Does a viral video capture people in Rafah applying makeup in order to fake injuries? No, that's not true: The claim mislabels a behind-the-scenes video from the production of a Palestinian TV series, not real-life scenes taking place in Gaza on May 6, 2024. The project premiered on March 12, 2024.
The story appeared in a post (archived here) on X where it was published on May 6, 2024. It opened:
WATCH
Rafah actors are preparing, and we may soon witness disturbing footage from Rafah.
Via @GAZAWOOD1
This is what it looked like on X at the time of writing:
The post went viral as the Israeli government launched strikes (archived here) in Rafah "in order to exert military pressure on Hamas," hours after Hamas had announced (archived here) the terms for a cease-fire it would accept.
In this context, the entry on X implied that the actors seen in the footage applying makeup were preparing to pretend they were injured residents of Gaza suffering from a new round of Israeli military actions.
The post reused an older video that originally appeared (archived here) on an account of Palestinian film director Bashar Al-Najjar (archived here) under the title translated from Arabic to English by Chrome as seen below:
backstage#Bleeding_dirt
On March 12, 2024, an episode of the series called "Bleeding Dirt" -- featuring one of the same actors seen in the X post -- was uploaded on YouTube (archived here.)
Less than two weeks later, the Middle Eastern Monitor published an article (archived here) about the project. Though its plot appears to have been heavily influenced by the events in the region, it is not a documentary.
Other Lead Stories fact checks about the Hamas-Israel war that began on October 7, 2023, can be found here.
