Old photo shared as Israeli soldiers 'crying' after recent Hezbollah attack

What is the claim?

A photo showing armed men in uniform sitting on the floor with their heads down has been circulating online, claiming to depict Israeli soldiers "crying" after Hezbollah's recent drone attack on Israel on October 13, 2024.

On X (formerly Twitter), a user wrote, "Israeli media: This Hezbollah attack is the bloodiest and most shocking attack since the war began." An archived version of this post can be found here.

Another post (archived here) states, "BREAKING: ISRAELI soldiers are reportedly 'crying, a lot,' as predicted by Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah before his martyrdom." The photo has also been shared on Facebook with similar claims in Assamese.

Screenshots of posts sharing the viral image. (Source: X/Screenshot)

However, our investigation revealed that the photo is from 2004 and is unrelated to the recent tensions between Israel and Hezbollah.

What did we find?

We performed a reverse image search and located the photo on the stock image website Alamy. According to the details available on Alamy, the photo was captured on April 3, 2004, by Oded Balilty for the Associated Press. The image caption states it shows Israeli army soldiers during a search operation at a refugee camp in Rafah, a city in the southern Gaza Strip, Palestine: "Israeli army soldiers wait as army specialists inspect a tunnel found in a house during an army operation at the Rafah refugee camp, adjacent to the Palestinian town of Rafah, next to the Egyptian border in the southern Gaza Strip early Saturday, April 3, 2004."

The now-viral photo is credited to the Associated Press on Alamy's website and is dated April 3, 2004. (Source: Alamy/Screenshot) 

We also found the photo in the archives of AP Newsroom and identified similar images from the same search operation showing Israeli soldiers resting. The captions noted that the Israeli army periodically finds and destroys tunnels used by Palestinian militants to smuggle weapons and explosives from Egypt into the Gaza Strip.

Similar photos of Israeli soldiers were captured during the same search operation on April 3, 2004. (Source: AP Photo/Screenshot)

According to a report by NBC News on April 7, 2004, the Israeli army, during its patrols, found and destroyed several "weapons-smuggling tunnels" along the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, where the Rafah refugee camp is located.

Additionally, a weekly report from April 8, 2004, by The Electronic Intifada, a Chicago-based publication covering the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, highlights several Israeli military operations at various locations in the Gaza Strip, including Rafah, during the first week of April 2004.

Hezbollah's recent drone attack 

On October 13, a drone launched by Hezbollah killed four Israeli soldiers and injured 60 others after it hit a military base near the central city of Binyamina, NPR reported. The drone reportedly penetrated Israel's defenses and struck the Golani Brigade's base's dining hall. The Lebanese militant group claimed responsibility for the attack, stating it was retaliation for Israel's strike on Beirut on October 10, which killed 22 people and injured more than 100.

The verdict