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littlebodyinkheart · 2 years ago

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HERE IT ISSS MY STUPID DDLC X INKHEART AU!!

Unfortunately, the file got messed up when I pasted it here, so I couldn't add any fancy visual effects to it (trust me when I say it looked SO much better in the original file), so I guess we'll just have to take what we can get.

So enjoy :D (I hope)

Ladies and gents of the Inkheart (and DDLC) community, I, @hearts4capricorn , present to you:

DOKI DOKI!🖋

❤️‍🔥FIRE RAISERS CLUB!❤️‍🔥

Monika - Capricorn

Sayori - Dustfinger

Natsuki - Basta

Yuri - Mo

Greetings, Capricorn here!

Welcome to the Fire Raisers! It's always been a dream of mine to reach the top and do great things, as of starting this “club” if you will, will only make things easier for me. Now that you're also a Fire Raiser, you can help me make that dream come true in this fantasy novel.

Every day is full of chit-chat and activities with all of my loyal and unique club members:

Dustfinger, the youthful and optimistic “Fire Dancer” who values life the most;

Basta, the deceivingly hot-headed boy who packs an assertive punch; also my most loyal henchman;

Mortimer Folchart, the timid and mysterious one who finds comfort in the world of books;

...And, of course, Capricorn, the leader of the club. (That's me)

I'm expecting you to make friends with everyone and help the Fire Raisers become stronger than ever. But I can tell already that you're a sweetheart—will you promise to spend the most time with me?

Mo poems

Act 1, second day

Ghost under the light

My hair illuminates beneath the amber glow.

Glowing.

It must be this one.

The last remaining streetlight to have withstood the test of time.

The last yet to be replaced by the sickening blue-green of the future.

I bathe. Calm; breathing air of the present but living in the past.

The light flickers.

I flicker back.

Act 1, third day

On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer

Much have I travell’d in the realms of gold,

And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;

Round many western islands have I been

Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.

Oft of one wide expanse had I been told

That deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne;

Yet did I never breathe its pure serene

Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:

Then felt I like some watcher of the skies

When a new planet swims into his ken;

Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes

He star’d at the Pacific — and all his men

Look’d at each other with a wild surmise —

Silent, upon a peak in Darien.

Act 1, fourth day

The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung up in America

Thou ill-formed offspring of my feeble brain,

Who after birth didst by my side remain,

Till snatched from thence by friends, less wise than true,

Who thee abroad, exposed to public view,

Made thee in rags, halting to th’ press to trudge,

Where errors were not lessened (all may judge).

At thy return my blushing was not small,

My rambling brat (in print) should mother call,

I cast thee by as one unfit for light,

The visage was so irksome in my sight;

Yet being mine own, at length affection would

Thy blemishes amend, if so I could.

I washed thy face, but more defects I saw,

And rubbing off a spot still made a flaw.

Act 2

Tyrant

My first thought was, he lied in every word,

That hoary cripple, with malicious EYE

Askance to watch the working of his lie

On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford

Suppression of the glee, that purs’d and scor’d

Its edge, at one more victim gain’d thereby …

The Bell

And then I heard them lift a Box

And creak across my Soul

With those same Boots of Lead, again,

Then Space – began to toll,

AS ALL THE HEAVENS WERE A BELL,

And Being, but an EAR,

And I, and Silence, some strange Race,

WreTCHEDed, solitary, HERE

C ICORN S L ST ENING

Dustfinger poems

Act 1, second day

Dear fire

The way you glow and crackle in the night,

It makes me feel like you missed me too.

Kissing my forehead to help me out of bed.

Making me rub the sleep from my eyes.

Are you asking me to come out and play?

Are you trusting me to wish away a rainy day?

I look above. The sky is of deep blue.

It's a secret, but I trust you too.

If it wasn't for you, I could sleep forever.

But I'm not mad.

I want to play with you.

Act 1, third day

And I to fire

My Love is like to ice, and I to fire:

How comes it then that this her cold so great

Is not dissolved through my so hot desire,

But harder grows the more I her entreat?

Or how comes it that my exceeding heat

Is not allayed by her heart-frozen cold,

But that I burn much more in boiling sweat,

And feel my flames augmented manifold?

Dustfinger's poetry pamphlet poem

Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of

Get.

Out.

Of.

My.

Head.

Ashes denote that fire was;

Respect the grayest pile

For the departed creature’s sake

That hovered there awhile.

