By Archis Chowdhury
A video showing a large group of people walking with white backpacks is viral with the claim that they are Egyptian civilians crossing the border into the Gaza strip to provide water and food to the Palestinians stranded due to Israel's blockade.
BOOM found this clip to be false; the viral video predates the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, and was posted earlier on TikTok on August 31, 2023.
Islamist militant group Hamas launched one of the biggest military offensives against Israel on October 7, 2023, garnering retributive attack from Israeli forces, with ongoing bombardments on the Gaza strip, and a complete blockade of the area by Israel. So far, the conflict has claimed more than 1300 lives in Israel, and more than 1,799 Palestinians in Gaza, which primarily includes civilians.
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The viral clip is being shared on X (formerly Twitter) and Facebook with the caption, "These are civil Egyptians crossing the Palestinian border to deliver water and food stuffs to Palestine."
View posts on Facebook here, here and here. View such posts on X here, here and here.
Fact Check
Going through the responses to the posts with the viral video, we found several users contesting the claim that it shows Egyptian civilians crossing the border to help the Gazans stranded due to Israeli blockade.
Instead, they suggested that the video is old, and unrelated to the ongoing conflict.
A user on X also stated that the video shows smugglers crossing the border between Egypt and Libya.
Arabic fact-checker MISBAR also investigated the video, and found that it shows smugglers crossing the border between Egypt and Libya.
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BOOM did a reverse image search of some keyframes of the viral video, which led us to the same video being shared on TikTok on August 31, 2023, more than a month before Hamas' offensive against Israel on October 7.
The video was shared with the title, "Al Sallum Western Borders Egypt". Sallum is a harbour village in Egypt, 8km away from its Western border with Libya.
Using keyword search, Misbar also found the same video being shared on X with the claim that it was taken at the Libyan-Egyptian border, on September 7, 2023.
Their fact-check also included a video uploaded on YouTube shorts, showing people walking with similar backpacks. The caption of the video stated, "Smuggling at the borders of Egypt - Libya, Salloum."
BOOM could not independently verify the context behind the video. However, the video predates the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas by over a month, and is there not related to the current situation in Gaza.
Furthermore, according to recent reports, while Egypt has offered aid to those stranded in Gaza, it has refused to offer passage for them to exit
Additional reporting by Sujith A.
