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Al Mayadeen's correspondent: Two were martyred in an initial toll of the Israeli drone strike that targeted the al-Asira neighborhood in the city of Baalbek, eastern Lebanon
Al Mayadeen's correspondent: An Israeli drone strike targeted the al-Asira neighborhood east of Baalbek, eastern Lebanon
Sheikh Naim Qassem to the pager attack survivors: You are the greatest resistance. Know that 'Israel' will fall because it embodies aggression, crime, and occupation; victory is truly yours
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Sheikh Qassem to the pager attack survivors: You are moving forward with insight deeper than sight itself. The enemy sought to eliminate your role in the battle, yet you remain steadfast and continue the fight
Hezbollah Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem to the pager attack survivors one year later: You are healing from your wounds and rising above them. You have successfully passed the test
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AEOI Chief Mohammad Eslami: Our presence in IAEA General Council and fact-checking helped in preventing unilateral rhetoric that aims to portray Iran as an unregulated country

Food blogger, Israeli film director scripted Hamas rape story for NYT

  • By Tala Alayli
  • Source: X: @zei_squirrel
  • 28 Feb 2024 23:50
  • 17 Shares
7 Min Read

Adam Sella and Anat Schwartz, who co-authored the NYT's widely-known false article have been called out for their credibility and their attempt to promote a fabricated narrative that the NYT proudly endorsed. 

  • x
  • Who are the authors running the NYT's Oct. 7 rape story?
    New York Police Officers stand guard in front of The New York Times building after being vandalized with red tint by Pro-Palestine demonstrators as they march calling for a cease-fire in Gaza, Friday, Nov. 10, 2023, in New York (AP Photo/Eduardo Munoz Alvarez)

While the New York Times pushes its virally debunked Hamas mass rape lies, a social media whistleblower under the name @zei_squirrel managed to compile data concerning two of the co-authors of the running article. 

Adam Sella and Anat Schwartz, who co-authored the NYT's widely-known false article alongside Jeffrey Gettleman, have been called out for their credibility and their attempt to promote a fabricated narrative that the NYT proudly endorsed. 

"If I told you that the New York Times hired a recently graduated college student with only a couple prior articles written on the subject of food and cooking to be their lead on the ground "reporter" on the "mass rape" hoax they fabricated, would you believe it? That's Adam Sella", the user said on a thread on X.

About Adam Sella 

Through LinkedIn, @zei_squirrel found that Adam Sella was a fresh graduate, with barely any journalistic experience, specifically on the topic of sexual assault, that the NYT recruited. Looking at his profile, his only professional experience in journalism is confined to leisure writing on cooking, food, and interior design. 

The social media whistleblower then posed the question: How could the NYT trust a fresh college graduate with zero reporting experience on one of its leading stories?

The answer to that would be Anat Schwartz. 

Who is Anat Schwartz? 

Anat is an Israeli film director and happens to be married to Adam's uncle, Dan Sella. 

The related duo teamed up and wrote the story that would later incriminate Hamas and allow the criminally false image of the nature of the Resistance to spiral into an uncontrollable narrative, but they failed. 

As the story gets further debunked, it is worth mentioning that Anat herself cannot be considered a reliable source of information, specifically when running a leading story for one of the biggest news media outlets. However, it does not come as a surprise. 

Schwartz formerly served in the Israeli occupation forces and actively worked with Israeli military intelligence. She was also the main focus of several online scandals that exposed her fascist extremism. 

Schwartz explicitly liked a post on X that says Zionists actively and deliberately run the narrative equating Hamas to ISIS. It is not a reality, but a charade that Zionist lobbyists have desperately tried to promote to conceal the Israeli occupation's crimes in Gaza since October 7. 

but it's much worse than that. And this is why the NYT desperately wants to scapegoat Anat Schwartz. She made public and explicit her and Adam Sella's intentions: They set out to fabricate atrocity propaganda "because it is important for Israel": https://t.co/KIoglQUoHG pic.twitter.com/GOGC1WRANQ

— ☀️👀 (@zei_squirrel) February 28, 2024

The former IOF soldier has not shied away from sharing her extremist views. In 2008, she co-directed a film titled "Waltz with Bashir" on the Lebanese civil war and the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. The film depicts the experiences of IOF veterans and "their trauma" to justify the gruesome massacres they committed against Palestinian and Lebanese communities. It is an artistic psychological operation that aims at garnering sympathy for perpetrators of violence. 