But a fire never actually dies.

It just stops moving.

Basta poems

Act 1, second day

Knives

Knives are sharp.

Knives are dangerous.

Knives are fun.

Knives can kill.

Knives can make you feel alive.

Knives go away.

Act 1, third day

Sharp

each night

when I go to bed

I lay on my side

because there are

knives in my back

and knives in my head

lying on my back

or lying on my chest

would only push the

knives in further

But then comes a hand

To guide me through the dark

And when I reach to grab it

The knives retract with a spark

Act 1, fourth day

Because you

Tomorrow will be brighter with me around

But when today is dim, I can only look down.

My looking is a little more forward

Because you look at me.

When I want to say something, I say it with a shout!

But my truest feelings can never come out.

My words are a little less empty

Because you listen to me.

When something is above me, I reach for the stars.

But when I feel small, I don't get very far.

My standing is a little bit taller

Because you sit with me.

I believe in myself with all of my heart.

But what do I do when it's torn all apart?

My faith is a little bit stronger

Because you trusted me.

My pen always puts my feelings to the test.

I'm not a good writer, but my best is my best.

My poems are a little bit dearer

Because you think of me.

Because you, because you, because you.

Act 2

Too many

"There’s too many”,

And they looked at me.

Did someone stab me?

It felt like it.

And then they said my name.

Did someone twist the knife?

It hurts.

Basta's request

I don't know how else to bring this up. But there's been something I've been worried about. Dustfinger has been acting kind of strange lately. You've only been here a few days, so you may not know what I mean. But he's not normally like this. He's always been sarcastic and lively and annoyingly energetic ...things like that.

Okay... This is really embarrassing, but I'm forcing myself to suck it up. The truth is, I'm REALLY worried about him. But I would rather DIE than try talking to him about it. He's my WORST ENEMY. I don't know what to do. I think you're the only person that he'll listen to. I don't know why. But please try to do something. Maybe you can convince him to talk to someone.

I've always wanted to try getting closer to “Dirty-Finger” and it actually really hurts me to see this happening. I know I'm going to hate myself later for admitting that, but right now I don't care. I just feel so helpless. So please see if you can do something to help. I don't want anything bad to happen to him. I'll even give you my knife for a day if I have to. Just please try to do something.

As for Capricorn... I don't know why, but he's been making me feel weird recently. Something in his eyes makes me freeze in fear when he glances at me, and I feel like I'm missing something important that I can't remember. So I'm trying my best to avoid getting him mad right now, and that's why I'm coming to you about this. DON'T LET HIM KNOW I WROTE THIS!!!! Just pretend like I gave you a really good poem, okay? I'm counting on you. Thanks for reading.

“I changed my mind.”

“Ignore everything you just read”

“There's no point in trying to do anything”

“It's Dustfinger's own fault that he's so unlikable”

“Can you hear me, reader?”

“If you would just spend more time with Capricorn, all these problems would go away.”

“Silvertongue and I are too messed up for someone as wonderful as you.”

“Just think of Capricorn from now on.”

“Just Capricorn.”

Just Capricorn.

*game restart*

Cornelia Funke

(Team Salvato)

Just Capricorn.

Capricorn poems

Act 1, second day

The Lady Who Knows Everything

An old tale tells of a lady who wanders Earth.

The Lady who Knows Everything.

A beautiful lady who has found every answer,

All meaning,

All purpose,

And all that was ever sought.

And here I am,

a feather

Lost adrift the sky, victim of the currents of the wind.

Day after day, I search.

I search with little hope, knowing legends don't exist.

But when all else has failed me,

When all others have turned away,

The legend is all that remains -

the last dim star glimmering in the twilight sky.

Until one day, the wind ceases to blow.

I fall.

And I fall and fall, and fall even more.

Gentle as a feather.

A dry quill, expressionless.

But a hand catches me, between the thumb and forefinger.

The hand of a beautiful lady.

I look at her eyes and find no end to her gaze.

The Lady who Knows Everything knows what I am thinking.

Before I can speak, she responds in a hollow voice.

"I have found every answer, all of which amount to nothing.

There is no meaning.

There is no purpose.

And we seek only the impossible.

I am not your legend.

Your legend does not exist."

And with a breath, she blows me back afloat, and I pick up a gust of wind.

Act 1, third day

Hole in Wall

It couldn't have been me.

