Does a video posted on X show Israeli protesters surrounding Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's residence in Jerusalem to demand his resignation? No, that's not true: The video shows a rally taking place in Tel Aviv to call for the release of Israeli hostages taken by Hamas. At least two English-language signs carried by protesters refer to Israelis held hostage by Hamas, but make no reference to Netanyahu.
The claim, which appeared on X, formerly Twitter, was published on November 25, 2023 (archived here). It read:
BREAKING:
🇮🇱The Israelis have surrounded Netanyahu's residence in Jerusalem and are demanding his resignation.
Earlier, it became known that #Hamas is delaying the release of the second group of #Israeli hostages until Tel Aviv begins to adhere to agreed standards for the release of prisoners.
This is what the post looked like on X at the time of writing:
The 15-second video attached to the X post shows a crowd of people holding posters and participating in a demonstration. Most of the signs are in Hebrew, but there are signs with English on them or a hybrid of Hebrew and English. Two English signs seen in the X screenshot above read, "They've Taken Our Hearts Captive" and "BRING THEM BACK HOME."
A Google News search of the keywords, "protest AND Jerusalem AND Netanyahu AND resignation AND November 25, 2023" (archived here) did not result in a news article that could substantiate this claim.
Demonstrators did gather outside Netanyahu's Jerusalem home (archived here and here) in early November 2023 to voice their anger about the failures that led to the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks and called for his resignation, but the video in the claim on X that is the focus of this article was not a recording of that event.
Lead Stories found the address to Netanyahu's Jerusalem residence and saw that the area in this neighborhood is not wide enough to hold all the protestors seen in the X video. Netanyahu's home has been blurred by Google Maps and the street name has been blocked out by Lead Stories.
(Source: Google Maps screenshot taken on Tue Nov 28 16:42:41 2023 UTC)
In the X video, there is a small, light green tag in a non-English language in the upper-left-hand corner. Evidence of the tag is below:
(Source: X post screenshot taken on Mon Nov 27 18:06:38 2023 UTC)
The watermark reading "RUPTLY" on the X video refers to Ruptly (archived here), a Russian video news agency. That tag reads, "Tel-Aviv, Israel" in Russian, according to Google Translate and translation by Lead Stories staff. As mentioned above, Netanyahu lived in Jerusalem (archived here) at the time of writing, not Tel Aviv. Evidence of the Google Translate translation is below:
(Source: Google Translate screenshot taken on Mon Nov 27 18:09:19 2023 UTC)
An X search of the keywords, "Tel Aviv (protest OR Israel OR Gaza) until:2023-11-26 since:2023-11-01" (archived here) led Lead Stories to an article from The Times of Israel on a November 25, 2023, rally in Tel Aviv for the Israeli hostages (archived here) and to mark "50 Days of Hell" since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks. A picture featured in the article shows similarities to the video seen in the X claim. The right side of The Times of Israel picture shows the same building seen in the X post. The evidence is seen below with circling done by Lead Stories:
(Source: The Times of Israel screenshot taken on Wed Nov 29 15:31:13 2023 UTC)
(Source: X screenshot taken on Wed Nov 29 15:32:39 2023 UTC)
The Times of Israel article also mentions the head of the Druze community being present at this rally in Tel Aviv. The Druze are an "ethnoreligious group concentrated in Syria, Lebanon, and Israel," according to Harvard Divinity School (archived here). Lead Stories used the transcribing website, Notta (archived here), to transcribe the Hebrew that was being spoken in the X video. Once the Hebrew was transcribed, we translated it to English using Google Translate and what we received was an unidentified speaker mentioning the Druze community briefly:
... who may not always receive the pampering and coolness they deserve. You must be conspiring that I'm talking about the Druze community, and that maybe you don't always get the flattery and coldness ...
There was no reference to Netanyahu heard in the audio portion of the clip.
Other Lead Stories articles on the Hamas-Israel 2023 conflict are here.
