The brawl between the Israel police and Christians in Jerusalem is falsely linked with the ongoing Israel-Hamas war
Claim
BREAKING: The Israeli Police Are Beating And Arresting Christians At A Church In Jerusalem #IsraelAttack #Israel
Rating
Explanation
Amidst the ongoing war between the Israel and Hamas in Gaza there are lots of videos surfacing on the internet connecting the incident. The conflict started on 7 October 2023.
The Israeli police attack churchgoers in #Jerusalem and assault Christians by beating, dragging, and arresting them.
Israel, the humanitarian and tolerant nation defended by Western media and its political leadership pic.twitter.com/ogDi4qEHEm— Ahmad M. Yassine | أحمد م. ياسين (@Lobnene_Blog) October 24, 2023
Here this 31-second viral video shows some police beating and dragging people in a small crowd. Also, we noticed that the incident was taking place in an alley. Some people even try to stop the brawl but it seems unstoppable. This same post has been shared by many social media users recently and can be seen here, here, and here. Come, let’s verify the veracity of this viral claim.
What’s the truth?
When we started our research with the keyframes of the viral video, we found a similar video dated back to the month of April this year. This video was uploaded by the YouTube channel ‘TRT World’ a Turkish public broadcast service on 16 April 2023. The video was titled as ‘Israeli forces attack Christians ahead of Holy Fire Ceremony.’ In the description box of the video, it says, ‘Israeli security forces attacked Orthodox Christians who wanted to attend the Holy Fire ceremony at the Church of Holy Sepulchre in occupied East Jerusalem.’
This clearly proves that the video is old and has no connection to the ongoing conflicts between Israel and Hamas. Also, this video’s description clearly mentions that the Israeli police beating and dragging of the orthodox Christians is to stop them from attending the Holy fire Ceremony in east Jerusalem.
When we advanced our research, we found an article dated on 15 April 2023, published by ‘Haaretz.com’ titled as ‘Israeli Police Violently Beat Several Holy Fire Worshippers Trying to Defy Capacity Limits.’
According to the article, “Tens of thousands of Christians took part in the Holy Fire ceremony on Saturday, an annual Orthodox Christian ceremony held in Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre, amid tension between police and Christian worshipers over Israel’s decision to place limits on the number of participants for the third year in a row. Thousands of clergy, police, diplomats and pilgrims huddled inside the church, while thousands more huddles in the surrounding alleys, where police clashed and in some cases violently beat worshipers trying to make their way through their barricades.”
The article was seen carrying the same viral video shared by a X user namely ‘Anadolu English’ on 15 April 2023.
When we saw the video on the X account we got another link and searched further and found one more article related to the same incident published on 15 April 2023.
The reports from ‘AA.Com’ titled as “Israeli police restrict Christian participation in Holy Fire ritual in Jerusalem’ also documents the same incident happened during the Holy fire ceremony.
This solidifies the truth that the brawl between the Israel police doesn’t have any connection to the war in Gaza now.
Nowadays, there are many such videos circulated on the internet linking it with the current war situation using the hashtags with Palestine, Gaza, war, and Israel. This creates unnecessary communal tension across the globe.
Knowingly or unknowingly, this kind of videos contribute more confusion and panic among the general public. So, we request our readers to be more vigilant and double-check facts and sources before forwarding any such videos and be more responsible.
Conclusion:
Therefore we conclude with the available evidence that the video is old and has no connection to the current war between Israel and Hamas.
