Italian researchers have accused Israel of contaminating land in the Gaza Strip through bombing. The New Weapons Committee, an Italian group of researchers, said it had studied Israel's use of ammunition and concluded that the population of the Gaza Strip was "in danger." The group of scientists based the claim on soil analysis of four bomb craters. "It is essential to intervene at once to limit the effects of the contamination on people, animals and cultivation," the researchers stated. Their findings made headlines in Italian, European and Middle Eastern publications, including ‘Terra’, ‘Ambito’, the ‘Turkish Weekly’ and ‘Tehran Times’.
"This so-called research is eerily reminiscent of ancient blood libels against the Jewish people, when rumors were spread about Jews poisoning wells," said Moshe Kantor, president of the European Jewish Congress. He added: "Today, we are seeing a recurrence of all the worst excesses of anti-Semitism and diatribes that we perhaps naively thought had remained in the Dark Ages." Gerald Steinberg, founder of the Jerusalem-based NGO Monitor, said the Italian study did not present enough evidence to support its claim and called the committee's accusations “designed to stigmatize Israel and to erase the context of mass terror."
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