Crescent International
Of the many scandalous allegations Israel has levelled against Hamas—beheading of babies, killing of civilians and even burning some of them alive—the most vicious is that Hamas fighters allegedly raped Israeli women during their October 7 operation.
Numerous sources, many of them Israeli, have debunked these allegations but that has not deterred the zionists and their allies from continuing to peddle them.
If a lie is repeated often enough, it would be believed, goes the conventional wisdom.
While the rape allegations surfaced soon after Hamas’s daring operation on October 7, it gained much greater traction after an article appeared in the New York Times on December 28.
The US daily published a report claiming it was based on “investigation” of alleged rape of Israeli women by Palestinians.
To give more credence to the report, the Times said that the story was based on over 150 interviews conducted by Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Jeffrey Gettleman.
Two other reporters were also involved: Anat Schwartz and Adam Sella.
Their “investigation” concluded that Hamas fighters indulged in systematic rape and sexual violence against Israeli women.
If the Times’ Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter was involved, the story must be credible. Right?
Wrong.
The story hinges on the alleged rape of “Gal Abdush,” who is described by the Times as “The Woman in the Black Dress.”
How did “the woman in the black dress” story emerge?
Apparently, a video captured on October 8 by a woman named Eden Wessely was published on her social media accounts.
“The video went viral, with thousands of people responding, desperate to know if the woman in the black dress was their missing friend, sister or daughter,” claimed the Times.
It did not, however, provide a link to the video.
Instead, it released a distant, indistinct image from it that revealed nothing.
There are other anomalies in the Times story.
How did the leading US daily confirm the existence of these responses since Wessely’s Instagram account has been banned, according to a report in Mondoweiss.
She created a new account in mid-December.
“There is currently no trace of the video on the internet despite the Times claim that it ‘went viral’,” Mondoweiss reported.
The strongest refutation of the Times story comes from the Abdush family itself.
On December 29, the Israeli website ‘YNET’ published an interview with Etti Brakha, Gal Abdush’s mother.
She told YNET:
“We didn’t know about the rape at all. We only knew after a New York Times journalist contacted us. They said they matched evidence and concluded that she had been sexually assaulted.”
Two days later (January 1), Nissim Abdush, Nagi’s brother, appeared on Israeli Channel 13.
During the 14-minute interview, Nissim repeatedly denied that his sister-in-law was raped.
He explained that his brother Nagi had called him at 7:00 in the morning, saying his wife was killed, and he was next to her body.
Then he continued to communicate until 7:44 and never mentioned anything related to sexual assault.
Nissim also stated that no official party informed them of these doubts or this investigation, neither the police nor forensic experts.
In the interview, Abdush reiterated that his brother’s wife was not raped and that “the media invented it.”
Gal’s sisters also denied allegations of rape.
Her sister Tali Barakha posted on Instagram, saying: “No one can know what Gal went through there! Also, what Nagi went through, but I can’t cooperate with those who say many things that are not true. I plead with you to stop spreading lies, there is a family and children behind them, no one can know if there was rape or if she was burned while alive. Have you gone mad?”
Likewise, Miral Altar, Gal’s sister, wrote a comment on Instagram in response to a video of a hasbara account.
She said: “I can’t understand all these reports. There were many difficult stories, why this story in particular? It’s based on only one video published without the family’s knowledge…
“It is true that the scenes in the video are not easy, but it’s clear that the dress is lifted upwards and not in its natural state, and half her head is burned because they threw a grenade at the car…”
Despite debunking of the New York Times’ story, the Times of Israel still ran with it on December 29.
Endlessly repeating lies is a special trait of the zionists and imperialists.
In August 2002, Judith Miller published a series of articles on the front-page of the New York Times alleging that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
These lies were fed to her by Dick Cheney’s office who was US Vice President at the time.
These and other similar lies paved the way for the US attack on Iraq in March 2003 causing millions of deaths.
That is why Allah warns the committed Muslims to verify the news that a fasiq (degenerate) brings to you lest you may cause harm to somebody (49:06).
The nastiest television talk-show host, exposed as a sexual predator, has been knocked off his perched.