In other news, she publicly expressed how her fabrications "are important for Hasbara" and the promotion of Israeli and anti-Palestinian propaganda, something the Israeli newspaper Ynet urged the NYT to conceal. 

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Another post calling for "turning the Gaza Strip into a slaughterhouse" was also endorsed by Anat Schwartz. 

So, it is only reasonable to question the NYT's intentions behind the publication of false rape claims, specifically when not a single author on the report could be considered reliable or credible. 

A desperate, fallacious sequel

However, @zei_squirrel does not stop there. It was also revealed how after the sexual abuse report was vehemently refuted, Adam Sella was given another chance to push the narrative, this time using ZAKA. 

ZAKA is an Israeli rescue group that submitted a report to the UN regarding the false rape accusations from October 7. It was then revealed that ZAKA's founder himself, Meshi-Zahav, was convicted of rape and exploiting his power to sexually assault young girls. 

Adam Sella cognitively utilized a renowned rape-infested organization to accuse Hamas of raping Israeli female captives, and tried to hide it by using an alias for ZAKA, the "Rape Crisis Group".

Zaka was founded by a pedophile rapist. This cult was tasked to be "first responders" on October 7 by the Israeli regime. They used that status to fabricate hoaxes, including the 40 beheaded babies. Today the AP, CNN, NYT, BBC, once again laundered their lies on their front page pic.twitter.com/YhrbDSCd9v

— ☀️👀 (@zei_squirrel) February 22, 2024

Meanwhile, Jeffrey Gettleman revealed that follow-up research would be conducted to give the original piece "credibility". 

Read more: Debunking Israeli claims: What led to NYT's false Hamas rape story

Internal and public refutations

NYT staff members gave their two cents when the first story was published: one editor expressed frustration with the executive editorial board that does not claim accountability for misdoings when publishing. He affirmed “The story deserved more fact-checking and much more reporting. All basic standards applied to countless other stories.”

The Israeli family involved in a key case mentioned in the October 7 New York Times report on alleged sexual violence by Hamas fighters has disavowed the published story, asserting that reporters manipulated their statements, Press TV reported, citing Israeli media.

 One day following the publication of the report, the Israeli news site Ynet interviewed Gal's parents. They emphasized the absence of evidence supporting the claim that she was raped, asserting that the newspaper's reporters had interviewed them under false pretenses. The parents stated that they were unaware of the sexual assault issue until the article in the American Daily was published. Additionally, Gal's sisters vehemently refuted the allegations of rape.

Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that the Israeli police are finding paramount difficulty locating and finding any Israeli settlers who were victims of sexual assaults or witnesses of such acts allegedly committed by the Hamas Resistance movement during their October 7 Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.

According to Haaretz, one of the main outlets propagating the claim that the Palestinian Resistance fighters sexually assaulted Israeli women on October 7, the police cannot find any victims or any witnesses of any form of sexual assault.

"Even in the few cases in which the [police] collected testimony about sexual offenses committed on October 7, it failed to connect the acts with the victims who were harmed by them," Haaretz said.

IOF soldiers sexually abuse Palestinian women: Proof

While unreliable reports get circulated, and false narratives get pushed, material proof is released confirming that IOF soldiers have sexually exploited Palestinian women and girls. 

UN experts raised concern over "credible allegations" of grave human rights violations against Palestinian women and girls in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.

According to the information, Palestinian women and girls were arbitrarily executed in Gaza along with their family members, even while fleeing, and, on at least one occasion, women detained were allegedly kept in a cage in the rain and cold, without food.

The experts expressed they were "particularly distressed" about reports of detained women and girls being subjected to numerous forms of sexual assault, like being stripped naked and searched by male Israeli army officers.

At least two female Palestinian detainees were raped, while others were reportedly threatened with rape and sexual abuse.

  • New York Times
  • sexual assault
  • IOF
  • Israel
  • Hamas
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