‘We gloat over the Jews’ misfortune’: jihadi groups on social media in macabre celebration of Mount Meron tragedy in Israel.
By Algemeiner Staff
Jihadis around the Middle East took to social media channels on Friday to gloat over the death toll of Jews crushed to death during a stampede at a Lag B’Omer festival on the slopes of Mount Meron in northern Israel.
Analysts at the Middle East Media Research (MEMRI), a Washington, DC based think-tank, shared their gruesome findings exclusively with The Algemeiner. On the messaging service Telegram, supporters of Al Qaeda and other jihadi groups engaged in a macabre celebration of the tragedy.
Prominent Al-Qaeda supporter Warith Al-Qassam posted a photo showing the bodies of Jewish pilgrims who were killed. He commented: “These bodies do not belong to our people in Gaza, rather they are the carcasses of the Jews who were killed in the collapse of the building. Oh Allah, we gloat over their misfortune.”
An ISIS supporter, Mousa, commented in a post he shared on Telegram: “More than 25 Jews were killed and more than 100 others were wounded, some of them in critical condition, following the collapse of the staircase.”
Another post uncovered by the team at MEMRI’s Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor celebrated the rise in casualties. “The number of those who were killed, the ancestors of monkeys and pigs is on rise,” the post declared. “More than 40 were killed and hundreds were wounded. Many of them are in critical condition. The state of Jews is horrified, living a state of horror and grief.”
Mousa also posted photos showing the festival scene before and after the accident. On the photo that showed the dead victims, he wrote: “The Jews’ corpses are filling the road, praise be to Allah.”
On Twitter, supporters of Hezbollah also celebrated the tragedy, the Jerusalem Post reported — with one account that has over 2,000 followers cheering that “more than 20 terrorist murderers occupying Palestine dead.”
Another pro-Palestinian account, with over 24,000 followers, asked God to “increase this night of hell fire.”