Clip From Iranian TV Series Falsely Shared as ‘Muslim Man Abusing Minor'

The video shows a scene from a 2004 Iranian TV series called 'Zahra's Blue Eyes'.

The viral communal claim is false. This video is taken from a 2004 TV series.

(Source: X/Altered by The Quint)

A video of an old man and young girl, getting out from a secluded, grassy area, has gone viral on social media.

What are users saying?: Those sharing the clip claim that it shows an 86-year-old man, Muhammad Moinuddin (or Moin Al-Din), who was caught sexually assaulting a seven-year-old girl in a field.

• They also go on to criticise the religion of Islam, calling this behaviour "Islamic culture."

An archive of this post can be seen here.

(Source: X/Screenshot)

(Archives of more posts sharing this claim can be seen here and here.)

Is it true?: No, the clip is taken from a 2004 Iranian television series called Zahra's Blue Eyes, and shows Zahra (the young girl), fleeing from the authorities with her grandfather Rahman (the old man).

How did we find out the truth?: Under one of the viral claims, we came across a post which shared a video, calling out the claim for spreading misinformation.

• The post stated that the scene was taken from "a MOVIE from 2004 called zehra's eyes (sic)," which depicted how Palestinian children were exploited by Israeli soldiers and authorities.

• Taking a cue from this, we looked for more details related to the "movie", which turned out to be a television series called Zahra's Blue Eyes, accordint to a website called The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).

• By using the show's name as keywords on YouTube, we came across a long video uploaded by a verified channel called 'Network Movie', which was a compilation of all of the show's episodes.

• Its description mentioned that the show, which aired in 2004-05, was about an Israeli commander, Isaac Owen, looking for eyes for his blind child.

• It added that in the show, Owen sends out a medical delegation to a Palestinian refugee camp to find a new set of eyes, when doctors find a girl named Zehra and "admire" her eyes.

• The show revolves around Owen tracking down and forcefully procuring Zehra's eyes for transplantation.

• Around the 2:33:04 mark into this video, we saw that the visuals matched the clip in the viral claim.

The scene shows Zehra and her grandfather fleeing from Owen's men.

(Source: X/YouTube/Altered by The Quint)

• In this part of the show, Zehra and her grandfather, Rahman, are seen fleeing from Israeli officers who are trying to track Zehra down to harvest her eyes.

• While fleeing, the two try to get some rest in a field at night, and wake up to run further away from the authorities in the morning.

Conclusion: A scene from an Iranian TV show about a girl and her grandfather fleeing from Israeli authorities has been shared to falsely claim that it shows a Muslim man sexually assaulting a minor.

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