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Fearing denial and disinformation, Israel shows journalists raw footage of Hamas attacks
TEL AVIV (JTA) — On Monday morning, Roxane Runel posted a photograph to Instagram of two Israel military officers addressing a crowd of reporters in an auditorium. Behind them is a giant television screen.
“Press conference between the international media and the Israeli army after it disseminated images and recordings of the Oct. 7 attacks,” Runel, a reporter for France’s M6 television channel, wrote across the photo, touting an upcoming broadcast. “Why? What is at stake?”
Runel, who has reported from several countries, has already interviewed relatives of Israeli hostages held in Gaza after Hamas’ Oct. 7 invasion of Israel, which killed and wounded thousands. Yet in the middle of Monday’s screening of the attack footage, she was one of a number of journalists who stepped out early.
“It was too much,” she told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “I knew coming here that the hardest thing for me would not be the images but the sound, because you can close your eyes if the images are too much.”
Runel was one of about 200 journalists who attended the screening, which the Israeli government billed as raw and unedited audio and video taken from Hamas terrorists’ body cameras and phones as they massacred communities on Israel’s border with Gaza. In addition to clips of Hamas attackers shooting people, the 43-minute compilation contained graphic images of children being murdered, bodies burned, civilians being mowed down and other atrocities.
Gruesome photos and videos have circulated online in the two weeks after the attack, along with harrowing accounts of the violence visited upon Israelis. The images have become so ubiquitous that Jewish day schools in the United States cautioned students to delete their social media apps to avoid seeing them, while journalists and other public figures have expressed ambivalence about sharing them.
The IDF has taken delegations of foreign journalists into some of the hardest-hit communities, with one spokesperson saying just days after the attack, “Walking through here is like Eisenhower walking through Bergen-Belsen and seeing the destruction and carnage. The world needs to witness this firsthand.”
Now, the Israeli government’s decision to broadcast the footage came as it is increasingly concerned that people are questioning the scale and depravity of Hamas’ massacre. Social media users and journalists alike have expressed skepticism about widespread reports and testimonies of the attack’s most harrowing details, often at the same time as they have sought to shift attention toward the escalating casualties of Israel’s retaliatory war in Gaza, where it aims to depose Hamas.
“I can’t believe I’m saying this and I can’t believe that we as a country are having to do this,” said Eylon Levy, an Israeli government spokesman, in a video announcing the press conference. “As we work to defeat the terror organization that brutalized our people, we are witnessing a Holocaust denial-like phenomenon evolving in real time as people are casting doubt on the magnitude of the atrocities that Hamas committed against our people, and in fact recorded in order to glorify that violence.”
At the press conference, held at a military base north of Tel Aviv, chief IDF spokesperson Adm. Daniel Hagari said the military had “been thinking about this for a couple of days, whether to show it or not,” but decided that screening the footage served as a valuable reminder of the atrocities both for the international media covering the war and Israelis themselves.
“We will not let the world forget who we are fighting,” he said, adding that the footage helps Israelis “to understand ourselves what we are fighting for.”
In addition, IDF Maj. Gen. Mickey Edelstein told the reporters, the Israeli military has evidence it cannot show of sexual violence committed by the Hamas terrorists as well as evidence of links between Hamas and Iran.
He dispelled Hamas claims that terrorists unaffiliated with the group committed the atrocities, saying that the video shows proof that “the vast majority are Hamas” and that the perpetrators attacking civilians were dressed in full tactical gear. Written and other evidence the IDF has discovered, he added, shows that Hamas had planned “to bring hostages and keep families, in order that it would be much more painful.”
Many attendees gasped in horror at difficult elements of the footage, and some chose to exit the theater before the screening had finished. Runel said her personal “limit” was reached when listening to an audio clip of a call on WhatsApp between a Hamas terrorist and his parents, made via the stolen cellphone of an Israeli victim.