See, the direction the spackle protrudes.

A noisy neighbor? An angry boyfriend? I'll never know. I wasn't home.

I peer inside for a clue.

No! I can't see. I reel, blind, like a film left out in the sun.

But it's too late. My retinas.

Already scorched with a permanent copy of the meaningless image.

It's just a little hole. It wasn't too bright.

It was too deep.

Stretching forever into everything.

A hole of infinite choices.

I realize now, that I wasn't looking in.

I was looking out.

And she, on the other side, was looking in.

Act 1, fourth day

Hole in wall 2

But she wasn't looking at me.

Confused, I frantically glance at my surroundings.

But my burned eyes can no longer see color.

Are there others in this room? Are they talking?

Or are they simply words on flat sheets of paper,

The sound of frantic scrawling playing tricks on my ears?

The room begins to crinkle.

Closing in on me.

The air I breathe dissipates before it reaches my lungs.

I panic. There must be a way out.

It's right there. She's right there.

Swallowing my fears, I brandish my pen.

Act 2

Wheel.

A rotating wheel. Turning an axle. Grinding. Bolthead. Linear gearbox. Falling sky. Seven holy stakes. A docked ship. A portal to another world. A thin rope tied to a thick rope. A torn harness. Parabolic gearbox. Expanding universe. Time controlled by slipping cogwheels. Existence of God. Swimming with open water in all directions. Drowning. A prayer written in blood. A prayer written in time-devouring snakes with human eyes. A thread connecting all living human eyes. A kaleidoscope of holy stakes. Exponential gearbox. A sky of exploding stars. God disproving the existence of God. A wheel rotating in six dimensions. Forty gears and a ticking clock. A clock that ticks one second for every rotation of the planet. A clock that ticks forty times every time it ticks every second time. A bolthead of holy stakes tied to the existence of a docked ship to another world. A kaleidoscope of blood written in clocks. A time-devouring prayer connecting a sky of forty gears and open human eyes in all directions. Breathing gearbox. Breathing bolthead. Breathing ship. Breathing portal. Breathing snakes. Breathing God. Breathing blood. Breathing holy stakes. Breathing human eyes. Breathing time. Breathing prayer. Breathing sky. Breathing wheel.

Open Your Third Eye

I can feel the tenderness of her skin through the knife, as if it were an extension of my sense of touch. My body nearly convulses. There's something incredibly faint, deep down, that screams to resist this uncontrollable pleasure. But I can already tell that I'm being pushed over the edge. I can't... I can't stop myself.

And suddenly all I see is red. Red blood. Red church. Red cathedral. Red satin. Red God. Red sky.

And the eye opens.

Act 3

Happy End.

Pen in hand, I find my strength.

The courage endowed upon me by my one and only love.

Together, let us dismantle this crumbling world

And write a novel of our own fantasies.

With a flick of his pen, the lost finds his way.

In a world of infinite choices, behold this special day.

After all,

Not all good times must come to an end.

Mo words

1. Pages

2. Book

3. Journal

4. Fantasy

5. Imagination

6. Words

7. Journey

8. Judgement

9. Landscape

10. Philosophy

11. Portrait

12. Intellectual

13. Analysis

14. Atone

15. Question

16. Time

17. Variance

18. Story

19. Novel

20. Tenacious

Dustfinger words

1. Fire

2. Adventure

3. Daydream

4. Match

5. Dancer

6. Summon

7. Fairy

8. Marten

9. Fireworks

10. Family

11. Home

12. Coward

13. Forgive

14. Friendship

15. Nature

16. Garden

17. Return

18. Scars

19. Unrequited

20. Secret

Basta words

1. Knife

2. Sharp

3. Edge

4. Neglect

5. Trust

6. Loyalty

7. Betrayal

8. Curse

9. Hex

10. Spell

11. Luck

12. Superstitious

13. Clairvoyant

14. Cat

15. Mint

16. Jacket

17. Anxiety

18. Tough

19. Blade

20. Dagger

+ Bonus!

Capricorn words

1. Shadow

2. Red

3. Cathedral

4. Master

5. Heart

6. Tyrant

7. Murder

8. Ashes

9. Memory

10. Crimson

11. Lust

12. Cage

13. Climax

14. Massacre

15. Wrath

16. Hate

17. Childhood

18. Father

19. King

20. Ink

Your Reality.

