Fact-Check: Clip of 2013 Syrian Massacre Falsely Linked to Israel-Hamas Conflict

The video was shot in April 2013 and shows the Tadamon massacre in Damascus, Syria.

(Trigger Warning: Due to the violent nature of the incident, the description of it might be triggering for some users. Discretion is advised.)

A video showing armed military personnel throwing people into a mass grave and executing them has gone viral on social media amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.

The claim: It is being shared to claim that it shows Israeli military committing war crimes in Gaza, "doing exactly what Hitler did to them."

(Note: Due to the graphic nature of the video we have refrained from using any archived links.)

The Quint received a query for this video's verification on its WhatsApp tipline.

Is it true?: No. The video dates back to 2013 and shows Syrian military personnel committing a massacre in Tadamon in Syria's capital city, Damascus.

How we found out: Using relevant keywords, we found a clearer version of the video.

• We divided it into keyframes using InVID, a video verification tool, and ran reverse image searches on some of them.

• The results led us to an article by The Guardian, which was published on 27 April 2022, and mentioned a massacre in Tadamon, a neighbourhood in Damascus, Syria.

• The article carried the viral video and screenshots of the viral video, stating that it was shot on 16 April 2013.

• According to this report, at least 41 civilians were killed and dumped in a mass grave, which Syrian military personnel set on fire later, covering up their war crimes.

We came across another report by New Lines Magazine, which mentioned the same details and carried a couple of screenshots from the video.

• This article was written by researchers Annsar Shahhoud and Uğur Ümit Üngör, who observed many videos of violence and killings in 2019 and reported on them in 2022, after authenticating the videos and survivor accounts.

• Nearly 300 people had been massacred in this neighbourhood, by soldiers belonging to branch 227 to Syria's Military Intelligence Directorate, it added.

• The Quint has previously debunked this video twice, when it was being shared as one of a recent incident in 2022, and when it was being falsely linked to earthquakes in Turkey in March 2023.

Conclusion: A 2013 video showing a massacre in the Tadamon neighbourhood in Damascus, Syria, is being falsely linked to the Israel-Hamas war.

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