By: Rajini KG
November 27 2023
Video from Syria shared as Al-Qassam fighters attacking Israeli snipers
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Screenshot of the viral video shared on social media platforms. (Source: X/Facebook/YouTube/Modified by Logically Facts)
Fact-Check
The Verdict False
The video shows members of the Hurras al-Din, a Jihadist organization, attacking the Syrian Arab Army in Latakia in 2018.
Claim ID 9f191f00
What's being claimed?
On November 19, 2023, the Al-Qassam Brigade, the military wing of Hamas, declared that it had killed Israeli troops and destroyed over 20 Israeli military vehicles in the Gaza Strip, according to a report in Anadolu Agency. Following this announcement, a video circulating on social media claims to show Al-Qassam personnel attacking Israeli soldiers in disguise. An X (Formerly Twitter) user shared a video (archive here) of two men in army uniforms searching a building. One of the uniformed men enters a room and shoots a third seated man with a rifle. The video was captioned, "Al-Qassam disguises itself as an Israeli army. From zero distance, I killed three snipers. Zionists. With a Kalashnikov weapon (Translated from Arabic)." The post had 662,700 views and 17,000 likes. Many users shared the video on X and YouTube. The archive of the posts can be found here and here.
Screenshot of the viral video shared on social media platforms. (Source: X/Facebook/Screenshots/Modified by Logically Facts)
However, the video is old, and it is from Syria.
What we found
Through a reverse image search, we found that Mepa News, a Turkish News media, had cited a screenshot from the viral video in its report published on June 4, 2018. This screenshot can be found on the viral video at 0:06 seconds. Mepa News reported that in the countryside of Syria's Latakia region, on June 3, 2018, the Hurras al-Din organization, a Jihadist organization, attacked Assad forces. According to the U.S.'s counter-terrorism guide, members of Hurras al-Din have been "specially designated global terrorists" since September 2019.
Additionally, media connected to the Hurras al-Din group has released a video of the raid.
Comparison of viral video and screenshot shared by Mepa News. (X/Mepa News/Screenshots)
Syrian local news outlets — Aksalser.com and SMM Syria — published the same image in their June 4, 2018, reports.
Al Khabar TV, a Syrian broadcast media, on June 3, 2018, reported that the Syrian Arab Army forces thwarted an attempt by an armed group from the Hurras al-Din organization to infiltrate the northeastern countryside of Latakia. Armed groups regularly attempted to enter the northeast countryside of Latakia to weaken Syrian Arab Army positions in the area.
Therefore, it confirms that the video is from Syria, not Palestine.
The verdict
A 5-year-old video from the Syrian civil war has been misattributed to events in Palestine. It is unrelated to the Israel-Hamas war. Therefore, we have marked this claim as false.
