Old Video Showing Car Ramming Into Protesters Falsely Linked to Israel-Hamas War

This video is from September and shows Judicial Overhaul protestors getting hit by a car in Tel Aviv, Israel.

Fact-Check: Old, unrelated protest video from Israel falsely linked to the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas. 

(Source: Altered by The Quint) 

Amid the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas, a video showing a car running over some people who can be seen carrying the Israeli flag is being shared on social media.

What are the users saying?: Those sharing have claimed that the video shows Israeli 'settler' running over Israeli protestors and causing injuries.

An archive of the post can be found here. 

(Source: X/Screenshot) 

This post recorded over 20,000 views at the time of writing this story.

(Archives of similar claims can be found here, here and here.)

Is it true?: The claim is false. This video is from September and shows a car running over a group of protestors protesting against the judicial overhaul reforms in Israel.

• The protestors had blocked the Ayalon highway in Tel Aviv at the time of the accident.

• During the investigation, the men in the car claimed that they did not intend to hurt the protestors.

How did we find out?: At first, we translated the text on the video, written in Hebrew to English. It loosely translated to, "The blockade in Ayalon: a car ran over protesters, clashes on the spot."

• Taking a cue from this, we ran a relevant keyword search in Hebrew and came across a thread on X (formerly Twitter) by the Hebrew-language media channel, Kann News, from 10 September.

• The thread included a longer version of the viral video.

• We compared the frames of the two videos and found similarities.

Here are a few similarities between the two. 

(Source: Altered by The Quint) 

• Using Google Translate, we translated the captions from Hebrew to English. It mentioned that the accident took place at the Ayalon highway in Tel Aviv.

• One of the posts in the thread mentioned that the two men - a father and a son - were driving the car.

• During the investigation they claimed that the son, who was driving at the time became "stressed" when he saw the protestors.

• The two decided to swap positions; however, during the exchange, the father unknowingly pressed the gas. It was an issue as the vehicle's handbrake was not raised.

• Further, we found a news report by the Times of Israel from 10 September.

• The report mentioned that a car rammed into a group of protestors who were demonstrating against the judicial overhaul reforms in Israel.

• Among the injured was a 25-year-old woman who required medical assistance for a leg injury.

• The report also included Kann News's post on X.

What are the Judicial Overhaul Reforms?: The Israeli government passed a 'reasonableness bill' in July that takes away the power of the Supreme Court and other courts in the country to overturn a government decision that seems 'unreasonable'.

• The protesters have called for the reforms to be rolled back and demand the resignation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

• The proposal for the reform of the judiciary was put forward earlier this year. Since then, those who are against the legislation have been engaging in ongoing protests.

Conclusion: It is clear that the claim is false. The car rammed into a group of protestors against the Israeli government's reasonableness bill. It is unrelated to the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas.

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