Rihanna denies she is taking sides as singer claims she didn't send 'Free Palestine' tweet that came from her account

Rihanna had denied claims that she supports the Palestinian Authority after a tweet was sent from her official account early today.

A tweet that simply contained the hashtag '#FreePalestine' was sent from the singer's account on Monday morning.

But TMZ claimed that after she was inundated with questions from fans asking if she supported Hamas, the tweet was removed with eight minutes of first appearing. 

Controversy: Rihanna deleted a #FreePalestine tweet on Monday, claiming she had not meant to send it

Deleted: The message, sent from the singer's official account Monday morning, was quickly removed

The message was quickly gone from her Twitter feed, and a source close to the singer said she had not intended to send it.

'She deleted it because it was never meant to be tweeted. She didn't even realize it was a

tweet until she started hearing from her fans,' the person, speaking to TMZ on condition on anonymity, said.

According to NY Mag, the hashtag was re-tweeted 7,000 times by her followers before it was removed.

Rihanna had apparently been reading about the Israel-Gaza conflict, which flared up after three Israeli teenagers were murdered, and then a Palestinian was killed in an apparent revenge attack.

Three Jews suspected of being behind the revenge attack, in which Mohammed Abu Khdeir, 16, was kidnapped and burnt alive, were charged with murder Monday.

The killers of the three Israeli teenagers who were murdered have not yet been caught.

A source told TMZ that while reading about the conflict, it appeared that Rihanna had inadvertently sent out the hash tag.

DM