Israel Hamas 2023

Does a video of an explosion in an urban area with clouds of smoke and large pieces of debris hurled skyward show the Israeli Air Force striking terror targets in Gaza in October 2023? No, that's not true: The footage is from a May 2023 airstrike in the Gaza strip. It is not a video of airstrikes hitting Gaza as…

Does this video show a salvo of rockets fired by Hamas from the Gaza Strip toward Israel in October 2023? No, that's not true: This video was posted over three years earlier on YouTube, on February 28, 2020, with a Russian-language caption naming the location as north Syria. Although Lead Stories could not verify that the footage shows rockets that…

Does a social media video show a "Hamas terrorist with kidnapped Jewish baby girl in Gaza," following the Hamas attack on Israel in early October 2023? No, that's not true: Lead Stories found the original video and it predates the October 7, 2023, attack by nearly a month. The man who posted the original said the video was shot in…

Does a viral video capture the staging of a "fake child death" aimed at blaming Hamas for attacking civilians during the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, or during later atrocities? No, that's not true: The footage predates this escalation by more than a year and shows the production of a short film named "Empty Place" that can…

Do several videos shared on social media in October 2023 genuinely show combat footage from the military conflict between Israel and Hamas? No, that's not true: A reverse image search revealed that one such clip originated from the combat video game Arma 3. Several other similar clips are making the rounds often posted by accounts looking to monetize views and…

Was a video of Jewish children held in animal cages posted to social media by "Arab" captors in order to show them off as trophies? No, that's not true: this video was posted on TikTok days before the Hamas attacks in Israel but by October 8, 2023 the video and the account that posted it were gone from TikTok. Screenshots…

Does a White House memo show $8 billion in new aid for Israel following the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023? No, that's not true: A social media post contains a doctored version of an earlier memorandum from the Biden administration. The "Presidential Actions" section of the White House website, which provides an index of daily actions, shows…

Does a video show Hamas soldiers parachuting into Israel during the October 7, 2023, attack? No, that's not true: The footage is of a military exercise at a military academy in Egypt. The building the parachuters are shown flying around in the video is of the Egyptian military academy in Cairo, which is more than 250 miles from Israel. The…

Does a viral clip show Pakistan sending its F-16 fighter jets to Palestine in the aftermath of the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel? No, that's not true: The footage predates the conflict and shows an exercise in Turkey. It was posted on social media in May 2023, months before the invasion. No credible sources have reported Pakistan sending…

Did Hamas claim that Ukraine sold them the weapons, purportedly paid for by the United States, that they used to attack Israel on October 7, 2023? No, that's not true: Hamas has made no such public claim. Additionally, there is no credible information, evidence, or reports supporting such an assertion. The claim appeared in a post on X (archived here),…