Every day, I imagine a future where I can be with you

In my hand is a pen that will write a poem of me and you

The ink flows down into a dark puddle

Just move your hand, write the way into his heart

But in this world of infinite choices

What will it take just to find that special day?

Have I found everybody a fun assignment to do today?

When you're here, everything that we do is fun for them anyway

When I can't even read my own feelings

What good are words when a smile says it all?

And if this world won't write me an ending

What will it take just for me to have it all?

Does my pen only write bitter words for those who are dear to me?

Is it love if I take you, or is it love if I set you free?

The ink flows down into a dark puddle

How can I write love into reality?

If I can't hear the sound of your heartbeat

What do you call love in your reality?

And in your reality, if I don't know how to love you

I'll leave you be.

CREDITS✒️

Doki Doki Literature Club! - Dan Salvato

Monika, Natsuki, Yuri, Sayori - Dan Salvato

Your Reality - Dan Salvato, Jillian Ashcraft

Poems “Ghost Under The Light”, “Because you”, “Wheel”, “Open Your Third Eye”, “Happy End”, “Dear Sunshine/Fire”, “Hole in wall”, “Hole in wall 2”, “The Lady who Knows Everything” - Doki Doki Literature Club!

Inkheart - Cornelia Funke

Capricorn, Mortimer Folchart, Basta, Dustfinger - Cornelia Funke

POEM CREDITS✒️

“Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came”

(Tyrant) - Robert Browning

“I Felt a Funeral, in My Brain”

(The Bell) - Emily Dickinson

“The Tenth Muse Lately sprung up in America” - Anne Bradstreet

“On First Looking into Chapman's Homer” - John Keats

“My love is like to ice, And I to Fire”

(And I to Fire) - Edmund Spenser

“Ashes denote that fire was”

(Dustfinger's poetry pamphlet poem)

- Emily Dickinson

“Knives” - user “Izzy” on hellopoetry.com

“Sharp” (short fragment from “knives”) - user “Rick Adams” on hellopoetry.com

@peppermintfreak @tintenherzundseele @a-pun-and-ten-dead

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xtruss · 9 months ago

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American Hypocrite, Hegemonic and Liar Media Keep Citing “ZAKA” — Though Its October 7 Atrocity Stories Are Discredited In Isra-hell! Isra-helli Media Has Debunked the Ultra-Orthodox Group’s Stories, But “The Hub of Yellow Journalism New York Times” Won’t Say So.

— By Arun Gupta | February 27 2024 | The Intercept

Volunteers of the Israeli ultra-Orthodox organization Zaka collect samples in one of the houses attacked by Palestinian militants on October 7, in Kibbutz Holit in Israel’s southern district south of the Gaza Strip on Oct. 26, 2023. Photo: Yuri Cortez/AFPvia Getty Images

YOSSI LANDAU IS the Head of Operations for the southern region at Zaka, an Israeli search-and-rescue organization. Assigned to collect human remains after the October 7 Hamas attack in Israel, Landau and his fellow Zaka members riveted media outlets worldwide with the horrific atrocities they saw.

Speaking through tears at the Jerusalem Press Club shortly after the attack, Landau described finding a pregnant woman in Kibbutz Be’eri in a “big puddle of blood, face down.”

“Her stomach was butchered open,” Landau said. “The baby that was connected to the cord was stabbed.”

In Be’eri, he said, he also found a family who was tied up, tortured, and executed with a bullet to the back of the head: father, mother, and two small children around 6 or 7 years old. An eye was missing, fingers chopped off. Landau later told CNN, “The terrorists were having a ball,” with Palestinian militants devouring a holiday meal set out by the family. Landau broke down recounting the tale, as a CNN reporter comforted him.

Long after Landau’s emotional recollections were replayed, repeated, cited, and quoted in the global media, a problem emerged: No one could find any evidence that the two massacres ever took place — in Be’eri or elsewhere.

In the case of the butchered mother and fetus, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz concluded the killing “simply didn’t happen.” As for the tortured family, no one killed in Be’eri matches Landau’s account. The one brother and sister to die in the kibbutz were 12-year-old twins, killed when an Israeli general ordered a tank to fire on a house where Hamas militants were holding them hostage. Nevertheless, Landau told these stories unchecked in interviews and press conferences.

