GazaHerald – Two years after October 7, the full scale of Israel’s deceit has come into view. What began as a torrent of sensational claims, of atrocities never proven, of crimes never committed, evolved into a machinery of deception designed to rationalize the annihilation of Gaza. What we are witnessing today is not merely a war of extermination but the collapse of a narrative built on lies, propaganda, and moral hypocrisy, a narrative that sought to erase an entire people while claiming to defend “civilization.”
A Genocide Built on a Lie
The war of extermination Israel has waged on Gaza for the past two years is not a “response” to October 7; it is the continuation of a settler-colonial project that has never tolerated Palestinian existence. The destruction of Gaza’s hospitals, schools, mosques, churches, and refugee camps was justified through an elaborate architecture of deceit, where every bomb dropped was accompanied by a story meant to sanitize the killing.
Israeli propaganda began to ramp up in the early hours of Operation Flood of Al-Aqsa. It exported a singular, rehearsed narrative: that Palestinian fighters were not resisting occupation but committing atrocities so unspeakable that their annihilation became a moral duty. Western media, politicians, and organizations embraced these claims uncritically, transforming Israel’s disinformation into the emotional scaffolding of genocide.
The Fabricated Crimes: Sexual Violence, “Beheaded Babies,” and “Weapons in Hospitals”
The first great lie was that of sexual violence. Israel claimed that Palestinian fighters had raped Israeli women in large numbers within hours of the October 7 attack. The story spread like wildfire, amplified by Western media and feminist organizations.
Yet, a full year later, Israel has failed to produce a single piece of forensic or testimonial evidence. Even the New York Times’ heavily promoted investigation fell apart when its sources proved unreliable, and one of its reporters, Anat Schwartz, was dismissed for her open incitement against Palestinians. Former Israeli captives themselves confirmed that they were treated humanely and not subjected to abuse, a fact quietly ignored by those who once shouted the loudest.
Then came the most grotesque fabrication of all, the story of “beheaded babies.” An Israeli i24 News correspondent, citing an unnamed soldier, claimed that forty infants had been decapitated in a kibbutz. The story was picked up by CNN, BBC, and Sky News and echoed by U.S. President Joe Biden, who falsely said he had seen photographic proof. Days later, the White House retracted his statement.
There were no photos, no witnesses, and no evidence. Even the Israeli newspaper Haaretz confirmed that “politicians and soldiers contributed to spreading false stories to fuel public anger.” But the image of the “slaughtered child” had already done its work; it branded Palestinians as monsters and turned genocide into a moral crusade.
When that narrative collapsed, new horrors were invented: claims that Palestinian fighters had burned children alive in ovens, invoking Holocaust imagery to solidify Western emotional allegiance. Many of these “images” were later exposed as AI-generated fakes, yet they circulated for weeks on prime-time television in Israel, France, and the United States.
The third great deception centered on Gaza’s hospitals. To justify bombing nearly every medical facility in the Strip, Israel claimed Hamas had built tunnels under hospitals and stored weapons in their basements. To “prove” this, the Israeli army invited journalists, including CNN, to inspect what turned out to be a doctors’ shift calendar hanging on a wall. Despite this absurdity, mainstream media outlets repeated the claims without scrutiny. Sean Casey, the emergency coordinator for the World Health Organization, said he did not witness any instances of hospitals being utilized for military purposes.
Journalists and independent groups subsequently verified that no tunnels or weapons were discovered. The lie, however, had already done its damage; every destroyed hospital and every murdered doctor was rationalized as a blow against “terror.”
The Collapse of the Narrative
Two years later, the edifice of Israeli lies is cracking. Fact-checkers have debunked dozens of fabricated stories. Journalists have resigned from major Western outlets in protest over biased coverage. Trust in corporate media has fallen to record lows. Even within Israel, commentators have begun to ask, “Have we believed our own story too much?”
Yet the collapse of the lie has not stopped the killing. More than 235,000 Palestinians are dead, tens of thousands of them children, and Gaza lies in ruins. The genocide continues, as though truth itself were powerless against power. Still, something irreversible has shifted.
Around the world, the myth of Israel as a “moral democracy” is crumbling. University students across the West chant for Palestinian liberation. Filmmakers refuse to share festivals with Israeli-funded productions. Artists, academics, and faith leaders speak openly of apartheid and genocide.
The exposure of Israel’s lies has become a turning point in global consciousness. What was once taboo to question is now widely seen: a state built on dispossession, sustained by propaganda, and defended by silence. Unquestionably, two years after October 7, Israel’s war on Gaza was motivated by ideology rather than fear or self-defense. And the world, having witnessed the machinery of deception laid bare, will not forget. The lie may have justified genocide, but truth has already begun to dismantle its power.
