Did Hamas capture two Saudi soldiers allegedly fighting alongside the Israeli Defense Forces in the Gaza ground offensive, as claimed by many on TikTok? No, that's not true: The video is from 2017 and features two Saudi soldiers who were captured by the Houthis in Yemen. The claim appeared in a video that's no longer available but is archived here.…

Did Hamas burn down Tel Aviv by firing 150 missiles at the coastal city in central Israel on October 31, 2023? No, that's not true: While Hamas did state that it launched 150 rockets at Tel Aviv on October 7, 2023, in response to an Israeli airstrike in Gaza that destroyed a high-rise building with over 100 apartments, the footage…

Did a natural disaster inflict massive damage to the shoreline of Tel Aviv, Israel's central coastal city on the Mediterranean, in October 2023? No, that's not true: Videos circulating on social media to support this claim display an aerial view of the widespread devastation in Acapulco, Mexico, where the colossal category 5 Hurricane Otis made a surprise landfall in the…

Is a video on social media showing a medical worker and a journalist under bombardment related to the Hamas-Israel conflict in late 2023? No, that's not accurate. The video is from an Al Jazeera documentary released in 2016 about an event in Gaza in 2014. The claim appeared in a video (archived here) published on TikTok by @user1460602497768 on October…

Does a video on TikTok show an Israeli warship being struck by an explosive device during the Hamas-Israel conflict in the fall of 2023? No, that's not true: The video, from 2015, captures a fire prevention drill at a chemical plant in the Tongzhou district of Beijing. The claim appeared in a video (archived here) on TikTok by @halabi77 on…

Does this photo show Hamas taking 40 Israeli soldiers as hostages in the Hamas-Israel conflict in the fall of 2023? No, that's not true: The photo is from 2022 and shows Hamas fighters training at a facility in the Gaza Strip with people in Israel Defense Forces uniforms. However, they are not real Israeli soldiers but instead are part of…

Does a video show the grand mufti of the United Arab Emirates reciting Quranic verses dedicated to the souls of Israeli soldiers whom he describes as martyrs? No, that's not true: The video, from May 2022, shows the spiritual leader of the Druze community in Israel, Sheikh Mowafaq Tarif, not the grand mufti of UAE, reciting from the Quran to…

Did protesters burn down the Israeli Embassy in the Jordanian capital, Amman? No, that's not true: Lead Stories toured the vicinity of the embassy in Amman's middle-class al-Rabiyeh district on November 12, 2023, and found it to be intact. A Jordanian security official told Lead Stories that riot police set up barricades and fired tear gas, preventing hundreds of angry…

Did Hamas militants shoot down an Israeli Air Force (IAF) plane in the Gaza Strip? No, that's not true: The footage used on social media to make the claim displays a greyish military aircraft, almost intact, atop the roof of a dilapidated one-story brick and cement building in China's Lenghu, also known as the oil town. The desolate location is…

Does a video on social media show a mosque being bombed by Israel in October 2023? No, that's not true: The footage predates the Hamas-Israel conflict, and shows the Islamic State bombing of the Uwais al-Qarni Mosque in Raqqa, Syria, in 2014. The claim appeared in a video (archived here) published on TikTok by @user4305266923337 on October 18, 2023. The…