A video on Facebook (FB) showing a tower in Gaza leveled by the Israeli military via airstrike is being passed off as an event from the attack that began last week. This needs context.
On Oct. 9, a Filipino FB page published the minute-long clip with a headline that read:
“Video shows the moment an Israeli airstrike hit and leveled the 14-story Al-Shorouk Tower in Gaza amid an escalating conflict between Israel and Hamas.”
The footage showed a group of people looking at a tower demolished by the Israeli military after a series of rocket barrages.
While the video was indeed taken during a conflict between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas, this is an old video.
A reverse image search revealed that this video featured two clips spliced together. The original clips were published by Instagram user @omaralsersawi in May 2021. The captions, written in a mix of English and Arabic, read:
“This is the effect of the Israeli attack on Gaza City, not in Ukraine
لحظة قصف برج الشروق من قبل طائرات الاحتلال، حسبي الله ونعم الوكيل (Translation: The moment the Shorouk Tower was bombed by occupation aircraft, God suffices me and He is the best disposer of affairs).”
“This is the effect of the Israeli attack on Gaza City, not in Ukraine
لك الله يا غزة (Translation: God bless you, Gaza) #gazaunderattack”.
International news network Al Jazeera published in 2021 a similar video on its official YouTube channel showing the same moment the missiles hit the 14-story al-Shorouk tower which housed several media offices.
According to local reports, the Israeli military hit the tower – the third of four structures that were allegedly used by Hamas for intelligence according to Israel – after an exchange of rocket attacks between Hamas and Israel in May 2021.
This video needing context was published after Hamas militants killed hundreds of Israelis on Oct. 7 and Israel retaliated by hammering the Gaza Strip with airstrikes. The attacks, which continue to happen as of publishing, have claimed over 1,900 lives on both sides.
FB page All in one Balita (created on Sept. 26) published the video, garnering over 6,000 reactions, 480 comments, 1,100 shares and 538,000 views.
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(Editor’s Note: VERA Files has partnered with Facebook to fight the spread of disinformation. Find out more about this partnership and our methodology.)
