Photo does not show Israeli forces capturing Hamas commander

"Breaking news: Israeli special forces arrest southern Hamas deputy commander," reads a Korean-language claim shared here on Facebook on October 9.

An accompanying photo shows soldiers handling a person whose hands are bound and whose face has been blurred.

The claim was shared online in the aftermath of an unprecedented surprise onslaught by Hamas across the Gaza Strip-Israel border on October 7, which has led to hundreds of deaths in Israel and Gaza as of October 13. It is the deadliest attack in Israel's 75-year history (archived link).

A day after the attack began, the Israeli Defense Forces announced their Shayetet 13 unit had taken into custody the deputy commander of the southern division of the Hamas naval force, Muhammad Abu Ghali, according to the Times of Israel and Wall Street Journal (archived links here and here).

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A screenshot of the false post on Facebook, captured October 11, 2023

Shayetet 13 is a marine commando unit but is also trained for land and air operations, according to the Israeli Defense Forces (archived link).

The photo purportedly showing the commander was shared with similar false claims elsewhere on Facebook, as well as on South Korea's Naver Blog platform here and here.

It was also shared in an English-language post on X, formerly Twitter, that has been viewed more than 42,000 times.

While the Israeli military has indeed announced Abu Ghali's capture, this photo shows a "terror suspect" apprehended by Israeli special forces in a separate operation in the West Bank in February.

West Bank operation

Through a reverse image search on Google, AFP found the image matched one of nine photos published by Ynet, an Israeli news organisation, on May 6, 2023 (archived link).

The pictures were taken by Israeli photographer Ziv Koren and document the activities of Shayetet 13 as they undertook "terrorist-apprehension raids across the West Bank", the report says (archived link).

A caption with the photo on Ynet reads: "Commandeering a vessel from the inside (Photo: Ziv Koren)."

Below is a screenshot comparison between the image shared in the false social media posts (left) and the original image published by Ynet (right):

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A screenshot comparison between the image shared in the false social media posts (left) and the original image published by Ynet (right)

The same photo was included in a set of images posted to Koren's personal Instagram account on April 29 with the description: "Shayetet 13 in action. The Israeli Navy seals elite unit as never seen before." (archived link)

Contacted by AFP, Koren's office manager Hadas Ruso said the photo does not show a Hamas deputy commander. The figure in the picture "is not the person they claim", he said.

AFP was not able to identify the man.

"An arrest of terror suspect in a hostile environment by Shayetet 13 as part of 'Breakwater' operation which started on March 31^st, 2022," reads Koren's original caption for the image, which was provided to AFP by Ruso on October 11.

Operation Breakwater was a series of raids carried out by Israeli forces in the north of the West Bank from March 2022 as part of the country's attempt to weaken militants there, according to reports in The Guardian and NPR (archived links here and here).

The West Bank is a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967.