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    Gareth Porter: IDF Knew Real Hamas HQ While Lying About al-Shifa Archived Message

    Posted by sashimi on November 26, 2023, 9:26 pm

    23 Nov 2023

    Although corporate news media have made it clear they don't buy the Israel
    Defense Forces (IDF) claim that al-Shifa Hospital has been a cover for a Hamas
    command and control center and weapons armory, Western media have failed to
    report a much bigger story.

    The IDF and the Israeli government already knew when they launched their
    propaganda campaign about al-Shifa that Hamas had no military command and
    control facility hidden there because it had already found the complex
    kilometers away.

    As Consortium News reported last week, for 15 years the Israelis claimed Hamas
    was operating its primary command and control base from a tunnel underneath
    al-Shifa. After the Israeli bombing campaign against Gaza began in October, the
    Israeli military amplified that message to press its contention that by hiding
    the Hamas high command, al-Shifa Hospital had lost its immunity from military
    operations under the law of war, and could now legitimately be taken over by
    force.

    On Nov. 11, IDF spokesman Richard Hecht declared that al-Shifa was the "main hub
    of Hamas activity;" Newsweek reported the IDF regarded al-Shifa Hospital as
    "Hamas's main command post" and the Times of Israel headlined "Hamas leaders
    again hiding under hospital".

    The crescendo of Israeli propaganda about al-Shifa being a "human shield" for
    Hamas came with a long report published by The New York Times on Nov. 14. It was
    based on interviews with eight present and former intelligence and defense
    officials, describing a vast military command complex under al-Shifa with
    multiple levels.

    But something quite unexpected had happened during this new round of press
    stories on al-Shifa that completely demolished the entire IDF story line: the
    IDF had gained control of the real Hamas command and control center in an area
    where the Hamas leadership had previously had their above-ground offices in the
    Al Atatra neighborhood, in the extreme northwest of Beit Lahiya city, 8.5km away
    from al-Shifa.

    After that office building was demolished, the IDF discovered a major tunnel
    facility that was quite certain had been the central headquarters for the Hamas
    high command - the command and control center for the entire war.

    As the IDF leaked to The Jerusalem Post in a story published Nov. 14, the
    discovery was made "several days ago" of a tunnel with an elevator that reached
    thirty meters underground, compared with only five meters underground in other
    tunnels. Furthermore it had been equipped with oxygen, air conditioning and
    more advanced communications than seen anywhere else.

    That major IDF discovery, made on or before the Nov. 11 false stories about
    al-Shifa, threatened to undermine the Israeli political campaign to justify the
    IDF's takeover and destruction of Gaza's hospitals on the grounds that they were
    "human shields" for Hamas.

    Al-Shifa Hospital was the centerpiece of that campaign, based on the claim that
    it was hiding the high command of Hamas in a tunnel underneath it. Obviously the
    IDF and the extreme right-wing Israel government would want to stop all further
    publicity about the discovery of the actual Hamas high command's underground
    base.

    No story about the discovery of the real Hamas high command bunker has been
    published inside Israel or elsewhere in the nearly two weeks since the detailed
    Jerusalem Post piece on Nov. 14. Somehow the Israeli government and media have
    been able to completely suppress the discovery of the Hamas headquarters,
    despite the fact that a number of foreign news media have offices in Tel Aviv
    and the story is still available on the internet.

    Instead of forcing a major climb-down by the IDF and the Netanyahu and the Biden
    administrations, the discovery of the real Hamas underground high-command center
    merely brought a slight revision in the wording used to refer to the issue.
    -- Cont'd at https://consortiumnews.com/2023/11/23/idf-knew-real-hamas-hq-while-lying-about-al-shifa/

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