Landau spread his tales far and wide with little pushback — telling similar stories on camera to CNN, Fox News, and the Media Line, and at an outdoor press conference. Even after reporters showed his accounts lacked any substantiation, news organizations continued to let him off the hook. The New York Times recently interviewed Landau as part of a profile about Zaka, but it did not mention either of his atrocity stories.

Western Media Whitewash

Zaka stories have been essential to justifying Israel’s all-out war against Gaza, which has killed around 30,000 Palestinians in less than five months. Speaking at the United Nations in December, Zaka deputy commander Simcha Greiniman broke down while describing alleged atrocities. He later told the same stories to a meeting of British parliamentarians.

Given its prominence, Zaka has been scrutinized by the Israeli press but not the U.S. media. A blockbuster Haaretz report found after October 7, senior military leaders sidelined Israel Defense Forces soldiers specializing in recovering bodies and preserving evidence and sent in untrained Zaka volunteers instead. Zaka reportedly turned massacre sites into a “war room for donations,” used corpses as fundraising props, “spread accounts of atrocities that never happened,” and botched forensics that are central to Israel’s claim that Hamas carried out a premeditated campaign of mass rape.

Even when Western media outlets have questioned Landau, the inquiries were half-hearted. The Times asked Landau “about reports, attributed to him, that children had been beheaded on Oct. 7.” It reported: “Mr. Landau denied making the claim, though he acknowledged sometimes misspeaking in the immediate aftermath of the attack. What he saw himself, he said, was a small, burned body with at least part of the head missing, perhaps severed by the force of a blast. It was unclear, he added, if it was the body of teenager or someone younger.”

While the Times said the statements had been “attributed” to Landau, there is no dispute he said them. He told the stories on camera, and the clips were posted widely online. He told CNN he found “a body, of a 14, 15-year-old. Head chopped off. We were looking around for the head. Couldn’t find it.” On India’s Republic TV, Landau said of beheaded children, “Yes, this occurred. This happened.” He made similar comments to Channel 14 Israel and CBS News. There is no evidence Hamas beheaded children or babies. As The Intercept reported at the time, the Israeli military said it couldn’t confirm the claims just four days after the attack.

The Times report on Zaka reads like a glowing portrait of selfless volunteers on a “holy mission” to honor the dead and give families closure in accordance with Jewish law. The article could also be read as a whitewash of an organization mired in sexual abuse and financial scandals for decades. The Times never notes that Landau appears to be a serial fabulist, and other Zaka volunteers tell stories that stretch credulity.

Landau has talked openly on four occasions of inventing stories: “When we go into a house, and we’re using our imagination. The bodies is telling us the stories that happened to them.” Another Zaka official said in an Israeli Foreign Ministry video, “The walls, the stone shouted: ‘I was raped.’”

“Fictional”

Zaka volunteers have become ubiquitous in media reports about the attacks of October 7. They have been quoted by Reuters, CNN, New York Times, BBC, The Guardian, NBC News, Politico, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Many Other Outlets — with few, if any, mentions of past scandals or present controversies.

These outlets fail to scrutinize Zaka stories. Many volunteers describe extreme crimes that would leave extensive evidence yet aren’t corroborated by reporting. Greiniman, Zaka’s deputy commander, claimed naked women were tied to trees at the Supernova music festival. He said he found a toddler with a knife stuck through his head and that he discovered foreign fighters — they had left their IDs in their pockets. A Zaka spokesperson said he saw dozens of dead babies, and children bound together and burned. Another volunteer claimed they found a sexually mutilated woman’s corpse under rubble with her organs removed.

Media outlets, including Israeli television news programs, have debunked numerous stories about dead babies, calling them “Fictional.”

No one else has corroborated Greiniman’s story of foreign fighters. Months later, another source did claim to find five dead women tied naked to trees: According to a new report from an Israeli group, a farmer who rescued attendees from the music festival alleged the five women’s organs were all slashed and made bizarre claims about sexual mutilation. In three previous interviews, the farmer never made such claims nor is there any forensic or photo evidence to back up his account.

Instead of offering verifiable evidence of war crimes, Zaka volunteers serve another purpose: They are an invaluable part of Israel’s propaganda machine. Israeli government officials, in pushing for a total war on Palestinians, portray Hamas as another Islamic State, the Iraq- and Syria-based terror group that shocked the world by making women sexual slaves and posting a spate of execution videos beginning around 2014.

In an interview with the Israeli news site Ynet, Eitan Schwartz, a volunteer consultant in the prime minister’s National Information Directorate, a public diplomacy office, explained how Zaka volunteers influenced news coverage.

