Corbyn accused of ‘wild blood libel’ after claiming Israel harvesting Gazan organs

Jeremy Corbyn has been accused of spreading a “wild blood libel” after sharing claims made by the director of the Al Shifa hospital in Gaza about the harvesting of organs by the IDF from dead Palestinian women’s bodies.

Corbyn posted a video message on the Instagram account of the We Are The Peace organisation in which he said he had received a message from the hospital chief “last Thursday or Friday” in which he was told about the delivery of 60-70 boxes from the IDF “which contained the skulls of Palestinians and the bodies of dead women with removed organs.”

The former Labour leader said, “It’s hard to describe this,” as he confidently stated, “That is what is happening to the people of Palestine.”

But responding to the claims, IDF International Spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani said: “What happened to fact-checking before spreading a wild blood libel?

There are some who maybe still claim Jeremy Corbyn isn’t an antisemite. But he is one of a number of openly antisemitic Jew haters sitting as MPs.
That is frightening.
Here he is spreading horrendous lies about Israel – lies of murder and organ removal.
These lies are already… pic.twitter.com/ZJduHGbKjP

— Nicole Lampert (@nicolelampert) February 23, 2026

“IDF soldiers haven’t been anywhere near the Shifa hospital in months! Jeremy Corbyn’s claims are completely false.

“The ’cause of our generation’ is double-checking claims and not believing journalists who spread crazy, baseless stories.

“The IDF operates in accordance with international law and strict internal directives that prohibit such conduct. The return of bodies to Gaza is carried out through international coordination and with the assistance of the Red Cross.”

Further expanding on the claims in the Insta post, Corbyn said of the director’s message: “He said there had been a delivery of boxes to the hospital by the IDF, a large number of boxes, 60 or 70 boxes.

“After the IDF had gone off, they opened the boxes, and each one contained the skull of a Palestinian who’d been killed. They were also delivered the bodies of dead women in Gaza that had been opened and some of the organs removed.”

Blood libel is a centuries-old, false,  antisemitic fabrication alleging that Jews murder non-Jews to use their blood for religious rituals.

This malicious myth has historically triggered violent pogroms, massacres, and the persecution of Jewish communities.

The Al-Shifa hospital has been at the centre of numerous disputed claims since Israel responded to the October 7 Hamas attacks.

Its director, Dr Mohammed Abu Salmiya, was also imprisoned for seven months over claims the hospital under his management had served as a Hamas command and control centre.

Hamas and the hospital administration denied this.

Salmiya also alleged that some medical staff detained by Israel had died in prison due to torture. In Israel, several ministers and leading politicians expressed outrage at Salmiya’s release from prison in July 2024.

It is not clear if Salmiya is the director to have messaged Corbyn with the latest claims about organ harvesting.

Israeli intelligence also suggested Hamas was using the hospital as a command centre below the ground.

Images of tunnels were eventually made public, backing up claims that weapons had been stored and that Hamas members were hired as guards around the site. But claims that Al-Shifa is a Hamas command centre remain contested.

Israeli forces pulled out of Gaza City’s vast al-Shifa hospital complex in April 2024, following their second raid there.

The UN Security Council expressed “deep concern” at the discovery of mass graves at both Al-Shifa and Nasser hospitals in southern Gaza.

The IDF said that during its raids on hospitals, its soldiers exhumed bodies that Palestinians had buried earlier as part of its search for the remains of some 250 hostages captured during the deadly Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October.

It maintains that bodies were examined respectfully, and those not belonging to Israeli captives were returned to their place.