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| - Fact Check: Staged photo of a person stuck under debris FALSELY linked to Gaza violence
The viral photo was shot by Olivier Le Queinec, a US-based stock photographer.
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India Today Fact Check
This is a staged photograph that’s more than a decade old. It has no links to the current situation in Gaza.
The International Court of Justice on January 26 ordered Israel to do all it could to prevent acts of genocide in Gaza, while not ordering an end to the military offensive. “The court is acutely aware of the extent of the human tragedy that is unfolding in the region and is deeply concerned about the continuing loss of life and human suffering,” court President Joan Donoghue said as the death toll in Gaza surpassed 26,000.
Amid this, a photo of a hand sticking out of the rubble was shared by many on social media. Those sharing it linked the visual to the Gaza Strip with hashtags such as “Gaza stained with blood”.
India Today Fact Check found that it was a staged photograph with no links to the ongoing situation in Gaza.
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With the help of a reverse search, we found the viral picture on several stock image websites like Dreamstime and Shutterstock. According to the description, this was a staged photo showing a dead man’s hand sticking out of demolished concrete rubble debris after a catastrophic earthquake.
Apart from the viral picture, we found other similar photos taken from different angles of the same hand on these stock image websites, reiterating that the photo was staged. These photos were credited to Olivier Le Queinec, a stock photographer based in Maine in the US.
We then found the viral photo shared on the website of Olivier, uploaded in the category of “Earthquake photographs”. The site noted that this was a staged photograph. It is noteworthy that the photo was shared on the website back on April 27, 2012. Other than that, a similar black-and-white photograph of the hand was also available for sale.
Thus, it is clear that a staged photograph was falsely linked to Gaza.
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