FACT CHECK: Video Claiming To Show Hamas Attack On Israeli Troops Is From Syria
A video shared on X claims to show a Hamas anti-tank guided missile (ATGM) attack on Israeli troops.
🇵🇸🇮🇱 God bless Hamas
Watch this hard blow and enjoy it. pic.twitter.com/KQG3058D91
— King Chelsea Ug 🇺🇬🇷🇺 (@ug_chelsea) October 15, 2024
Verdict: False
The video is from 2016. It is from Syria, not Gaza, and is not related to the Israeli-Hamas conflict.
Fact Check:
Social media users are claiming to show Hamas terrorists using an anti-tank weapon to target Israeli troops. One user wrote, “God bless Hamas…Watch this hard blow and enjoy it.”
Through a reverse image search, Check Your Fact found that the video is from Syria and was taken in 2016. The video’s title reads,”Watch… Jaysh al-Izza kills and wounds dozens with a TOW missile on the Maardas front in the Hama countryside.”
Tal Hagin, an open-source intelligence analyst, also debunked the claim in an Oct. 16 post.
This doesn’t show an attack against the IDF by Hamas.
It showcases a Free Syrian Army Faction fighting against Assad Forces in Maardees, Hama countryside, Syria. The video was uploaded on October 16th, 2016. https://t.co/XVaSRMf1VV pic.twitter.com/lcg8VdsRqq
— Tal Hagin (@talhagin) October 16, 2024
Other details show that the video is not from Gaza. The anti-tank guided missile being fired is a TOW, which is an American-made weapon. Hamas uses a mixture of Russian/Soviet/Chinese ATGMs, such as the Kornet and Red Arrow. Israel does not seem to currently use TOW missiles, though it is a former user of the missiles.
Syrian rebels were supplied with TOW missiles by the United States through its allies, according to The New York Times. (RELATED: FACT CHECK: Video Shows 2003 Baghdad Bombing, Not Israeli Attack)
