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| - Fact Check: This isn't a 'Hamas tunnel' in Gaza, it's a World War bunker in UK
India Today found that this video is neither recent nor from Gaza. Instead, it shows a military bunker which was built in London during the Second World War.
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India Today Fact Check
This video shows a tunnel in London that was built during the Second World War.
A video of a man holding a flashlight allegedly traversing a Hamas tunnel is being widely shared on social media. The archived version of such posts can be seen here and here.
An X user posted this video with the caption, “Part of a 7 min. clip of Hamas' tunnel system. Most would find it easy to get lost in. They placed these under schools, hospitals, daycares, civilisation's homes and wherever.”
India Today found that this video is neither recent nor from Gaza. Instead, it shows a military bunker which was built in London during the Second World War.
DIGGING INTO FACTS
In the viral clip, we noticed the watermark of a TikTok account “@urbexkev”.
Accessing TikTok through the Tor browser, we found that the viral video was shared on October 31 with hashtags like bunker”, “ww2”, and “underground”.
On November 8, @urbexkev shared another video of a similar location, calling it a “WW2 HQ Bunker”. Getting a clue from here, we ran a keyword search which led to a video on a YouTube channel named “TheSecretVault”. In this video, people can be seen going inside a similar-looking tunnel.
The exact name of the tunnel or its location wasn’t revealed in this video. However, its description contained the link to an article on the website “Beyond the Point”. Per this article, the tunnel in the video was the Reigate army bunker, a secret bunker located in Reigate, a town in England’s Surrey county. It was reportedly built during the Second World War. The article contained several photos of the bunker, all of which bear a striking resemblance to the viral video.
LOCATING THE BUNKER ON GOOGLE MAPS
At the beginning of the video posted on the “TheSecretVault” YouTube channel, one can see a wooden door, a brown building surrounded by a green fence and another brown building with “SES Water Tower” written on it. The building adjacent to it had the “The National Trust” written on a plaque outside it. A tall tower could also be seen. We found all of this on Google Street View.
As the people in the video moved further past “The National Trust” building, they jumped over a small wooden gate and headed further into a forest area. Street View is not available for that area. However, it can be said with certainty that the Reigate army bunker is located in this vicinity.
Others too have shared videos of their visit to the Reigate army bunker on YouTube. Some of these videos can be seen here, here, and here.
HUNDREDS OF TUNNELS BUILT IN THE UK DURING WWII
According to a report published in the Daily Mail, more than 600 secret bunkers were built in the UK during the Second World War. These bunkers served as military bases for soldiers and were furnished with basic facilities like wooden bunk beds, basic cooking equipment, and chemical toilets. A vast majority of these bunkers have now been identified but the locations of many others are still unknown.
So, while many reports suggest that Hamas has built a labyrinth of tunnels in Gaza, and Israel has claimed to have found some of them, it’s nevertheless clear that the viral video does not show one.
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