As the world reacts with alarm to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, disinformation about the famine there is spreading widely. In Southeast Europe, these falsehoods often take the form of wishful thinking rather than overt fabrication.
The escalation of the armed conflict in Gaza, now approaching its second anniversary, has been accompanied by heavily biased reporting and a steady flow of disinformation. As Israel intensifies its military operations, official denials from the Israeli side are increasingly scrutinized by fact-checkers worldwide. Israeli forces are now advancing into Gaza City as part of an ongoing military occupation. This operation follows months of restrictions on humanitarian aid entering the city, a blockade that has contributed to the famine now recognized worldwide.
The Israeli government, however, denies that starvation is occurring, framing it instead as Hamas propaganda. On July 27, 2025, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly stated there is no famine in Gaza, a claim that the U.S. fact-checking outlet PolitiFact assessed as contradicting extensive evidence of a hunger crisis. In the same coverage, PolitiFact cited an interview that day in which Israeli army spokesperson Effie Defrin told NPR that images depicting dire conditions were part of a Hamas-driven campaign to create “an image of starvation, which doesn’t exist.”
“The Israeli leadership, along with the media, consistently deny that there is starvation in Gaza, dismissing it as mere propaganda,” Riham Abu Aita, founder of the Palestinian fact-checking outlet Kashif, told SEE Check. “They argue that sufficient aid is entering Gaza, but that Hamas is stealing it.”
Beginning in March, Israel halted all humanitarian aid to Gaza for two and a half months. Under mounting international pressure, the blockade was partially eased on May 19. Still, aid groups told the Associated Press that the relief allowed in was far from sufficient.
“Gazans are starving — 74 people have died of malnutrition in 2025, 63 of them in July, the United Nations reports, and thousands more are at risk. The hunger crisis is well documented in images, by United Nations data, news reports, first-person accounts, and information from humanitarian organizations working in Gaza,” PolitiFact noted.
Abu Aita said that pro-Israel accounts on social media have been publishing photos of food in Gaza from before the famine, claiming that it represents the current situation.
Reports Confirm Famine
On August 22, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), UNICEF, the World Food Programme (WFP), and the World Health Organization (WHO) released a report warning that “more than half a million people in Gaza are trapped in famine, marked by widespread starvation, destitution, and preventable deaths.” For anyone still doubting, the report confirmed the existence of famine, sounding alarm bells worldwide.
Despite that, Israeli officials and supporters continue to downplay the extent of the disaster. The same day, according to Deutsche Welle, Israel started a new campaign using sponsored advertisements to influence the public opinion in Europe and North America.
The narrative also shifted slightly after the circulation of a video in early August showing Israeli captive Avitar David appearing emaciated. The footage appears to have divided Israeli society, as some acknowledged it as evidence of famine, while others insisted that starvation affects only Israeli captives.
Assertions that the severity of Gaza’s crisis has been fabricated are not confined to Israel. In Germany, Bild published claims that photographs of starving children in Gaza were staged as “Hamas propaganda.” This narrative reached Bosnia and Herzegovina, though with a different framing: the country’s most-read online news outlet, Klix, reported on Bild’s coverage with an editorial remark labeling it as “a shameful article by the German Bild.”
Famine Denial Finds Little Ground in Southeast Europe
In much of Southeast Europe, however, claims that the famine in Gaza is “staged” have failed to gain significant traction.
In Slovenia, famine denial took the form of a controversy over a widely circulated photograph published by The New York Times. On July 24, the American newspaper ran a front-page story on famine and child malnutrition in Gaza, featuring an image of 18-month-old Mohamed in his mother’s arms. Slovenian outlet Nova24TV reported that the boy had pre-existing health conditions affecting muscle and brain function, a detail that was used in some circles to bolster claims that the famine in Gaza was fabricated.
Slovenian fact-checking platform Razkrinkavanje later debunked these claims, finding no evidence that The New York Times had intentionally misled readers. The outlet cited Sandra Bašić Hrvatin, a professor of media studies at the University of Primorska, who stressed that “war-zone reporting is difficult but must uphold basic journalistic standards.” She also noted that Gaza is closed to foreign journalists, making local reporters indispensable for credible coverage. The fact that the child had pre-existing conditions, Razkrinkavanje concluded, is not proof that the famine in Gaza has been fabricated.
As noted, data from established humanitarian organizations confirm that famine in Gaza is widespread.
In Southeast Europe, outright famine denial was relatively rare. Fact-checkers in the region covered the issue, but the disinformation that circulated took different forms. Both the Bosnian and Montenegrin editions of Raskrinkavanje reported on false claims about alleged breakthroughs in delivering aid to Gazans. In Bosnia, a viral post claimed that people had broken through the blockade to bring supplies into Gaza; in reality, the video showed mushroom pickers in Nepal.
Similarly, both outlets (1, 2) debunked a claim that China had “broken the Israeli blockade” and delivered humanitarian aid to Gaza by air. The footage, in fact, came from a joint military exercise between the Chinese and Egyptian air forces, which was misrepresented as an aid delivery.
Other false claims about aid to Gaza also gained traction online. Both Montenegrin Raskrinkavanje and Albanian Faktoje debunked (1, 2) AI-generated images purporting to show humanitarian supplies being sent from Egypt to Gaza across the sea in plastic bottles. Another widely shared video, also fact-checked by Raskrinkavanje.me, claimed that Russia and China had air-dropped aid into Gaza. The accompanying captions carried strong pro-China and pro-Russia messaging, alongside anti-Western rhetoric.
These examples suggest that disinformation actors seized on the crisis in Gaza not only to distort facts about humanitarian aid, but also to advance their own geopolitical agendas.
When War Reporting Meets Propaganda
Wartime reporting is inherently difficult. Extreme conditions, coupled with entrenched military and political agendas, create fertile ground for disinformation. Covering the crisis in Gaza is particularly challenging: foreign journalists are barred from entry, and local reporters face constant threats. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, 197 journalists have been killed since the conflict began in October 2023. On August 12, the entire Al Jazeera crew reporting from Gaza was killed in an Israeli strike, which authorities justified by alleging ties to terrorist groups. On August 25, Israeli strikes on Nasser Hospital in Southern Gaza killed five more journalists.
The spread of disinformation is further fueled by competing agendas, vested interests, and pervasive propaganda. Disinformation about the famine is being circulated globally, often amplified by senior Israeli officials. In Southeast Europe, however, such narratives have failed to take root. In a region with its own history of recent conflict, the disinformation that does appear is less about denying the famine and more about indulging in wishful narratives of breaking blockades and delivering aid to the people of Gaza.
