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12:18 p.m.
Tuesday April 28, 2020
I wrote- Hoda El-Shimi:
Matigi Benassi, a U.S. military reserve person and mother of two, became part of the conspiracy theories that spread at the start of the outbreak of the Corona virus epidemic that caused Covid-19, after others claimed it was transmitting the disease to China, where the epidemic first appeared in the world.
CNN said the false allegations about Benassi and her husband circulate daily on YouTube, are watched by hundreds of thousands and published by the Chinese Communist Party media, although the couple’s coronavirus test results were not positive and did not suffer. its known symptoms. So far, the recent Bata is a social media fanatic who has been followed by large numbers of Chinese and others across the world.
The life of the Benassi family was turned upside down, and the couple said that their home address was published on the Internet, and that they had to close their social media accounts, after receiving an infinite number of messages from people who believed in conspiracy theory.
An endless nightmare
In an interview with CNN, Benassi compared what she and her family were going through “waking up from a bad dream in a nightmare day after day.”
Corona’s misinformation spread faster than the virus itself, and while tech giants discussed steps to verify coronavirus information, these things did not help Benassi and his family.
Benassi and her husband Mata still hold their government jobs, according to CNN. Benassi is a civilian employee of the Fort Belvoir of the US Army. USA In Virginia, where he works as a security officer, and the husband was a retired Air Force officer, and is now a civilian Air Force employee at the Pentagon.
Matt tried to remove the YouTube videos and prevent their further dissemination on the Internet, and the couple contacted the lawyer who said they could not do anything, which the local police also told them.
The origin of conspiracy theory.
Conspiracy theories are no different from viruses, they both spread quickly. Before Benassi became the proponent of this conspiracy theory, many conspiracy theories had circulated on the Internet for many months.
In the first weeks of the spread of the coronavirus, some claimed, without evidence, according to CNN, that the “emerging crown” was nothing more than an American biological weapon.
Later, a Chinese government official publicly promoted a story in which he claimed that the US military brought the virus to China, and Defense Secretary Mark Esber considered these allegations “ridiculous and irresponsible, and cannot be issued by an official who speak for China. “
Benassi and her husband were not part of the conspiracy theory only last March, months after the first recorded cases of coronavirus in China.
Pinassi’s conspiracy theory began last October with his participation in the World Military Games, organized by Wuhan, the epicenter of the virus’s spread and appearance for the first time last year.
According to CNN, Benassi participated in the cycling competition in Wuhan, and had an accident on the last lap, which broke his rib and suffered a concussion, but decided to finish the race, and that was the beginning of something worse.
Perhaps the most prominent promoter of the Benassi family-related conspiracy theory was George Webb, 59, who has been posting YouTube videos that have garnered more than 27 million views and been followed by nearly 100,000 people.
Webb claimed that Italian “DJ” Benny Benassi, the owner of a worldwide hit song in 2002, was infected with coronavirus, and he, Matigi and Matt Benassi spread the virus in China.
However, Benny confirmed to the American network that he did not know Benassi’s partner, and the two confirmed that they had no connection to the Italian “DJ”, indicating that Benassi’s name was a very common name in Italy.
Benny Benassi told CNN that he was not infected with the Corona virus, but that he had to cancel his concerts, like many artists around the world, due to precautionary measures to limit the spread of the epidemic, including social separation and travel restrictions.
