Hamas Officials Report 9,500 Missing Under Rubble as Ceasefire Begins, Exposing Months of Viral Misinformation

Hamas data reveals true scale after fabricated "Harvard study" spread false 400,000 missing claim worldwide

As the hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas is about to take effect, brokered by President Trump, new data from Hamas-controlled Gaza Civil Defense Agency reveals approximately 9,500 Palestinians remain missing under rubble across the territory. This figure stands in stark contrast to the viral misinformation that spread throughout the war, falsely claiming hundreds of thousands of Palestinians had “disappeared.”

The Harvard Study Misinterpretation

The most prominent piece of misinformation centered around claims of a “Harvard study” purporting to show nearly 400,000 missing Palestinians. However, fact-checkers revealed Harvard University published no such study.

The false allegation originated from a misrepresentation of a report by Yaakov Garb, a professor at Israel’s Ben-Gurion University, published on Harvard Dataverse - an online repository where researchers can share work without university approval or affiliation requirements. Garb’s study examined aid distribution compounds in Gaza, not missing persons.

False Narrative Claim on X. Credit: sahouraxo on X

The false 377,000 figure became widespread from a Medium blog post by an author named “Maximilian,” who misinterpreted Garb’s population maps. The blogger subtracted current population estimates from pre-war figures, ignoring that approximately 100,000 Palestinians had left Gaza and that the Israeli military’s population estimates were not comprehensive.

“If anyone had asked me about these numbers I would have set things straight right away,” Garb told the Associated Press. “Instead the number was circulated and recirculated by people who had not read the report or stopped to think about it for a moment.”

Credit: Mr_Andrew_Fox on X

High-Profile Amplifiers of Misinformation

UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese

Among the most prominent figures spreading the false claims was UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, who stated in an interview with El País that “400,000 people have disappeared” in Gaza.

Albanese has faced significant controversy for her role. The US Mission to the United Nations condemned her “malignant antisemitism and support for terrorism,” declaring her “unfit to serve as Special Rapporteur.”

Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)

The Council on American-Islamic Relations amplified the false claims, stating that “at least 377,000 people in Gaza have been ‘disappeared’ by the Israeli military, with half of that number believed to be children.”

CAIR has recently faced intense scrutiny over its alleged ties to terrorist organizations and activities. Senator Tom Cotton has petitioned the IRS to investigate CAIR’s tax-exempt status, citing “ties to terrorist organizations, including Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.” The organization was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in a 2009 federal terrorism financing case.

Additionally, investigations revealed CAIR is running a “coordinated national campaign” to promote what critics describe as “pro-terrorist, anti-Israel materials” in US public schools across multiple states, including lesson plans that discourage using terms like “jihadists” and “radical Islamic terrorists” when discussing 9/11.

June 2025: The Misinformation Explosion

The timeline reveals how rapidly false information spreads in the digital age. Yaakov Garb’s legitimate study about Gaza aid distribution was published on Harvard Dataverse on June 3, 2025. Just seven days later, on June 10, blogger “Maximilian” published the Medium post that fundamentally misinterpreted Garb’s population maps to claim 377,000 Palestinians were “missing.”

The original study examined aid distribution logistics, yet within days, it became a viral claim about mass disappearances. June 2025 became the epicenter of this misinformation campaign, with false claims spreading faster than fact-checkers could respond.

Unprecedented Digital Reach

The scope of this misinformation campaign proves staggering. Social media analysis of posts containing “400,000” and “Gaza” from June 3, 2025 through October 12, 2025, reveals the false claims achieved a potential reach of 460.5 million people.

This massive digital footprint illustrates how the June misinformation burst created lasting damage that persisted for months. According to AP News fact-checkers, individual posts claiming the fabricated Harvard study results received significant viral engagement, with one X post alone garnering over 35,700 shares and likes.

The misinformation’s reach demonstrates how false narratives can achieve unprecedented global impact within days of their creation, fundamentally distorting public understanding of complex conflicts before accurate information can counter the damage.