video is blamed on Jews exploiting dead and injured Palestinians. Of course.

I first saw this video soon after it was posted to Live Leak, immediately thinking it suspect. Had an Israeli attack caused casualties on the scale shown al Jazeera would have been crowing about it. It also seemed odd to see Hamas goons in uniform running around the streets; military dress makes it hard to hide.

Update: More disinformation, this time from EUobserver:












The Israeli bombing in Gaza has killed
over 380 Palestinians so far, including
45 women and children (Photo: wikipedia)

No country other than the United States flies B1 bombers and the United States has flown no missions supporting Israel.

Update II: Irfan Yusuf, Australia's biggest blogger (click and scroll down), is also fooled by the bogus video:

The video shows the aftermath of an Israeli bombing in Gaza It shows dead bodies of women and children. If, after watching this video, you still believe there is no humanitarian problem in Gaza, you may as well believe the moon is made of lettuce.

Yep, them Jews is evil.

Update III: Raw Story has removed the video, describing it as "misdated", but hints that Israel could be responsible:

The source was in error. The footage was actually taken on September 23, 2005 at the Jabaliya refugee camp, described as a bombing of a parade that killed at least 15 Palestinians. Israel denied responsibility, and the ruling Palestinian Fatah blamed Hamas.

Raw Story's source is more honest:

The video was not taken on January 1st 2009. It was not taken in a civilian market, and it was not the result of an IDF air strike.

This video is from September 23rd 2005, and was taken in the Jabalya refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip. A Hamas pick-up truck carrying Qassam rockets detonated by mistake during a Hamas rally, leaving at least 15 killed and dozens more injured.

Antony Loewenstein's post has yet to be corrected.

Update IV: Rather than admit he'd linked to a bogus anti-Israel video, Loewenstein has silently consigned his post to oblivion. The link now produces this:

Oh no! You're looking for something which just isn't here! Fear not however, errors are to be expected, and luckily there are tools on the sidebar for you to use in your search for what you need.

Using the sidebar tools won't help locate a post that's been removed. It is available in Google cache, however.