Old video of an attack on elderly man in the Netherlands shared as 'refugees' attacking a U.S. citizen

Context

An X (formerly Twitter) user, ‘Izlmaic Terrorist,’ known for spreading misinformation, posted a video on August 19 with the claim, “Some Muslim refugees beat up a US citizen badly.” The video has nearly 4,250 views and more than 150 reposts. Archived version of the post can be seen here. 

The video shows a group of four young adults kicking and attacking an elderly man walking a dog. The boys were screaming at him in Dutch while attacking him. The senior citizen can be seen falling down due to the blows of the youngsters. 

However, the man in the video is not a U.S. citizen being attacked. It is an old video from the Netherlands. 

In fact

A reverse image search of the keyframes from the video yielded a post on X dated May 10, 2023, that contained screengrabs from the video, with a caption written in Dutch. It was posted by a user named ‘Lou Lewinsky 2’. 

Screenshot of the X post that carried screengrabs from the video
(Source: X/@lewinskylou2)

We looked for news about the attack in Dutch language sources. A search on Google with the keywords ‘old man attacked in Netherlands’ provided various news reports in Dutch on the incident. 

According to a report in Nos.nl, a Dutch public broadcaster, on May 10, which carried a screengrab from the video, the incident happened on May 8, 2023, in a town named Pijnacker in the Netherlands. The old man was walking his dog when the group attacked him, according to the report. 

According to a May 11 report in Omroep West, a news station based in The Hague, which also carried a screengrab from the video, the old man in the video has been identified as 73-year-old Paul. The report added that the attack started after Paul questioned the youngsters for littering two cans on the street. During this exchange, the group attacked him. According to the report, they shouted expletives at him while punching and kicking him. 

According to a report on RTL Nieuws.nl on May 11, 2023, which embedded the assault video in their report, three teenagers aged 13, 14, and 15, who hailed from Pijnacker, were arrested immediately after the incident, and a fourth boy aged 15 from the nearby Delft was arrested on May 11, 2023. As the accused were juveniles, their identities were not released to the public.

Based on the report that the assault happened at the intersection of Nobellaan and Einsteinlaan streets in Pijnacker, we identified the location of the attack and compared it with the video. The lamp post, orange colored mailbox, the paved road, and brick red building in the background can be located on Google Maps. 

The lamppost and mailbox seen in the viral video can also be located on Google Maps (Source: Video screengrab (L), Google Maps (R))

Therefore, it is clear that the video is from the Netherlands and not the U.S.

The verdict

An old video from the Netherlands has been shared with the false claim that Muslim refugees attacked a senior citizen in the U.S. Therefore, we have marked this claim false.