Old video of 'salvo' of rockets being fired is misattributed to Hamas attack on Israel

Context

On October 7, Hamas militants launched a surprise attack from the Gaza Strip into surrounding Israeli communities, killing residents and tourists. In response to the attack, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that the country is now at war with Hamas and conducted airstrikes in Gaza. According to the Associated Press, on October 9, the death toll passed 1,100, thousands have been wounded on both sides and more than 123,000 Gazans have been displaced. 

Following the recent conflict, outdated videos are being misattributed to the current conflict and shared on social media. A post on X (formerly Twitter), shares a video of military rockets being fired at night. The post links this to recent events and claims, “JUST IN: Video of a salvo of rockets fired by Hamas from the Gaza Strip towards Israel.”

A screenshot of a viral post on X showing military rockets being fired at night. (Source: X)

In fact

The footage has been misattributed to recent events and can be traced back to 2020. Attached to the X post was a community note that stated the footage was “an old video from years ago.” The community note linked to a YouTube video from a Ukrainian user that covers military topics. The video shows the same footage shared by the X post, but its upload date on YouTube is 2020.

Screenshot of the same footage uploaded to YouTube in 2020. (Source: YouTube)

The video description claims that the footage is from Northern Syria but provides no additional context or source of the footage. The origin of the video could not be confirmed. Therefore, there is no way to verify if the video is from Syria or a different country. No information could be found to verify what military group is firing rockets in the footage. Furthermore, it cannot be confirmed that the video is from events in 2020. The footage could be from a year before 2020. 

However, due to the upload date, it is evident that the footage is at least from 2020. Therefore the footage is not recent or related to the current conflict between Israel and Hamas. 

The user who made the original X post claiming the footage was recent also issued a clarification. They stated that the “Video is outdated, approximately 2 years old.”

The sharing of misattributed footage has surged alongside news of the conflict between Israel and Hamas. Logically Facts has fact-checked other instances of footage misattributed to the conflict and found them to be misleading. 

The verdict

The video of rockets being launched can be traced back to 2020 and has been misattributed to the current conflict between Israel and Hamas. Therefore, we have marked this claim as misleading.