“He tells them on the phone — with a voice that is so ecstatic — he sounds like he’s out of his mind,” she said. “He was repeating the same thing over and over again, ‘I killed 10 of them.’ He was saying this as something he was really proud of and he wanted his parents to check the Whatsapp” to see videos he sent of the massacre. The man’s father reacted with praise, while his mother begged him to return home.
Amit Palit, a news anchor and correspondent for India TV based in New Delhi, said that after reporting on the attacks of Oct. 7 on live television, seeing the raw footage helped him understand the “bigger picture.” He said the screening “was necessary for many people who have some doubts.”
Palit, who has been covering the war in Israel for the past 12 days, was most affected by a video of two young brothers after they lost their father, who was murdered in front of them with an explosive while the three were hiding together in a bomb shelter at home. The footage was among the “very painful” clips he witnessed, he said.
“He was asking, ‘Dad,’ and the teenager said, ‘Why am I alive?’” Palit recounted. “A 13-year-old boy cursing himself, asking why he was alive, asking his brother ‘Can you see?’ And he couldn’t see because he lost [one of] his eyes” from the shrapnel of the blast that killed his father.”
Some journalists expressed skepticism about the screening, saying that authentic footage compiled by the Israeli army could come with its own agenda. Nicolas Coadou, a reporter for BFN TV in France, said the footage “is edited, they choose what they want to show us.”
But he acknowledged that reporting on the press conference would be challenging.
“I have a live [broadcast] in one hour,” he said. “And I don’t know what I am going to say.”
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The post Fearing denial and disinformation, Israel shows journalists raw footage of Hamas attacks appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Security Warning to Israelis Vacationing Abroad Ahead of holidays
A passenger arrives to a terminal at Ben Gurion international airport before Israel bans international flights, January 25, 2021. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – Ahead of the Jewish High Holidays, Israel’s National Security Council (NSC) published the latest threat assessment to Israelis abroad from terrorist groups to the public on Sunday, in order to increase the Israeli public’s awareness of the existing terrorist threats around the world and encourage individuals to take preventive action accordingly.
The NSC specified that the warning is an up-to-date reflection of the main trends in the activities of terrorist groups around the world and their impact on the level of threat posed to Israelis abroad during these times, but the travel warnings and restrictions themselves are not new.
“As the Gaza war continues and in parallel with the increasing threat of terrorism, the National Security Headquarters stated it has recognized a trend of worsening and increasing violent antisemitic incidents and escalating steps by anti-Israel groups, to the point of physically harming Israelis and Jews abroad. This is in light of, among other things, the anti-Israel narrative and the negative media campaign by pro-Palestinian elements — a trend that may encourage and motivate extremist elements to carry out terrorist activities against Israelis or Jews abroad,” the statement read.
“Therefore, the National Security Bureau is reinforcing its recommendation to the Israeli public to act with responsibility during this time when traveling abroad, to check the status of the National Security Bureau’s travel warnings (before purchasing tickets to the destination,) and to act in accordance with the travel warning recommendations and the level of risk in the country they are visiting,” it listed, adding that, as illustrated in the past year, these warnings are well-founded and reflect a tangible and valid threat potential.
The statement also emphasized the risk of sharing content on social media networks indicating current or past service in the Israeli security forces, as these posts increase the risk of being marked by various parties as a target. “Therefore, the National Security Council recommends that you do not upload to social networks, in any way, content that indicates service in the security forces, operational activity, or similar content, as well as real-time locations.”
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Israel Intensifies Gaza City Bombing as Rubio Arrives
Displaced Palestinians, fleeing northern Gaza due to an Israeli military operation, move southward after Israeli forces ordered residents of Gaza City to evacuate to the south, in the central Gaza Strip September 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Israeli forces destroyed at least 30 residential buildings in Gaza City and forced thousands of people from their homes, Palestinian officials said, as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived on Sunday to discuss the future of the conflict.
Israel has said it plans to seize the city, where about a million Palestinians have been sheltering, as part of its declared aim of eliminating the terrorist group Hamas, and has intensified attacks on what it has called Hamas’ last bastion.
