Fact-Check: Picture showing Infants killed during chemical attack in Syria, goes viral as Infants killed in Israeli airstrikes in Gaza.

The ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas has claimed the lives of thousands. Meanwhile, a picture of infants wrapped in cerement is going viral on social media with the claim that infants shown in the picture, have been killed during Israeli airstrikes in Gaza.

Claim made by Users

Sharing a picture on X(Twitter), a verified user named Miss.H wrote: “CHILD GENOCIDE IN GAZA Israeli forces killed almost 700 children in Gaza in just one week and the world is silent!”

Claim made by other users

Several users shared this picture making similar claims.

Fact-Check

To verify the authenticity of the viral picture, the DFRAC team conducted a reverse image search and found a similar picture on the image site Alamy where it was told that the infants shown in the image were killed in the poisonous gas attack carried out by pro-government forces in Eastern Ghouta on the outskirts of Damascus in Syria in 21/08/2013.

Upon further investigation, we discovered a report published by Human Rights Watch, stating that a large number of infants had been killed during the chemical attack in Eastern Ghouta on the morning of August 21, 2023.

Conclusion

It is clear from DFRAC’s Fact-Check that the viral picture is misleading as the picture captures infants killed in the chemical attack at Eastern Ghouta, Syria in the year 2013, not those who have been killed during the ongoing Palestine conflict.