Eyeless in Gaza, enemies of the Israelis — and Jews more broadly — are using an unfounded story from the Hamas-controlled strip of land to turn Israel to a perpetrator of a war crime from a victim of terror. The Arab world, the establishment press, Western politicians, and organizations purporting to defend human rights are rushing to adopt Hamas propaganda even as they endlessly doubt Israel’s facts. 

The episode demonstrates that a lie can travel, via the press, around the world before Israel assembles the facts. Condemnations of Israel appeared moments after the Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry claimed that more than 500 persons were killed in an Israeli air attack on Al Ahli hospital. A short period of world sympathy in the wake of Hamas’ pogrom on October 7 is swiftly turning to outrage over an Israeli “crime.”

It took nearly two hours for Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari’s team at the Israel Defense Force’s spokesman’s office to examine the case and conclude that a Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket, part of a barrage launched at Israel, fell short and hit the Gaza hospital. Israel knows that in many quarters it is presumed guilty. So why wait? Because the IDF also knows that it is better to get its facts straight than to risk spreading inaccuracies. 

Minutes after the event, the Hamas health ministry, already overwhelmed by casualties, was somehow able to report 500 deaths and to assign blame. On the Israeli side, the military and intelligence analysts are still counting Israel’s October 7 casualties, dotting their I’s and crossing their T’s. Now they are opening up some of their most sensitive intelligence, including a video of the PIJ barrage and the dud rocket, and an intercepted audio clip in which the terrorists’ culpability becomes clear. 

After swallowing Hamas propaganda, major publications are settling on a he-said-she-said version. For 24 hours, the New York Times website frantically updated its headline to soften an initial embrace of the Hamas version. Yet, even after the IDF produces dispositive evidence exonerating Israel, even to President Biden’s satisfaction, the Times editors who blamed Israel moments after the event insist on doubling down on the idea that “neither side’s account could be independently verified immediately.”

As the British foreign secretary, James Cleverly writes on X, “Last night, too many jumped to conclusions around the tragic loss of life at Al Ahli hospital. Getting this wrong would put even more lives at risk.” Indeed, blaming Israel while ignoring the facts is reigniting the world’s darkest hatred. Synagogues are burning. Israeli embassies at Amman and Istanbul came under attack. At Beirut thousands of protesters besieged the American embassy. 

The Palestinian Authority declared three days of mourning. Jordan disinvited President Biden from a summit planned for today at Amman, where he’d hoped to coordinate aid to civilians in Gaza. The UN Security Council convened an “emergency” session. “There are rules around wars and it’s not acceptable to hit a hospital,” Prime Minister Trudeau opined. He wasn’t referring to an October 8 Hamas hit on Israel’s Barzilai hospital at Ashkelon. 

Mr. Biden, who traveled to Israel Wednesday, said there that “the other team” fired the rocket that hit the hospital. He vowed not to repeat the silence that enveloped the Holocaust. Israel is yet to be accused of causing the Ukraine war, yet the Financial Times claims that a “rush by west to back Israel erodes developing countries’ support for Ukraine.” Since the blood libel started in the 12th century, it has had many iterations — but few to match Hamas’s today.