Thread by @EricLevitz

1) Many have misconstrued this tweet as an apology for Hamas. It isn't; the tweet immediately follows one in which I highlight the fact that Hamas burned families alive. I recently wrote a piece expressing my moral revulsion at leftwing apologias for Hamas nymag.com/intelligencer/…

https://twitter.com/EricLevitz/status/1716118168526012839

2) For weeks, I have argued that the fixation of some leftists on whether Hamas cut off the heads of infants was bizarre, since it isn’t any less morally hideous to shoot or burn an infant to death than to cut off their heads. Here is an excerpt from one such exchange:

3) Nevertheless, the question of whether Hamas beheaded infants has been a subject of controversy. Last night, I suggested that the recently published forensic pathologists’ report indicated that Hamas had cut off infants’ heads...

4) But the report actually explicitly stated that the pathologists could not determine whether this happened. Rather, they said that it was possible that the infants had been mutilated by an RPG explosion...

5) Thus, I felt an obligation as a journalist to correct that small point of fact. I felt this obligation partly because I did not want to give ammunition to those who wish to belittle the October 7th attacks...

6) ..who could use my error to promote the idea that journalists were lying about the severity of the attack. I really did not want to give them that opportunity precisely because the undisputed facts of what happened that day are every bit as horrific as the beheading allegation

7) It is not better to burn a baby alive than to behead one. What matters is that irreplaceable lives were destroyed, each death opening a hole in the worlds of all who loved them.

8) So, please understand that my insistence on precision about what exactly befell these murdered innocents is rooted in a mere concern for accurately representing the findings of the forensic pathologists' report.