Snopes is one of the most well-known “fact-checker” websites worldwide, regularly posting articles debunking online conspiracy theories, dispelling media misinformation and separating satire from serious news.
Its website boasts of the stringent process its editorial team undertakes to ensure the veracity of information, including contacting primary sources, finding experts who have relevant expertise in the subject at hand, and using non-partisan information and data sources to inform its pieces.
However, since the outbreak of the October 7 war against Israel, Snopes has been producing some dubious content that requires some fact-checking of its own.
Here are just a few examples of Snopes’ problematic fact-checking on the Israel-Hamas war:
Sneaky Editing on Gaza Hospital Blast
The explosion at Gaza City’s al-Ahli Hospital sparked a flurry of media misinformation and social media disinformation.
From the New York Times headline that an “Israeli airstrike” was responsible for “killing 500″ to the BBC’s correspondent Jon Donnison confidently announcing live on-air that he found it “hard to see” who else could be responsible other than the IDF, the lie that Israel bombed a civilian hospital spread like wildfire.
But then the truth emerged. The Israeli military released satellite imagery, videos of the blast, and tapped phone recordings that proved it was a misfired rocket shot by Islamic Jihad that was responsible.
What’s more, further evidence came out that the rocket did not directly hit the hospital and that nowhere near 500 people died.
On October 19, two days after the explosion, Snopes published an article asking, “Did Israel Warn Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza to Evacuate?” written by former Al Jazeera journalist Nur Ibrahim.
In addition to relying on widely discredited reporting on the events from the New York Times for its “fact-checking,” the article also fails to acknowledge the many pieces of evidence released by Israel that exonerate itself, as well as the United States’ own findings that Islamic Jihad was responsible.
Perhaps owing to her employment history, Ibrahim uses a statement given to Al Jazeera without noting the outlet is a state-run propaganda arm of the Qatari government and fails to note that the “unnamed senior health official in Gaza” who spoke to Al Jazeera would be affiliated with Hamas, which controls the Gazan health authorities.
It is also clear that Snopes did some sneaky editing of the article where it had initially made errors.
An original version of the piece states unequivocally that “500 people were killed” which was later amended to read “hundreds of people” even though that figure is still in dispute.
Fact-Finding Over Beheaded Babies
One of the most disgusting “debates” that has taken place during the war is whether Hamas terrorists beheaded babies or shot them during their murderous onslaught in Kibbutz Kfar Aza on October 7.
Also written by Nur Ibrahim, the Snopes article allegedly debunking the claim flippantly describes the atrocity as a “viral rumor spread by news media, the US president, and so on.”
It also includes this disturbing paragraph: “As we looked into the claim, we found contradictory reports from journalists, Israeli army officials, and almost no independent corroborations of the alleged war crime, leading to concerns among fact-checkers that such a claim may be premature or unsubstantiated.”
This is a lie.
In addition to numerous eyewitness accounts, including from independent journalists who saw the aftermath of the massacre and photographic evidence, there is enough proof to say that babies were indeed beheaded during the Hamas rampage.
More importantly, Ibrahim’s insistence on calling it an “alleged war crime” is baffling. For, even if babies had not been beheaded, what Hamas did would have still amounted to a war crime — there is nothing “alleged” about the events of October 7.
Lastly, Ibrahim claims details of the massacre being released could lead to hatred toward Muslims, explaining that people should be “wary of claims that echo Islamophobic rhetoric, or statements that compare the violence in Kfar Aza to ‘ISIS-style’ killings — i.e., beheadings that have taken place in a different context and were committed by a different group” because they have the “potential to become dangerous propaganda.’
BREAKING: Israeli official confirms two important details.
⭕ Babies were decapitated at Kibbutz Be’eri.
⭕ Women were raped next to the bodies of fellow festivalgoers at Re’im. They were “killed twice, first raped and then murdered,” the official said.
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) October 11, 2023
Shilling for the Iranian Ayatollah
Ibrahim acted as an apologist for another Islamist regime in an October 10 article that asked, “Did Iran Say It Will Hit Israel with Missile Strikes from Lebanon, Yemen and Iran if Attacked?”
According to the Snopes piece, the following claim that appeared in the Wall Street Journal remains unproven: “During the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023, Iranian officials said that if Iran were attacked, it would respond with missile strikes on Israel from Lebanon, Yemen and Iran, and send Iranian fighters into Israel from Syria.”
Citing the fact the WSJ only cited one source for the threat, Ibrahim concluded Snopes “cannot independently verify whether such a threat was sanctioned by the Iranian state.”
But just days after the Snopes article was published, Iran effectively confirmed its threats when its foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian warned the regime may take “preemptive action” against Israel via its proxies, which happen to be based in Lebanon and Yemen.
“Today, when we talk about the resistance in the region, it is not only Hezbollah, and we are witnessing the activities of various resistance groups in the region,” Amir-Abdollahian added.
Did Snopes update its article to reflect this? Nope.
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Photo credit: Ali Jadallah/Anadolu via Getty Images
