Old video of Gaza strike falsely shared as footage of Israel-Hamas conflict in October 2023
- Published on October 16, 2023 at 09:07
- 3 min read
- By Chayanit ITTHIPONGMAETEE, AFP Thailand
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"#Israel In response to the attack in Israel, the Israeli Defense Forces began bombing Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip," says a Thai-language Facebook post shared on October 7.
The video, which has more than 32,000 views, shows a tower block crumble to the ground after it is hit by airstrikes.
The logo of international news outlet Al Jazeera features in the top-left corner of the video.
More than one million people have fled their homes in Gaza as Israel bombarded the territory and continued massing troops in preparation for a full-blown ground invasion.
The bombing -- which has killed at least 2,670 people, mainly civilians -- was in retaliation for a bloody attack in which waves of Hamas fighters broke through the heavily fortified border on October 7, shooting, stabbing and burning to death more than 1,400 people, most of them civilians.
Hamas also took about 150 Israeli, foreign and dual national hostages back to Gaza in the initial attack, Israel has said.
Posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, shared the footage here, here and here, falsely linking it to the fresh violence in Gaza.
One Thai-language TikTok post expressed solidarity with Thai nationals in the territory, after Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin said on October 14 that 24 Thais had been killed and 16 taken hostage (archived link).
Old video from 2021
A keyword search and Google reverse image search found the video uploaded to Al Jazeera's YouTube channel on May 14, 2021 (archived link).
"Israel destroys third Gaza tower | AJ #shorts," the video's caption reads.
The video's description adds: "This is the moment the 14-storey al-Shorouq tower, housing media offices in Gaza City, was completely destroyed by multiple Israeli air raids on Wednesday [May 12, 2021]."
Al Jazeera reported that the Al-Shorouk building, which was built in 1995, was one of the most famous landmarks in Gaza (archived link).
Below is a screenshot comparison between the misleading Facebook post (left) and Al Jazeera's video uploaded on YouTube (right):
Reuters photographer Ibraheem Abu Mustafa took a string of photos of the blast, which ressemble Al Jazeera' video (archived link).
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