“The testimonies of Zaka volunteers, as first responders on the ground, had a decisive impact in exposing the atrocities in the South to the foreign journalists covering the war,” Schwartz said. “The entire state of Israel was engaged in framing the narrative that Hamas is equal to ISIS and in deepening the legitimacy of the state to act with great force.”

“The Entire ‘Illegal Regime of Isra-hell’ Was Engaged In Framing The Narrative That ‘Freedom Fighter Hamas’ Is Equal To ISIS.”

“The first-hand testimonies of the organization’s amazing men of grace, who were exposed to the most difficult sights, had a tremendous impact on the reporters,” he went on. “These testimonies of Zaka people caused a horror and revealed to the reporters what kind of human-monsters we are talking about.”

In the same Ynet article, Nitzan Chen, director of the government press office, said, “It’s hard for me to imagine Israeli hasbara advocacy vis-a-vis the foreign press without the amazing, effective activity of Zaka people.” (Hasbara is usually translated as explanation or diplomacy, but in practice it’s sophisticated information warfare to mold public opinion to serve Israel’s strategic ends.)

Western media lapped up Zaka stories. An Israeli government video of Landau telling his tortured family story is emblazoned with “HAMAS = ISIS.”

The political response after October 7 played out like a coordinated campaign. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu led the way, proclaiming “Hamas is ISIS” on October 9. Netanyahu’s rival and ruling partner Benny Gantz rallied behind the slogan, as did Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and other Israeli officials. Within days, top American officials lined up too. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin both echoed the sentiment. Even President Joe Biden said, “The brutality of Hamas — this bloodthirstiness — brings to mind the worst rampages of ISIS.”

Fundraising on the Scene

Israeli news outlets — in particular Haaretz’s investigation into Zaka — have called into question credulous media reports repeating Israeli claims that religious concerns and chaos prevented gathering of forensic evidence in the aftermath of the attack.

After Zaka personnel and soldiers from the IDF’s Military Rabbinate were deployed to recover remains, much of the collection was bungled, according to Haaretz. When soldiers trained in recovery were finally let in the second week after the attack, they were alarmed by Zaka’s actions.

An ultra-Orthodox organization made up of male volunteers, the precursor to Zaka, was founded by Yehuda Meshi-Zahav in 1989, formally becoming Zaka in 1995. The group relies on donations and government tenders for its budget, and after October 7 it made the most of both, according to Haaretz. The Israeli newspaper published a photo of Zaka members carrying out fundraising activities near a dead body; sources from other rescue groups observed Zaka volunteers make fundraising calls and videos with corpses in the background. The second week after the attacks, the Defense Ministry began paying Zaka for its work on the ground.

All available evidence suggests Zaka needed a cash infusion. The group was nearly insolvent on October 7. According to a 2022 Haaretz investigation, Zaka netted millions of dollars in public funds over the last five years by claiming more than three times the number of volunteers than it had, a timespan that includes the tenure of the current CEO, Duby Weissenstern, who was featured in the New York Times profile. Even as Zaka was under threat of bankruptcy in 2021, according to the Times of Israel, it used “shadow organizations” to divert millions of dollars to Meshi-Zahav and his family, allegedly spending it on groceries, plane tickets, luxury hotels, “and a multi-million dollar villa.” Zaka’s schemes, reported the Israeli news site NRG, included hitting up donors for money to buy the same motorcycle and changing a plaque to reflect the new donor’s name.

All Available Evidence Suggests Zaka Needed A Cash Infusion. The Group was Nearly Insolvent On October 7.

Under Meshi-Zahav, the organization was beset by financial and abuse scandals. Despite knowing of “at least 20 cases” where Meshi-Zahav allegedly sexually assaulted minors, police failed to investigate him and closed the case without charging him in 2014. More than a dozen people came forward in 2021 claiming Meshi-Zahav raped, assaulted, and threatened them. “He allegedly exploited his status, power, money and even the organization he heads [Zaka] to assault teenagers and … boys and girls” as young as 5 years old, Haaretz reported. The abuse was a family affair: One brother was imprisoned for raping a female relative and a second fled abroad after being investigated, along with Yehuda, for lavishing gifts on seven teenaged girls in distress and then sexually abusing them, sometimes in Zaka vehicles.

