WaPo: WH says Biden and other officials have not seen footage/photos of beheaded kids

[WhiskeyGrinder]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/11/israel-hamas-war-updates-gaza-attack/#link-SIA4LEH6CVAGFEXIJ4556IMXRI

Text is from the article headlined "Netanyahu says ‘every Hamas member is a dead man’ in televised speech".

“I’ve been doing this a long time,” Biden said at the White House. “I never really thought that I would see, have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children.”

A White House spokesperson later clarified that U.S. officials and the president have not seen pictures or confirmed such reports independently. The president based his comments about the alleged atrocities on the claims from Netanyahu’s spokesman and media reports from Israel, according to the White House.

In response to questions from The Post, an Israel Defense Forces spokesperson declined to comment on the state of victims’ bodies.

[Solly Mack]

1. K&R

[moondust]

2. Joy Reid said

Last edited Wed Oct 11, 2023, 11:12 PM - Edit history (2)

NBC News has not confirmed the reports of beheading children.

ETA: Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the U.S., is on with Lawrence O'Donnell right now from Tel Aviv. He said the son of his close friend was sent by the army to pick up not bodies but body parts--arms, heads, etc. Didn't say if they were from children.

ETA: MSNBC just reported with some video clips that some Israeli soldiers had been beheaded.

[Alexander Of Assyria]

30. Yikes! The misinformation is going to the heads of our leaders. Sad.

[obamanut2012]

37. I totally believe IDF personnel were beheaded and even dismembered

Still a war crime and appalling, but that doesn't gin up the outrage like beheaded babies.... or babies tossed from incubators.

They ahve been using babies in propo for a long time. Some fo teh WW! and WWII ALLIED propo is disgusting. So, the "good guys."

[Delphinus]

3. Hmm ...

Unsure why he would have said that.

[KS Toronado]

25. I'm not either

[herding cats]

26. Hi!

Are you on this term? Perfect GIF, by the way! 😂

[KS Toronado]

29. Thanks ole friend

[GP6971]

27. Hello.

[Doc Sportello]

4. But posters on DU have said it is so

How can this be?

[revmclaren]

5. Since we are not privy to what President Biden

actually is briefed on...nor the press...for national and international reasons, I will wait for official word on this.

There are those who seem to try to discredit our President even here on DU especially where this act of cowardly terrorism against Israel is concerned.

I will repeat again:

I support President Biden!

[WhiskeyGrinder]

7. .

I will wait for official word on this.

Official word on...what?

[revmclaren]

8. This statement from the president...

"I've e been doing this a long time,” Biden said at the White House. “I never really thought that I would see, have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children.”


It is the same kind of statement that you or I would make discussing this...

"I never thought I would see when children are beheaded in a terrorist attack. "

I didn't actually see it, but it has been confirmed.

They have confirmed pictures undoubtedly through our own agencies.

This article seems to want to make Biden out to be a lier.

IMHO of course.

[obamanut2012]

38. He was briefed badly, but teh WH has walked this back

So what official word are you waiting on??? That is the official word.

[revmclaren]

11. By the way...where is the original post.

It seems to be gone.

Please update the link.

Thank you in advance

[WhiskeyGrinder]

15. As indicated, it's at that link. You have to scroll down to the headline listed.

[revmclaren]

18. Ok...

See posts 8 and 12 please.

[SpamWyzer]

14. In World War 1,

the demonization of German soldiers in propaganda included the claim and images of "the Hun" with babies impaled on bayonets and women dead on the ground. When April Glaspie gave Saddam Hussein veritable US government permission to attack Kuwait, the claim was made that babies in incubators were thrown into the street and the incubators stolen and taken to Iraq. Russian troops have been claimed to shell hospitals and have killed mothers and babies. It seems to be a trope in propaganda; the moral outrage fueled by the killing of innocent children. I do not doubt that children, maybe infants may have been killed in this attack. Hamas is scum, terrorists kill innocent people, not a stretch to see them killing babies and children. The history of the Middle East is rife with examples of "massacres of innocents", Herod ordered one that is part of the Biblical tale of the life of Jesus. Nonetheless, since the fog of war includes the use of propaganda against your own population, as well as the enemy, we can accept that hate is the order of the day and getting people more riled up is the point.
President Biden may well have seen the claimed images. However, I believe he was talking in a figurative sense.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

17. As I've said elsewhere, the best propaganda is true.

[leftstreet]

6. DURec

Thanks for posting. I saw that earlier on the Post feed, but couldn't go back and find it

[revmclaren]

10. The post is gone...

Interesting...

[TexasDem69]

9. It seems undisputed

That Hamas murdered hundreds of civilians. Not by a random bomb, but intentionally and using guns and knives. Murdered babies and whole families, murdered folks attending a concert, burned houses with families inside. The reports suggest Hamas also beheaded some of the children they murdered. But it doesn’t really matter if that’s true. Hamas is no different than ISIS, Al Qaeda or any other rabid animal and must be put down.

If you engage in both-side arguments or attempt to justify Hamas’ actions you are no Democrat and shouldn’t be on this website.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

19. Having neither made a both-sides argument nor justified Hamas' actions, I'm not concerned.

[TexasDem69]

22. Of course

I certainly wasn’t pointing the finger at any individual, but there are individuals on DU who at the very least have argued that Hamas’ acts were justified.

