Last month we noted a report in the Washington Post about Palestinians training for the Olympics; this report turned out to be only the first in a series of stories about Palestinian athletes, clearly being released as part of a purposeful public relations campaign, mainly focusing on a young swimmer named Raad Aweisat. Today Israel Insider reprints an article from SwimInfo.com, showing that almost every detail of these moving stories of Palestinian Arab athleticism was a lie: ’Palestinian Swimmer’ story doesn’t get off the blocks.

Indeed, the story proved irresistible to news media around the world. It was picked up and either reprinted or elaborated upon in the Washington Post, London Times, New York Times, Guardian, Minnesota Star Tribune, Newsday and the Chicago Tribune, among many others. MSNBC picked it up, as did CNN and Reuters. It was reported in at least 60 countries in newspapers, radio, T.V. and on the Internet. At least half a dozen friends e-mailed the story to me from various points around the globe.

Inevitably, Raad’s plight and courageous fight were used to raise funds. The Palestine Monitor web site published an appeal by Students for Justice in Palestine at the University of Maryland. “Help Raad, the Palestinian Olympic swimmer,” the group wrote, and “you will receive a tax-deductible notice in 4-6 weeks.”

Even the Voice of America was taken in. In a story written by David Schickert and broadcast on January 21, announcer Dave Byrd says: “Aweisat was practicing at the YMCA near his neighborhood in Jerusalem when violence broke out in September 2000.”

Echoing Sukhtian’s original story, he goes on to report: “The YMCA told Aweisat to either join the Israeli Swimming Federation, which as a Palestinian he did not want to do, or find somewhere else to swim. There was only a 17-meter pool in the area, located in the backyard of several connected homes. Aweisat’s father gathered nearby villagers together to lengthen the pool by digging until it reached an acceptable 25 meters.”

It is undeniably a great story. It trots out the usual villains - the big, bad Israelis, this time aided by the bureaucratic Christians. And it casts Raad, with his pure, apolitical, Olympic dream as the spunky victim.

The only trouble is: it’s dead wrong. None of the reporters or news media bothered to check out the allegations or interview a single official from the YMCA or Israeli Swimming Federation. If they had, they would have learned that almost every aspect of the story is either false or a misrepresentation of the facts.