Editor’s note: This story includes graphic descriptions of violent acts that some readers may find disturbing.
A series of shocking reports have spread horrific claims of baby beheadings by Hamas militants across social and mainstream media in recent days, adding a particularly incendiary element to an already violent and bitter war. But the reports are still unconfirmed, and in some cases have been retracted.
The most high-profile claim came Wednesday night when President Joe Biden said that he had seen photographic evidence of terrorists beheading children. The White House later clarified that Biden was referring to news reports about beheadings, which have not included or referred to photographic evidence.
Photos have been published by Hamas showing beheaded soldiers and the X account belonging to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posted pictures on Thursday of babies killed and burned by Hamas. No photo evidence had been made public as of Thursday morning corroborating claims that babies had been beheaded.
Unverified information spreads quickly on social media, particularly around breaking news events, reaching even larger audiences when it is shared by mainstream news outlets, politicians and people with large followings. Follow-ups that retract or add context are less likely to be repeated or reach the same audience.
Biden’s statement followed a series of news reports and comments from Israeli officials, most of which have since been softened or walked back. Easily debunked misinformation like fake press releases have circulated widely since the start of the war, but such stories often die down quickly once proven false. The claims about beheadings, difficult to verify, have continued to spread thanks in part to the lack of clarity.
Alexei Abrahams, a disinformation researcher at McGill University in Montreal, said that even without the allegations of beheaded babies, “just the facts themselves are horrifying enough to have the kind of effect you expect.”
“It may turn out that the slaughter was done in a particularly barbaric way. But one way or another, this is an absolutely shocking, unprecedented event of violence,” Abrahams said. “The general concern, of course, is that it’s going to exacerbate what is already a very fraught situation.”
On Wednesday, a spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told CNN that babies and toddlers were found with their “heads decapitated” in southern Israel after Hamas’ attack. By Thursday morning, an Israeli official told CNN the government had not confirmed claims of the beheadings.
A senior State Department official said Thursday morning that the agency was not in a position to confirm the beheading claims.
Many of the reports appear to have originated from Israeli soldiers and people affiliated with the Israel Defense Force (IDF).
An IDF spokesperson told Business Insider on Tuesday that soldiers had found decapitated babies, but said Wednesday it would not investigate or provide further evidence regarding the claim. Late Wednesday, an IDF spokesperson said in a video on X that the IDF had “relative confidence” of the claims.
On Thursday, in a call with a group of international journalists, Colonel Golan Vach, the head of the IDF’s national search and rescue unit, said that he had “found one baby with his head cut.”
Marc Owen Jones, an associate professor of Middle East studies at Hamad Bin Khalifa University in Qatar who studies misinformation, told NBC News that he found that the source of the “40 babies beheaded” allegations largely stemmed from a viral Israeli news broadcast clip that did not specifically refer to the allegation.
Nicole Zedeck, a correspondent for the privately owned Israeli news outlet i24NEWS, said in the video that Israeli soldiers told her they’d found “babies, their heads cut off.” The video has been viewed more than 11 million times on X, according to its view counter. In another tweet, Zedeck wrote that soldiers told her they believe “40 babies/children were killed.”
“Somehow those two bits of information were connected, the story became ‘40 babies were beheaded,’ and in the British press today, about six or seven newspapers had it on their front pages,” Jones said.
An IDF spokesperson, Doron Spielman, told NBC News on Tuesday that he could not confirm i24NEWS’s report.
Yossi Landau, the head of operations for the southern region of Zaka, Israel’s volunteer civilian emergency response organization, told CBS News that he saw the bodies of beheaded children and babies, parents and children who had been tortured and had their hands bound, and “a lot more that cannot be described for now, because it’s very hard to describe.”
By Wednesday, the claims, though still contentious, were going viral online — being used as evidence of Hamas’ depravity. On Wednesday, the phrase “Did Hamas kill babies” saw the biggest increase in search interest on Google of anything related to the war.
“Stranger Things” star Noah Schnapp posted the shocking claim to his 25 million Instagram followers: “40 babies were beheaded and burned alive in front of their parents by Hamas.” Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, mentioned beheaded babies in a post on X, and Rep. Mike McCaul, R-Texas, echoed the allegations on CNN.
Jones found that the “40 babies beheaded” claim had over 44 million impressions on X, with over 300,000 likes and more than 100,000 reposts. The main accounts propagating the claims were i24NEWS and the official Israel account, Jones’ data showed.
“Baby stories are very emotive. Historically, they’re stories that can be used to rationalize a very brutal response,” Jones said. “It’s such a volatile information environment that such claims will inevitably be taken out of context, both deliberately and accidentally.”
