IN RECENT DAYS, reports have circulated widely – on WhatsApp, social media, in newspapers, and even by US President Joe Biden – that Hamas militants beheaded dozens of babies in an attack on the Kfar Aza kibbutz in southern Israel.
If true, it would constitute one of the most horrific war crimes in an already-brutal conflict between Israel and Hamas that is not even a week old.
At present, there is no way to independently verify that it happened: no authority, including the Israeli government or the country’s military, have officially confirmed or denied the reports. This does not necessarily mean that the beheadings didn’t happen, just that it can’t be said with certainty that they did.
This has not stopped the claim from being reported in the media and going viral in online spaces that are awash with misinformation about the conflict, such as old videos from other conflicts being re-shared or false reports about the actions of both sides.
In those online spaces, the claim has surfaced alongside opinions about the situation in Gaza which are highly charged (in part because of the complex and intractable nature of the overall Israel-Palestine conflict).
All of this makes it harder to tell what is and isn’t true about the alleged beheadings, and obscures the actual facts – including that small children were killed by Hamas in the attack on Kfar Aza kibbutz.
Here’s what we do know about the claim and where it came from.
The Kfar Aza kibbutz, a communal village in southern Israel about 2km from the border with Gaza, was home to around 400 people before Hamas attacked last Saturday.
Its proximity to the Palestinian territory meant that it was one of the first places hit by militants, who struck at around 6.30am local time on Saturday morning, the Jewish sabbath.
Cars and homes were set ablaze and retired Israeli major general Itai Veruv said 70 Palestinian gunmen took part in the raid.
No official death toll has been provided but multiple soldiers told reporters on the ground that militants killed least 100 people – including an undetermined number of children and babies.
It took more than 12 hours for the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) to respond with help and days for them regain control full of the kibbutz, with fighting reportedly continuing up to Tuesday morning.
Domestic and international media were invited to the kibbutz from later on Tuesday, and reports of decapitations of some of those who had been killed soon emerged.
One report by the BBC’s International Editor Jeremy Bowen quoted Davidi Ben Zion, the deputy commander of the IDF paratrooper unit who re-took control of the kibbutz, as mentioning a number of decapitations. The commander did not specifically mention children in the quotes he gave to the veteran BBC journalist.
“They killed them and cut some of their heads, it’s a dreadful thing to see… and we must remember who is the enemy, and what our mission is, [for] justice where there is a right side and all the world needs to be behind us,” Ben Zion is reported to have said.
Later on Tuesday, another report about beheadings in Kfar Aza emerged from i24News, a 24-hour Israeli news channel.
A three-minute video clip from a report by journalist Nicole Zedeck in Kfar Aza was shared on the station’s feed on X, formerly Twitter, during which she made the claim that babies in the kibbutz had been decapitated by Hamas.
“I’m talking to some of the [IDF] soldiers and they say what they’ve witnessed as they’ve been walking through these different houses, these different communities… babies [with] their heads cut off,” she said.
The post on i24News’ profile has currently been viewed more than 11 million times.
In a subsequent tweet quoting the video, Zedeck also mentioned that a specific number of children had been killed, though she did not say they were beheaded.
“Soldiers told me they believe 40 babies/children were killed. The exact death toll is still unknown as the military continues to go house to house and find more Israeli casualties,” she wrote.
In another video, she also described “40 babies at least” being “taken out on gurneys”, although once again, she did not say that these babies had been beheaded.
And in yet another video, Zedeck was filmed speaking to David Ben Zion, the deputy commander of the paratrooper unit, who also said that Hamas “cut off heads [...] of children, of women”.
Around two hours after the original i24News video was posted, it was re-shared by the official @Israel account on X with the caption “40 babies murdered” (a figure that was not mentioned by Zedeck in the report).
That post has currently been seen more than 18 million times.
