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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

War & conflict fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about war & conflict. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

5,848 published reviews in this topic

FACTLYWar & conflict

Video of Palestinians posing as ‘corpses’ for media

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a video presented as showing Palestinians pretending to be corpses for the media. The review describes the footage as showing people arranged under white sheets who appear to move, and says it checked screenshots from the video using reverse image search. That search led to an earlier discussion of the same visuals, which identified Egypt rather than the claimed Palestinian setting. The review then traced the video to a YouTube upload dated 28 October 2013 by Al-Badeel Newspaper, an Egyptian channel. Its translated title described a staged presentation of bodies inside Al-Azhar University. The accompanying description said Muslim Brotherhood students at the university had organized a demonstration. A second video uploaded the same day, about students storming the university’s administrative building in Nasr City, contained similar visuals. To check that account against events, the review reports finding news articles about demonstrations by Al-Azhar University students in Cairo’s Nasr City district on Saturday, 26 October 2013. Taken together, the earlier Egyptian upload, its description, the similar video, and reporting about demonstrations at that location provide evidence for the footage’s Egyptian context. The reviewed claim instead identified the people and setting as Palestinian and said they were posing for media; the evidence presented by the review does not support that identification.

FACTLYWar & conflict

Videos sharing the visuals of Israel air defence system destroying Palestinian missiles

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The review investigates videos circulated as showing Israel’s air-defence system destroying Palestinian missiles during the Israel–Palestine conflict. It distinguishes three videos rather than treating them as one recording: the first two are described as simulated footage made with ARMA 3, while the third depicts a Russian military exercise. The review says none of the videos depicts the claimed Israeli interception activity. For the first two videos, the investigators used reverse image searches on screenshots to find videos with similar visuals on the YouTube channel Compared Comparison. The first match was uploaded on 22 July 2020 and titled as an ARMA 3 simulation involving a counter-rocket system; the second was uploaded on 29 January 2021 and was also described as a simulation. The review identifies ARMA 3 as a military tactical shooter game and notes that the channel makes cinematic war films using that software. The third video was traced through reverse image search to reporting about a Russian military exercise held on 14 September 2018. The review contrasts these unrelated sources of footage with the conflict setting in which the clips were shared, concluding that the videos do not show Israel’s Iron Dome system intercepting Palestinian rockets. Its conclusion rests on the identified provenance of each clip, not merely on the appearance of the footage.

FACTLYWar & conflict

Photo of a Palestinian girl who is injured in Israel’s airstrikes on Gaza city

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

FACTLY examined a social-media post describing a photograph as showing a Palestinian baby injured in Israeli airstrikes on Gaza City. Its review says the image instead shows Bianca, a girl from Rockford in the United States, and identifies her facial marks as connected to medical treatment—not an airstrike injury. The review’s claim and conclusion are specific to the photograph shared in that post: “A photo is being shared on social media claiming it as the picture of a Palestinian baby, injured in Israel airstrikes on Gaza city.” It later states that “the photo shared in the post is related to a US girl diagnosed with Port wine strain and Sturge-Weber syndrome.” The publisher describes using a reverse-image search to find a similar photograph in a Caters news-agency article from April 2019. According to FACTLY’s account of that article, Bianca had been diagnosed with port-wine stain and Sturge-Weber syndrome as an infant, and her parents began Pulse Dye Laser treatment in hopes of treating her birthmarks. FACTLY says the treatment’s early stages produced the red spots visible in the image: “the initial stages of this laser treatment created red spots on Bianca’s face.” The review also reports that the spots disappeared after two weeks and expressly distinguishes the photograph from the Israel-Palestine conflict. Its conclusion rests on the image’s identification and the reported treatment history, rather than on evidence that the pictured child was injured in Gaza: “these red spots on Bianca’s face had vanished two weeks after the treatment” and “the photo shared in the post is not related to the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine.”

dpaWar & conflict

Video toont geënsceneerde doden aan de kant van de Palestijnen, in het conflict met Israël.

Publisher’s rating: De beweringen die bij deze beelden worden gemaakt zijn onjuist. De beelden zijn van een studentenprotest uit oktober 2013 in Caïro, Egypte. Er is geen link tussen deze beelden en Hamas, de Palestijnse gebieden of Israël.