The group’s political leadership, which has engaged in on-and-off negotiations on a possible ceasefire and hostage release deal, was targeted by Israel in an airstrike in Doha on Tuesday in an attack that drew widespread condemnation.
Qatar will host an emergency Arab-Islamic summit on Monday to discuss the next moves. Rubio said Washington wanted to talk about how to free the 48 hostages – of whom 20 are believed to be still alive – still held by Hamas in Gaza and rebuild the coastal strip.
“What’s happened, has happened,” he said. “We’re gonna meet with them (the Israeli leadership). We’re gonna talk about what the future holds,” Rubio said before heading to Israel where he will stay until Tuesday.
ABRAHAM ACCORDS AT RISK
He was expected to visit the Western Wall Jewish prayer site in Jerusalem on Sunday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and hold talks with him during the visit.
US officials described Tuesday’s strike on the territory of a close US ally as a unilateral escalation that did not serve American or Israeli interests. Rubio and US President Donald Trump both met Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani on Friday.
Netanyahu signed an agreement on Thursday to push ahead with a settlement expansion plan that would cut across West Bank land that the Palestinians seek for a state – a move the United Arab Emirates warned would undermine the US-brokered Abraham accords that normalized UAE relations with Israel.
Israel, which blocked all food from entering Gaza for 11 weeks earlier this year, has been allowing more aid into the enclave since late July to prevent further food shortages, though the United Nations says far more is needed.
It says it wants civilians to leave Gaza City before it sends more ground forces in. Tens of thousands of people are estimated to have left but hundreds of thousands remain in the area. Hamas has called on people not to leave.
Israeli army forces have been operating inside at least four eastern suburbs for weeks, turning most of at least three of them into wastelands. It is closing in on the center and the western areas of the territory, where most of the displaced people are taking shelter.
Many are reluctant to leave, saying there is not enough space or safety in the south, where Israel has told them to go to what it has designated as a humanitarian zone.
Some say they cannot afford to leave while others say they were hoping the Arab leaders meeting on Monday in Qatar would pressure Israel to scrap its planned offensive.
“The bombardment intensified everywhere and we took down the tents, more than twenty families, we do not know where to go,” said Musbah Al-Kafarna, displaced in Gaza City.
Israel said it had completed five waves of air strikes on Gaza City over the past week, targeting more than 500 sites, including Hamas reconnaissance and sniper sites, buildings containing tunnel openings and weapons depots.
Local officials, who do not distinguish between militant and civilian casualties, say at least 40 people were killed by Israeli fire across the enclave, a least 28 in Gaza City alone.
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Turkey Warns of Escalation as Israel Expands Strikes Beyond Gaza
Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a press conference with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (not seen) at the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey, May 13, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
i24 News – An Israeli strike targeting Hamas officials in Qatar has sparked unease among several Middle Eastern countries that host leaders of the group, with Turkey among the most alarmed.
Officials in Ankara are increasingly worried about how far Israel might go in pursuing those it holds responsible for the October 7 attacks.
Israel’s prime minister effectively acknowledged that the Qatar operation failed to eliminate the Hamas leadership, while stressing the broader point the strike was meant to make: “They enjoy no immunity,” the government said.
On X, Prime Minister Netanyahu went further, writing that “the elimination of Hamas leaders would put an end to the war.”
A senior Turkish official, speaking on condition of anonymity, summed up Ankara’s reaction: “The attack in Qatar showed that the Israeli government is ready to do anything.”
Legally and diplomatically, Turkey occupies a delicate position. As a NATO member, any military operation or targeted killing on its soil could inflame tensions within the alliance and challenge mutual security commitments.
Analysts caution, however, that Israel could opt for covert measures, operations carried out without public acknowledgement, a prospect that has increased anxiety in governments across the region.
Israeli officials remain defiant. In an interview with Ynet, Minister Ze’ev Elkin said: “As long as we have not stopped them, we will pursue them everywhere in the world and settle our accounts with them.” The episode underscores growing fears that efforts to hunt Hamas figures beyond Gaza could widen regional friction and complicate diplomatic relationships.