One teenaged victim said Meshi-Zahav effectively turned him into a “prostitute” and rewarded the teen with “a Zaka beeper” and a coveted certificate of volunteer work. A young woman alleged that after being raped by Meshi-Zahav, he threatened: “If you say anything to anyone, a Zaka van will run you over.” Police suspected that top Zaka officials and figures in the ultra-Orthodox community knew of the abuse but helped silence the criticisms. Meshi-Zahav attempted suicide shortly after the abuse allegations were reported and died a year later.

No mention of this history made it into the Times profile, or that of any other U.S. media outlet that has featured Zaka volunteers. Meanwhile, the positive reports have been a boon to Zaka’s image and bankroll.

Zaka Fundraises on Facebook and Buys Google Ads For Donations. Days after October 7, with specialized fundraising efforts popping up, money began flowing to different Zaka outfits. The Group Was Showered with some of the $242 Million disbursed by the Jewish Federation of North America. It shared in a $15 Million donation from Chip-making Giant Nvidia. Billionaire Roman Abramovich pledged $2.2 Million to Zaka. At a November 19 “Unity Concert for Israel” in Manhattan, with Yossi Landau on stage, a sign displayed $1,000,430 raised for Zaka. The Zakaworld website has a campaign that has topped $3.5 illion, and apparently a separate post-October 7 fundraiser totaled nearly $2.1 Million. Haaretz Calculated that Zaka has raked in at least $13.7 Million since the attacks.

Zaka volunteers seemed less intent on bagging bodies than grabbing money. According to Haaretz, Zaka failed to document remains, put parts from different bodies in the same bag, and did not collect all the remains in homes and the field. Zaka volunteers apparently did find time to rewrap already bagged remains in material that “prominently displayed the Zaka logo.”

“Not Pathology Experts”

The New York Times’s Zaka profile came after the paper’s controversial December 28 article titled “Screams Without Words” about allegations of sexual assault during the October 7 attack. The report was widely criticized for weak sourcing and citing cases that lacked physical evidence. The Times, The Intercept reported in January, pulled a related episode of its podcast “The Daily” over issues with the article, stoking internal worries it could be another “‘Caliphate’-level journalistic debacle.”

In the “Screams Without Words” story, the Times quoted two Zaka figures, one being Landau. “I did not take pictures because we are not allowed to take pictures,” Landau said. “In retrospect, I regret it.”

The Times beatific portrait of Zaka from January 15 seems to take an approach of blind trust in Zaka statements, suggesting that perhaps Landau did not say children were beheaded; that he “worries about getting details right”; that he diligently gathers human remains; that Zaka isn’t trained in forensics; and, finally, that women were subjected to sexual violence.

Yet these are Landau’s assertions, as is his claim that Zaka volunteers can’t take pictures of the dead. Haaretz reported that Zaka “released sensitive and graphic photos” from massacre sites. There is news footage, showing remains being carried on stretchers, labeled “Videos taken onsite by Zaka volunteers.” And Greiniman, the Zaka deputy commander, has bragged at least three times of “all the pictures and all the evidence, we have everything to prove it” — but nothing has ever been publicly produced.

Zaka always seemed ill-suited for the task of forensics. In the 1980s, Meshi-Zahav led an extremist ultra-Orthodox movement called Keshet, which protested archaeological digs and autopsies as religious desecration. Keshet members reportedly terrorized doctors and pathologists by planting fake explosives at their homes and sending them bullets with a note “this time it’s only in the mail.”

The group has also operated a legal department “for decades” whose purpose was to block police and pathologists from conducting medical examinations on dead bodies, which has hampered criminal investigations. No Western media outlet has asked why an organization hostile to forensic pathology was allowed to bungle the most significant forensic evidence in Israel’s history.

Zaka acknowledges the shortcomings of testimony from its own members. Haaretz debunked Landau’s tale of the pregnant woman’s corpse in Kibbutz Be’eri whose fetus was cut out by Hamas attackers. There is no independent corroboration of Landau’s claim, Kibbutz Bee’ri denied that the incident occurred there, police said they have no record of the case, and a “pathology source” at the main morgue did not know of the case.

In a statement to Haaretz on the lack of supporting evidence for its volunteers’ accounts, Zaka said: “The volunteers are not pathology experts and do not have the professional tools to identify a murdered person and his age, or declare how he was murdered, except for eyewitness testimony.”

— Tali Shapiro Contributed Research to This Story.

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