By Archis Chowdhury
An old video of Saudi Arabian prince Turki bin Faisal Al Saud denouncing Israel for the dispossession of Palestinians of their lands has been revived in the wake of the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas.
BOOM found that the video is from 2020, and shows Al Saud speaking at the IISS Manama Dialogue event, that took place in Bahrain's capital Manama between December 4-6, 2020.
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 1,400 lives in Israel, and more than 4,137 Palestinians in Gaza.
Also Read:Unrelated Video Of Pilgrims Sleeping In The Open Falsely Shared As Gaza
A user shared the video - which had the text "Saudi Prince Slams Israel" on Instagram on October 16, 2023, with the caption, "#freepalestine🇵🇸❤️." (Click here to view an archive)
In the video, Al Saud can be heard saying, "From the time of the Balfour Declaration, they have forcibly evicted the inhabitants of Palestine after the 1948 war as attested to by Israeli historians. They burned the villages of the Palestinians to the ground."
We also found the same video going viral on Facebook, which can be viewed here and here.
Fact Check
BOOM noticed that the video had the text "IISS" written in the background, along with "IISS Manama Dialogue" written on the podium from where Al Saud was speaking.
Taking cue from this, we did a keyword search with "saudi prince iiss manama dialogue speech", which led us to a YouTube video uploaded by the channel The International Institute for Strategic Studies on December 6, 2020.
The video was a recording of the final day of the IISS Manama Dialogue, an annual event held by The International Institute for Strategic Studies in Bahrain's capital Manama, in 2020.
At the 2:45 mark into the YouTube video we found the portion of the recording which was shared in Instagram, where Al Saud can be heard making the exact same statement about Israel.
Al Saud's speech has also been covered by various news outlets, including the Financial Times, which added the headline, "Senior Saudi royal launches tirade against Israel."
The video is therefore old, and is being misleading revived in the wake of the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas.
