Did a post mentioning Lebensraum for Israel appear on the Times of Israel blog platform? Yes, that's true: The screenshot that resurfaced on social media in 2026 showed a blog entry that was indeed published there almost two years earlier, but then was deleted. The Times of Israel, however, states that it does not assume responsibility for the content of its blog section.
The statement appeared in a post (archived here) published on X by the @AlanRMacLeod account on Sept. 25, 2026. It opened:
They said it. They literally came out and said it.
The image attached to the post showed the Times of Israel logo and what looked like an article's title that read:
Lebensraum Needed for Israel's Exploding PopulationDEC 4, 2024, 4:27 PM
This is what the picture looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Image source: post by @AlanRMacLeod on X.)
A piece with this title did appear on the Times of Israel website on the said date, but the next day it was already taken down. However, it was not an editorial article or a report authored by the newspaper's staff.
The piece in question was published in the blog section whose sidebar showed the following disclaimer:
Please note that the posts on The Blogs are contributed by third parties. The opinions, facts and any media content in them are presented solely by the authors, and neither The Times of Israel nor its partners assume any responsibility for them...
Although coined decades before World War II, the term "Lebensraum" became historically associated with the Nazi state (archived here) that used it to justify invasion of other countries purporting that such expansion was necessary for the German state to survive.
The entry was authored by Dan Ehrlich who described himself (archived here) as a "London based American journalist with a long wide ranging career spanning print, radio TV and online news".
When the post was first published, the controversy was covered by Newsweek (archived here).
The Times of Israel blog section did not show any other posts published by the same person after the removal of the article mentioning "Lebensraum".
Lead Stories reached out to the Times of Israel via the contact form on its website and if a response is received, this article will be updated as appropriate.
