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| - Fact Check: Old video of Syrian army executing civilians falsely linked to Israel-Hamas conflict
India Today found that the viral video shows the mass execution of civilians by the Syrian army in 2013.
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India Today Fact Check
This video shows Syrian army soldiers executing civilians in Syria in 2013.
A distressing video showing the execution of handcuffed men by individuals in military uniforms and the disposal of bodies in a pit filled with tires is being widely shared on social media. The video is claimed to show Israelis killing Palestinian prisoners of war.
One Facebook post containing the video read: "This is what the Zionist Israelis are doing to their Palestinian prisoners of war. Please make viral and let the world know.” An archived version of one of the posts can be seen here.
India Today found that the video in question is unrelated to Israel and the Israel-Hamas conflict; instead, it shows the Syrian army executing civilians in Syria.
Our Probe
Reverse-searching the keyframes of the video with relevant keywords, we found several news reports regarding the incident. A DW report dated April 26, 2022, noted that the video shows a massacre that occurred on April 16, 2013. The report detailed how the Assad regime's security forces shot ten innocent civilians in less than seven minutes. The executioners placed blindfolded civilians into a grave dug in an abandoned alley in the city and then shot them without hesitation.
In a detailed report, The Guardian stated that the incident took place in Tadaman, a suburb of the Syrian capital, Damascus. The mass execution was carried out by the Pro-Assad forces on April 16, 2013, However, it only came to light after a former soldier of the regime leaked the video to two academics from the University of Amsterdam’s Holocaust and Genocide Center.
The report identified the executioner as a Major in branch 227 of the Syrian military intelligence service, named Amjad Youssuf. The researchers spent years gathering information from families and witnesses on Facebook to identify and locate the perpetrators, with the aim of bringing them to justice.
Thus, it's clear that the viral video is not related to the Israel-Hamas conflict. It shows a 2013 incident in Syria.
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