The video shows people lying beneath white sheets, appearing to be dead until movement can be seen. It circulated with claims that the scene was staged to mislead people about the Israel–Palestinian conflict; one version described it as Hamas propaganda from around 2014. The investigation identifies the footage instead as a student protest in Cairo in October 2013, with no connection to Hamas, the Palestinian territories or Israel. To trace the footage, the review examined details visible in the shared clip. Arabic writing on the sheets identifies the people as “martyrs” and gives individual names. A logo in the upper-right corner identifies Egyptian news platform El Badil. The same footage in better quality was still available on El Badil’s YouTube channel, where it had been posted on 28 October 2013 and described as showing a protest at Al-Azhar University in Cairo. Journalist Mostafa Darwish, named in the video’s YouTube description, confirmed to dpa that he filmed it for El Badil. He said the people were Al-Azhar University students paying tribute to those killed by the army at Rabaa Square earlier that year. The review also notes that footage of the same lying protest appeared in a report by Akhbar El yom TV on that date. Although a university in Gaza City also bears the name Al-Azhar, the review distinguishes the location using photographs, video and other reporting on the 28 October 2013 demonstrations: this footage was filmed at the university in Cairo.

APA - Austrian Presse AgenturWar & conflict

Auf einem Video ist entweder eine Inszenierung eines Corona-Toten oder eines Opfers im Nahost-Konflikt zu sehen. Die Menschen im Video fliehen nach einem Luftanschlag-Alarm.

Publisher’s rating: Das Video aus Jordanien zeigt Jugendliche, die mit einer Scheinbestattung die damals strikte Ausgangssperre umgehen wollten. Es ist eine Polizeisirene zu hören, ein Luftanschlag stand nicht bevor.

The video was presented in two ways: as evidence of a faked COVID-19 death, or as a staged depiction of a Palestinian death during the Middle East conflict. The review says neither interpretation is correct, and that no air attack was about to happen. It identifies the footage as a staged funeral in Jordan involving young people who were trying to evade the strict COVID-19 curfew in force at the time. [S1: “Eine darin zu sehende Scheinbestattung wird derzeit sowohl von Corona-Skeptikern geteilt (1,2,3), die damit gefakte Corona-Todesfälle belegen wollen, als auch von Menschen, die behaupten, dass es sich um eine Inszenierung von palästinensischen Todesopfern handelt (4,5).”] [S1: “Allerdings ist keine der beiden Behauptungen wahr. Ebenso stand in dieser Situation kein Luftangriff bevor, wie in den Beiträgen behauptet wird.”] [S1: “Das Video aus Jordanien zeigt Jugendliche, die mit einer Scheinbestattung die damals strikte Ausgangssperre umgehen wollten.”] To trace the footage, the review says it searched for the first frame using reverse image search. That led to an earlier YouTube upload, titled “fake funeral in Jordan, to break the CoronaVirus curfew,” which it says showed the video was already circulating in March 2020. The review also refers to an account by the Arabic news site 24.ae, which described the people as Jordanian youths trying to get out of their homes during the curfew. [S1: “Gibt man diesen Screenshot in eine Bild-Rückwärtssuche, kommt man schnell zu Ergebnissen.”] [S1: “Tatsächlich ist es aber bereits im März 2020 entstanden, wie ein YouTube-Video mit dem Titel „fake funeral in Jordan, to break the CoronaVirus curfew“ belegt (6).”] [S1: “Einem ihrer Tweets zufolge, der am 24. März 2020 das Video teilte (7), handelte es sich um jordanische Jugendliche, die durch diesen Trick aus dem Haus kommen wollten.”] The review’s account of the alarm is that it was a police siren, not a warning of an impending airstrike. It says the youths ran from the risk of arrest for breaking the curfew; according to the cited Egyptian newspaper Youm7, the man on the stretcher was ultimately arrested. It also reports finding no media reports of airstrikes in Jordan during the relevant period. [S1: “Laut der ägyptischen Tageszeitung „Youm7“ (10) handelte es sich bei dem Warnsignal um eine Polizeisirene.”] [S1: “Die Jugendlichen flüchteten also nicht vor einem Luftanschlag, sondern vor einer Verhaftung aufgrund des Verstoßes gegen die Ausgangssperre.”] [S1: “Den Angaben von „Youm7“ zufolge wurde der Mann auf der Bahre, der als letztes weglief, schließlich auch verhaftet.”] [S1: “Medienberichte über Luftangriffe in Jordanien im fraglichen Zeitraum sind keine zu finden.”]

