Clip shows Turkish soldiers en route to Syria in 2018, not in Jerusalem in 2021
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on May 21, 2021 at 15:58
- 3 min read
- By Marion DAUTRY, AFP Belgrade
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“Turkey army arrived in Palestine to protect Masjid Al Aqsa,” reads a Facebook post featuring a TikTok video.
In the recording, an army vehicle cruises past a cheering crowd while waving a Turkish flag. A soldier with glasses and a blue beret is seen shaking hands with people in the crowd.
The same video was published on TikTok here with the caption: “free palstine we are with palstine always (sic)”.
A different version of the video in Bosnian, taken from the same parade, also appeared here on Facebook with the same false claim.
Old Video
By doing reverse image searches on selected video keyframes, AFP Fact Check found a longer version of the video posted on YouTube on January 1, 2019. According to the description, the clip was taken in Pazarcık in Kahramanmaraş district, the site of a military base in Turkey.
A further search with the additional location details led to this YouTube video published by Turkish news site Aksu TV Haber on February 13, 2018. The bespectacled army official (who also appears in the Facebook video) can be seen 2’10” into the clip.
A caption accompanying the video reads: “Citizens of the military convoy that went to the borderline for Operation Olive Branch in Kahramanmaraş held a farewell ceremony in Pazarcık district center”.
Operation Olive Branch
About three years ago, Turkey launched a military operation codenamed "Operation Olive Branch" in Syria’s northern region of Afrin, targeting the Kurdish People’' Protection Units (YPG) which Ankara considers a terror group.
On January 20, 2018, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced that Ankara had launched a ground offensive to oust Kurdish militia from Afrin. The following day Turkish troops and tanks entered Syria.
But days before the Turkish army set foot in Syria, street celebrations were held in the city of Pazarcik to bid them farewell. The celebrations were covered by the Turkish news agency IHA and by CNN Turk on February 13, 2018.
Gaza conflict
The latest deadly clashes between Israel and Palestinians were sparked by a years-long bid by Jewish settlers to take over Arab homes in the Sheikh Jara settlement in annexed East Jerusalem. Protests followed, leading to Israeli forces storming the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem – one of Islam’s holiest sites.
The bloody conflict escalated after Hamas, the Islamic group that controls Gaza, had launched rockets at Israel, which responded with a deadly bombing campaign.
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