Gigi Hadid has issued a groveling apology for accusing Israel of being “the only country in the world that keeps children as prisoners of war” — admitting she helped spread “misinformation” by sharing the inflammatory post without first fact checking it.
The 28-year-old Palestinian American supermodel shared the false accusation that focused on the case of Ahmed Mansara, who she claimed was “abducted” by Israel — but who was in fact filmed carrying out a brutal stabbing spree in East Jerusalem when he was just 13.
Hadid deleted the post while facing a firestorm of outrage, which she addressed in a two-page apology Tuesday.
“It is important to me to share real stories about the hardships that Palestinians have endured and continue to endure, but this weekend I shared something that I did not fact check or think deeply about prior to reposting,” the influencer wrote to her 79.1 million followers.
She said she “wanted to show the ways in which international law is being violated by the Israeli government” and claimed that a Palestinian child arrested by the Israeli Defense Forces would be treated differently than an Israeli child accused of the same crime.
“Unfortunately, I used the wrong example to make that point, and I regret that.”
The supermodel then went on to say she condemned violence against all people, writing that “attacking any human, which of course includes Jewish people, is NEVER OK. Taking innocent people hostage is NEVER OK. Harming someone BECAUSE they are Jewish is NEVER OK. It is wrong.
“To want freedom and humane treatment for Palestinians and to want safety for Jewish people can both be important to the same person — including myself.”
Still, Hadid accused Israel of engaging in human rights violations.
“It is well-documented by credible human rights organizations that there has been systemic mistreatment of the Palestinian people by the government of Israel,” she wrote.
“I know these historical issues well because they are the history of my own family, Palestinians who were forced to flee their homeland in the late 1940s,” said Hadid, whose father is Palestinian.
“At the same time, I understand that with the power of my platform comes a huge responsibility. I’m human and I make mistakes. But I also hold myself accountable for those mistakes,” she said.
“I do not stand behind the spreading of misinformation, and have always condemned using the Free Palestine movement as justification for anti-Semitism,” she claimed — saying she therefore owes it to herself and her followers “to gather my thoughts and share them in a more constructive way.”
She also declared she will “continue to pray for the safe return of all hostages and peace and safety for the people of Gaza and Israel.”
Hadid’s apology only came after The Post revealed that she was using a Palestinian terrorist to condemn Israel, and following backlash from several other well-known celebrities.
It was blasted by disgraced music mogul Scooter Braun, who accused Hadid on social media of sharing false information with her millions of followers.
“I know people mean well but when you say a child was abducted when it turns out it was a teenager who went out and stabbed two random innocent civilians including a 12 year old on camera and then stated ‘I wanted to stab Jews.’ Let’s get our facts right before we post to 78 million people,” he wrote.
Israeli supermodel Bar Refaeli also shared a screenshot of Hadid’s post on her Instagram Story, which called her out for being the latest to portray the “knife-wielding Palestinian terrorist as a victim.”