Deutsche Presse-AgenturWar & conflict

Aus Angst vor einem Luftangriff wird im Video eine inszenierte Trauerfeier abgebrochen.

Publisher’s rating: Es gibt keine Hinweise, dass in dem Video ein Luftangriff bevorsteht. Es wurde in Jordanien aufgenommen, zu hören ist eine Polizeisirene. Laut einem Medienbericht versuchten Jugendliche mit einem inszenierten Begräbnis die Ausgangssperren zu übergehen.

The claim concerns a video showing people carrying a body on a bier, then setting it down after a siren sounds as the apparent deceased gets up and runs away. The post framed this as a moment when fear of an air attack outweighed the alleged deception of COVID-19 deaths. The investigation found no indication that an air attack was imminent: it identified the recording location as Jordan and the sound as a police siren. It reported that, according to a media account, young people staged the funeral procession to evade curfew restrictions. (S1) The review describes a reverse image search of a frame from the video, which found other instances of the footage. It also points to a YouTube upload dated March 26, 2020, whose title describes a “fake funeral in Jordan” intended to break the coronavirus curfew. The review says this helped trace the footage’s history and connects it to a report by the Arabic news site 24.ae, which described Jordanian youths staging a funeral procession to get around movement restrictions. This evidence identifies the video as an older Jordanian recording, rather than evidence of an impending air attack. (S1) As to why the group ran, the review says an Egyptian newspaper, Youm7, reported that the siren in the video belonged to a police patrol and that the youths likely fled because they feared arrest. The source presents this as the newspaper’s account and a likely explanation; it does not establish that an air raid warning was heard. (S1)

FACTLYWar & conflict

Video of a massive explosion in Israel where 500 Jews were killed

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a video shared during the Israel–Palestine conflict, described in the post as showing a large explosion in Israel that killed about 500 Jewish people. FACTLY investigated the footage itself, rather than treating the post’s description as proof of where or when it was recorded. Its review identifies the video as showing a fire in a suburb of Cairo, Egypt, and says the incident resulted from a crude-oil pipeline leak in 2020. The review therefore concludes that the footage was not of an explosion in Israel and was unrelated to the then-current conflict. To trace the video, the review says a reverse-image search of screenshots led to a 2020 Telegraph news report containing the same visuals. It describes that report as locating the fire in a Cairo suburb and identifying a ruptured crude-oil pipeline as its cause. FACTLY also says keyword searches found other news articles and videos reporting the same incident. Those steps connect the shared footage to a specific earlier event in Egypt, rather than merely showing that a different explosion happened elsewhere. The review separately says it found no recent news reports of an explosion in Israel that killed 500 Jewish people. That absence is reported as an additional check, not the basis for identifying the video: the decisive evidence is the match between the footage and reporting about the 2020 Cairo fire. The review’s conclusion is that the post misrepresented old footage from Egypt as a deadly event in Israel.

FACTLYWar & conflict

Recent images of Gaza amidst the Israel-Palestine conflict

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

FACTLY examined four images shared online as pictures of recent Gaza attacks during the Israel-Palestine conflict. Its conclusion was based on tracing the images to earlier appearances and reported locations: the first two had been identified as old images from Gaza, while the other two were linked to Syria. The review says it used reverse image searches to find earlier posts, articles and a video containing the same images. For the first image, FACTLY found a Facebook post dated 3 April 2019. That post described a Gaza family celebrating a child’s birthday amid the ruins of their house and credited the photograph to Belal Khaled/TRT. The second image appeared in a news article dated 3 June 2016 and, according to the review, had circulated on social media since 2016. These earlier appearances contradict presenting either image as new material from the recent attacks. The review traced the third image to a YouTube video uploaded on 10 May 2014, and also noted earlier Tumblr appearances. For the fourth, it found a news article dated 3 October 2016 describing a scene in Syria, followed by another article in 2017 and a Facebook post in 2018 identifying it as from Syria. On this evidence, the four images do not collectively show recent Gaza attacks: two were old Gaza images and two were from Syria.