Asked about the number of babies killed at Kfar Aza, the Israeli foreign ministry, which runs the @Israel account on X, has told multiple outlets: “We cannot confirm any number at this stage.”
After the posted by the @Israel account, the claim was quickly re-shared online, in domestic and international media and by Israeli officials.
As the claim initially spread, the exact number of people beheaded was also reported in different ways.
In an interview on Sky News on Tuesday evening, Israeli economy minister Nir Barkat made an indirect reference to the claim, mentioning that 40 boys had been killed and that some of them had been decapitated.
“We’ve seen just now… we’ve heard of 40 young boys. Some of them were burned alive. Some were beheaded. Some were shot in the head,” he said.
The next morning, when the claim featured in several UK newspapers, including The Independent and the front pages of The Times and the Daily Mail, the latter of which reported that an unspecified number of babies had been beheaded and that 40 children had been shot.
The claim has also been indirectly attributed in different ways, with some who originally said that children had been beheaded subsequently clarifying their remarks.
In a statement on Tuesday evening, the IDF initially said that beheadings had occurred but would not confirm a number.
The force indirectly suggested children had been beheaded by alluding to the Islamic State, which became notorious during the last decade for releasing videos of their militants decapitating hostages.
“We cannot confirm any numbers period. What happened in Kibbutz Kfar Azza is a massacre in which women, children, toddlers and elderly were brutally butchered in an ISIS way of action,” a spokesperson said in a statement circulated to multiple outlets.
However, the latest IDF statement has said that reports of beheadings are currently “unconfirmed”.
The following day, the Israeli Government appeared to confirm the claim.
Its spokesperson Tal Heinrich told London-based radio station LBC and said that “toddlers [and] other babies, some of them with their heads cut off” had been found at Kfar Aza.
Heinrich later clarified that her statement was based solely on the testimony of soldiers. Another government spokesperson then told CNN on Thursday that although beheadings had occurred, it could not confirm if this had involved children.
US President Joe Biden also suggested that he had seen pictures of beheaded children during a meeting with Jewish leaders at the White House on Wednesday night.
“I never really thought that I would see, have confirmed, pictures of terrorists beheading children,” he said.
However, a White House spokesperson later confirmed that neither Biden nor any other US officials had seen pictures of beheadings or confirmed reports independently, and that the president’s comments were based on news reports and claims by the Israeli government.
On Thursday afternoon, the Jerusalem Post reported that it had verified photos showing that children in the kibbutz had been burned and decapitated.
It said the photos had been shown to US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken before being shared on the official X account of the Prime Minister of Israel.
The account has posted extremely graphic photos of dead children, which it said were shown to Blinken, and also compared Hamas to the Islamic State group.
However, the caption accompanying the post makes no reference to babies who were beheaded. The Jerusalem Post did not explain how it had verified the images.
Children are among those to have been killed at the Kvar Aza kibbutz during the attack by Hamas militants on Saturday.
Violence against civilians, including children, is prohibited during armed conflict under international law, and armed forces are required to take measures to protect civilians.
To date, no reports of decapitated children have been officially confirmed.
Various reports suggest that some beheadings took place in the kibbutz, a claim repeated by the IDF in its statement to CNN on Thursday.
“There have been cases of Hamas militants carrying out beheadings and other ISIS-style atrocities. However, we cannot confirm if the victims were men or women, soldiers or civilians, adults or children,” an official is quoted as saying.
Numerous journalists visited the kibbutz for a tour on Tuesday, though none seem to have confirmed reports of beheadings themselves.
Oren Ziv, a reporter with the independent 972 Magazine in Israel, posted a thread to X on Wednesday saying that he did not see any evidence during the tour.
Sky News reporter Stuart Ramsey likewise said that the subject of beheaded children did not feature in interviews he conducted with two IDF majors at the scene. Ramsay said if he believed that babies had been beheaded, he and other reporters would have been told.
Hamas has denied the allegations, which remain unproven at the time of writing.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
have your say