Liberal Media Spreads Blood Libel About Israel and Organ Harvesting

Liberal Media Spreads Blood Libel About Israel and Organ Harvesting

The Washington Post has come under fire in recent weeks for what its critics say amounts to the so-called news outlet being little more than a mouthpiece for the Hamas terrorist government, accusing Israel of, among other things, “[creating] a humanitarian disaster and [damaging] America’s moral authority in much of the world” thanks to its pledged support for Israel.

Sadly, WaPo is at it again. This time around, it published one of the most serious allegations made against Israel since the start of the Hamas-instigated war: Israel is allegedly harvesting the organs of dead Palestinians before returning their bodies to Gaza.

There is, of course, no evidence for this – which the Washington Post acknowledged. But they tried to give the claims, which amount to blood libel against Israel, an air of credibility by tossing in the words “Palestinian officials say” – perhaps hoping few would understand that “Palestinian officials,” like the infamous Gaza Health Ministry, is code for Hamas officials:

Palestinian officials said Tuesday that Israel had returned the bodies of 80 people it had held during the Gaza war via the Kerem Shalom border crossing. The Hamas-run government media office said Israel had not identified the bodies or said where they had been taken from. They had been “mutilated,” the media office said in a statement, and there were “clear” indications that organs had been “stolen” from the corpses.

The claims could not be independently verified. The Israel Defense Forces referred questions about the bodies to the Israeli agency for civilian coordination with the Palestinians, which did not immediately respond. The corpses, wrapped in blue body bags, were buried Tuesday in a mass grave.

Naturally, others in the MSM ran with the claim, like NBC News tech editor Ben Goggin, who, you know, was just passing the unsubstantiated info along just to be informative and stuff:

“Palestinian officials [said] that Israel had returned the bodies of 80 people it had held during the Gaza war … Israel had not identified the bodies or said where they had been taken from. They had been ‘mutilated,’…organs had been ‘stolen.’” https://t.co/cyFH2ueqTe

— Ben Goggin (@BenjaminGoggin) December 27, 2023

The problem here, as Elder of Ziyon noted on Twitter, is that harvesting organs from dead bodies is nearly impossible:

Here’s @nbcnews deputy tech editor @BenjaminGoggin uncritically quoting the absurd Hamas blood libel that Israel stole [harvested] organs from dead Palestinians, something that is literally impossible unless they died in a sterile hospital environment. But why would a science editor know and report basic science? Much better to spread a classic antisemitic trope than to think critically!

Of course, his followers believe anything bad you can say about Jews, so his timeline is now filled with people who say this is evidence of Israeli evil. Great job, Ben! You helped spread hate!

Why would the @WashingtonPost, whose story he was quoting, report the charges without mentioning the science either? They were more “fair” – saying that Israel didn’t respond yet to one of the dozens of absurd lies that Hamas hurls at them, because it has to act responsibly and get an official answer, unlike Hamas which can make up as many lies as it wants and leave it to Israel to play defense.

Oh, and one more thing: if Israel is returning bodies through Kerem Shalom, as the article admits, that means they were in Israel itself. A real reporter would note that this means that the bodies were likely those of the 10/7 murderers and rapists, the only Gazans who were in Israel – unless the IDF kidnapped the Gazans just to kill them and steal their organs, which antisemites would readily believe as well.

Real journalists would report that the slander is literally impossible and that Palestinian leaders and other antisemites have a history of making up lies like this. Even Israeli doctors who go to disaster areas to save lives have been accused of organ stealing by today’s Jew-haters.

Reporting the story as if it could be true is not journalism – it is irresponsibly spreading pure hate dressed up as objectivity. And it is emblematic of coverage of this war.

Here's @nbcnews deputy tech editor @BenjaminGoggin uncritically quoting the absurd Hamas blood libel that Israel stole organs from dead Palestinians, something that is literally impossible unless they died in a sterile hospital environment. But why would a science editor know… https://t.co/aYQDzMuu7l

— Elder of Ziyon 🇮🇱 (@elderofziyon) December 27, 2023

They elaborated more on their blog:

It is impossible to use organs like hearts and kidneys from dead bodies. Tissue donation must be within 24 hours after death and requires a full medical evaluation of the donor beforehand.

In short, it is not just a lie, but a lie that is easily proven to be a lie. Yet the Post didn’t bother to take that extra step and actually inform their readers that it is indeed a lie.

The process for procuring and preserving organs for donation is, as one might expect, complex, as Live Science explained here, and which further proves the point that organ harvesting from dead bodies (especially the ones Israel allegedly “exhumed from their graves” according to Hamas) is near impossible.

Legal Insurrection has also tackled previous instances of the allegation being passed off as factual by anti-Semitic activists and so-called scholars here and here.

As always, in these matters, it’s best to consider the source – and then form your opinions accordingly.

— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —

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