[Disaffected]

28. Rather than pointing the finger at any individual then,

how about pointing to the relevant posts these individuals (supposedly) made?

Personally I haven't seen any. And I am certainly not making the scurrilous aqusation that questioning or criticism of Israel equates to justification of acts of Hamas.

[claudette]

36. That's one thing I have not seen here

I have never seen ANYONE say or argue that what Hamas did to Israel was "justified." Expressing compassion for the deaths of innocent Palestinians does NOT equal "justifying" the atrocities of Hamas.

[obamanut2012]

40. No one has said that

Fine us ONE rep[ly from a non-troll saying Murdering innocents is justified.

[sarisataka]

46. No one has said that... but

You can't be beating a people to death for years and decades
And then cry about it when they manage to get a good lick in, even if they kick you in the balls.

Brutal occupation comes with a cost

"Hamas attacked a music festival held for the Palestinians for Peace"

-"I view this as people partying and having fun while
oppression, tyranny and brutality continued against Palestinian civilians."

Apologies if anyone recognizes their own words. Some of these justifications/ excuses come for DUers that have been here up to 20 years.

[Alexander Of Assyria]

31. The Strawman Brigade will be out in full force...well said!

[obamanut2012]

39. But it does matter if it's true, because of what the "fact" is being used for

It also will throw doubt onto other things claimed.

Things are bad enough without adding "enhancements." And, dragging Biden and other world leaders into spreading it.

[BlueTsunami2018]

12. I think he was speaking figuratively.

“I never thought I’d see the day” type of thing.

I’m sorry but I’m skeptical of this whole beheaded babies thing. Isn’t what we know happened bad enough? This just feels like an attempt to stoke the emotions even higher. To make people willing to accept the most brutal response possible.

I don’t think it’s outside the realm of possibility considering the extreme barbarous acts of ISIS and other radical religious nutcases that we’ve seen posted on the internet but something about this has my bullshit detector going off.

I guess we’ll know for sure one way or the other soon enough.

[revmclaren]

13. That's exactly what I said.

[ecstatic]

16. Same. nt

[WhiskeyGrinder]

20. A lot of people are speaking figuratively about a very specific claim. That's dangerous.

[obamanut2012]

42. Exactly -- this is concerning me, too

[TexasDem69]

23. I don't know if Hamas beheaded babies

Or just intentionally murdered babies in their cribs, but it really, really, really seems like both are barbaric, indefensible, and must be punished.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

33. Both are indeed barbaric and indefensible; there's no moral distinction when it comes to killing

babies. There is a distinction when it comes to propaganda value, however, and it's deeply important to be aware of it.

[Alexander Of Assyria]

32. Stoke emotions higher and higher...prepare the ground for mass killings....obvious tactic used

a thousand times before in every war…it works…as we have just witnessed. Sad.

[Alexander Of Assyria]

34. Unfortunately social media has made folks incapable of separating literal from figurative.

And mass media doesn’t care to help with the distinction either…and only a few on DU get it.

[obamanut2012]

41. That is exactly what this is

They beheaded little babies!

The Israeli government and soooo many people over in teh US, including on DU, are calling them animals. Some on here say it is okay to kill Palestinian CHILDREN in Gaza because "they support Hamas."

And, those posts are not hidden.

DUers are advocating for murdering literal 10-year-olds (that was the age mentioned in one post), because "they support Hamas." And, the post was not hidden, the poster is not banned. This is literal Fascist manipulation techniques and they are falling for it.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

21. Evening kick

[sl8]

35. Where is the statement?

Last edited Thu Oct 12, 2023, 10:14 AM - Edit history (1)

I looked at your link last night and couldn't find anything about beheaded children. I also checked the copies of the WP web page on Internet Archive and archive.ph to see if other versions of the page might have the statement, but with no luck.

This morning I see see several other news sources reporting that the White House is walking back President Biden's statement, using the Washington Post as their source, but I can't find it on the Post's site.

One of the news souces cited NPR as their source, but their link was to a tweet, not NPR. I'm not finding anything on NPR's site about it.

On edit:

The cited tweet was from Asma Khalid, who is an NPR White House correspondent.

On edit (2) :

NPR article from last night:

https://www.npr.org/2023/10/11/1205123459/biden-steps-up-security-for-jewish-communities-in-the-u-s-after-the-attack-in-is

[...]

"I never really thought that I would see, have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children," he said. It was unclear whether Biden had seen pictures. A National Security Council official said Biden was referring to media reports from Israel. NPR has not independently verified the reports.

[..]

[617Blue]

43. I remember the "babies in incubators" story from Gulf War 1

Everything said about this situation puts you in hot water but just brining in some perspective from a previous time.

Again I'm not sure if the original story regarding Iraq in Kuwait was true but it was bandied about a lot during the runup to war.

[obamanut2012]

44. No, it wasn't true, it was a literal lie

The girl who testified to Congress about it was the daughter of a Kuwaiti Ambassador, and she wasn't even in Kuwait at that time.

[617Blue]

45. Yes I remember her testimony.

That's one positive of the internet is people can be fact checked and exposed much quicker than the prehistoric days!

Thank you for confirming.

[obamanut2012]

47. I remember watching it, too

And remembered having studied the same exact type propaganda from WW1.

[Ace Rothstein]

48. They weren't beheaded but there are some incredibly disturbing pictures that were released.

Dead babies, both burnt and bloodied.