On Sunday, a more than three year old video of an accidental munitions truck explosion at a Palestinian rally in September 2005 was spread around the liberal blogosphere as footage of an Israeli attack on Gaza on January 3, 2009.
Two prominent leftwing websites -- Raw Story and Democratic Underground -- displayed this video for hours before a poster at Reddit exposed the hoax (h/t NBer Blazer).
Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs reported early Sunday:
A gruesome propaganda video uploaded to LiveLeak that purported to show the aftermath of an IDF attack on civilians in Gaza turned out to be a fraud—it actually shows the results of an accidental explosion of a truck full of Hamas rockets at a Palestinian rally.
This didn’t stop the video from reaching the top spot on reddit.com and gaining more than 2,000 up votes, because reddit.com is absolutely infested with antisemites and terror supporters: GRAPHIC Video of Israel Defense Force’s attack on Gaza civilian market — originally uploaded on & banned by YouTube (NSFW) : politics.
Raw Story issued a correction Sunday:
On Sunday, RAW STORY ran video of a bombing in Gaza purported to be recent footage leaked from an exiled Palestinian blogger. We removed the video from the site early Sunday and issued a correction but the original was deleted in a database without the actual html file being removed, so the original persisted through Monday morning without our notice.
The footage is the aftermath of a devastating bombing taking place in a market, said to have been taken on Saturday. According to Haitham Sabbah, it was taken "immediately after a terrorist Israeli air strike hit a busy market where kids with their mothers and fathers were searching for food to eat from one of the local markets early on Saturday 03, Jan 2009."
Raw Story has removed its original article on this matter, but Question Everything still has the text:
As Israel's IDF wages it's [sic] own "media war" via Twitter and YouTube, uncensored footage from Palestine has been completely blacked out in the US.
Until now.
Saturday, before Israel launched a full-scale invasion of Gaza, a Palestinian with a camera witnessed a devastating bombing. His video shows the brutal, bloody results of an air strike on what appears to be a civilian area.
In the footage, scores of bodies - men, women and children - lay strewn about a Gaza market as abject chaos spirals around them. Some struggle to their feet, covered in concrete powder and blood, as others assess their injuries or join the effort to carry away wounded.
Within moments, men in camouflage holding automatic weapons and RPGs assert a growing number among the citizenry. The men, presumably affiliated with Hamas, appear to be helping with crowd control and medical response.
The source of this video was Haitham Sabbah, a self-proclaimed "Palestinian activist and blogger."
Although he too has updated his blog to reflect his error, this is what he originally wrote concerning this video:
This video clip was taken with a mobile camera immediately after a terrorist Israeli air strike hit a busy market where kids with their mothers and fathers were searching for foot to eat from one of the local markets early on Saturday 03, Jan 2009, Gaza.
As you will see, there are no words to describe the terror of the Jewish state of Israhell. This is why Israel is continuously refusing to allow foreign correspondence and reporters from entering Gaza.
Please spread the video widely. Let the world see what their news TV channels won't show about reality of Israel. (YouTube deleted the video minutes after it was uploaded, but it is worth trying again).
Get the code for the video to embed on your blog from: http://sabbah.blip.tv/#1642223.
I guess that's all it takes to get anti-Israeli propaganda spread throughout the liberal blogosphere these days.
How sad.
