Information laundering

Strong language is sometime necessary to counter malevolent lies, even when those lies are amplified by virtually every leader in the West (including our cognitively-disabled President), the UN and WHO (no surprise) and our left wing propaganda media (think: New York Times and WaPo, among many, many others). We're told that 30,000+ women and children have been wantonly slaughtered by Israel's war against the Islamist terror group, Hamas. We're told that the resultant humanitarian crisis is "unprecedented" and that "genocide" is on-going. 

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Now for the strong language—every one of those claims is Hamas propaganda, giddily reported by leftist leaders, organizations, and media without verification or investigation. Those claims are patent bullshit.

David Adesnik dissects the propaganda when he writes:

The [Gaza (Hamas) health] ministry says its casualty counts include two types of fatalities: those recorded by medical facilities and those reported by “reliable media sources.” In its March 31 report, the ministry attributes 15,070 of the dead, or 45.9%, to news reports. From which outlets? The ministry never says.

Its choices are limited, since Gaza has no independent media. It has networks like al-Aqsa that are extensions of Hamas and other armed factions. It has Al Jazeera, the Qatari state network that describes the atrocities of Oct. 7 as an “incursion” and denies that any “widespread and systematic” sexual assault took place. Western outlets report from Gaza, but they rely on the ministry for their casualty data ...

... Gabriel Epstein, an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, did this [analyzed the data] soon after the ministry published its first statistical report in December. He found that the deaths attributed to “reliable media sources” consisted almost entirely of women and children. Of the 6,629 fatalities attributed to media, 1,941 were women, 4,678 children and only 10 men.

Amazing ... only 10 men were killed!! I've heard of "smart" bombs, but bombs that are smart enough to kill ONLY women and children are ... well ... unbelievable—in the literal meaning of that word.

Of course, facts and logic mean nothing to leftists who WANT to believe that Israel is indiscriminately killing innocents. The reason: it allows those useful idiots to draw a false moral equivalence between the atrocities committed by Hamas on October 7th and the response by the Israelis—a response that every responsible report indicates is unprecedented in its attempt to warn civilians to get out of harm's way.

Of course, the casualty figures are but one of dozens of malevolent lies that have allowed the palestinians to construct their "pyramid of lies" (see here and here).  Adesnik continues:

Over time, media reports have accounted for an ever larger share of the ministry’s data. Of nearly 11,000 fatalities reported between Jan. 1 and March 31, the ministry derived 77.7% from media reports. [emphasis mine]

In reality, this is similar to money laundering, except its "information laundering." Hamas lies are published by Hamas controlled media. Those lies are then laundered through supposedly respected Western media and then quoted as fact by everyone from Joe Biden to the UN. At each step in the laundering process the propaganda is amplified—often knowingly by news outlets that are anti-Israel). The consequence is a false narrative that goes viral and ultimately gets translated into government policy. 

Despicable ... but effective.