Cousin Says Hamas Paid Family Of Baby Supposedly Killed By Israeli Tear Gas To Lie About What Really Killed Her

Remember the international outcry when Hamas claimed that an 8-month old baby, Layla Ghandour, died as a result of tear gas inhalation when Israel’s IDF forces confronted Gaza border protesters on May 14?

Remember the baby’s mother saying, “The Israelis killed her,” and Hamas ministry spokesman, Dr. Ashraf Al-Oudra, posting a photo of the baby on Facebook and attesting she died from tear gas inhalation?

Remember how the story took a twist when an unidentified doctor in Gaza told an Associated Press health official that the baby had a preexisting medical condition which caused her death?

Now the story gets even more serpentine: On Thursday, a 20-year-old Palestinian, Mahmoud Omar, who was indicted on terror-related charges and is a cousin of the baby, told Israeli investigators that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar paid the baby’s parents, Miriam and Anwar Ghandour, roughly $2,200 to lie to the media and say the baby died of tear gas inhalation when in fact the baby had died of a blood disease, the same disease that killed the baby’s brother in 2017.

The indictment against Omar states that he was among the 40,000 Gazans at the May 14 protests when his mother called and told him his cousin, the baby Layla Ghandour, had died. When he returned home, he was told the baby had died of the blood disease.

As The Times Of Israel reports, Omar was arrested on May 28 after he and a fellow member of Fatah’s armed wing, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, tried to infiltrate Israel and torch an unmanned IDF post.

According to the indictment, Omar was promised financial aid for his family if he joined the Mujahideen, a branch of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. Israel and the U.S. have named the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades as a terror organization. The Times of Israel adds, “The suspect had allegedly been active in the Mujahideen throughout the course of 2017 and had carried out guard duty, during which he had been instructed to fire at IDF forces if they approached the border.”

While Layla Ghandour’s funeral was covered internationally with condemnation of Israel, an Israeli army spokesperson stated that “contrary to the unequivocal Palestinian announcement, we have evidence that undermines the credibility of the Palestinian Ministry of Health’s announcement regarding the death of the baby.”