FACT CHECK: VIRAL CLAIMS ABOUT VIOLENCE IN SYRIA

Fri 14 March 2025: S

Brutal videos and images about violence against minorities in Syria are circulating online. Some are true; many are false. A DW fact check.

Warning: This fact check examines images and videos that depict armed violence and murder.

Syria is experiencing one of the deadliest episodes in its 14-year conflict. According to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, at least 973 civilians were killed in more than 20 locations across the Latakia, Tartus and Hama governorates in recent days. The Observatory noted that most of the civilians killed were from the country’s Alawite religious minority.

The violence erupted after loyalists of ousted dictator Bashar Assad ambushed a Syrian security patrol last week. This led to intense clashes and a series of revenge killings targeting Assad’s Alawite sect. But civilians from other groups were also reportedly killed.

In breaking news situations like this one, which is also very emotional, many videos and images are being spread online. While some are showing the current atrocities in Syria, many are fake or spread without, or in the wrong, context. DW’s Fact Check team looked at some viral claims.

Image showing Christians being crucified?

This cruel video is not related to the current attacks in SyriaImage: X

Claim: “Islamist jihadists are crucifying Christians in Syria while the Vatican and certain cardinals celebrate Ramadan,” a viral post on X says, adding a photo that shows that alleged scene. Several posts and online articles repeat that claim.

DW Fact check: False

The photo is a screenshot from an old video, and it’s unrelated to the current events in Syria. In the video, you can see how the person behind the man on the cross shoots at his head. We haven’t added the link here because it’s too graphic and cruel to watch. A quick reverse image search shows that the video dates back to at least 2017. We weren’t able to verify where exactly these cruel scenes took place.

Coming back to the current events in Syria, on social media it’s widely spread that Christians have been a main target in the last attacks of the HTS rebels. But there’s no proof for that. On the contrary: Christian leaders released a joint statement (archived here) on March 8th on Facebook strongly condemning the acts of violence against innocent civilians but not mentioning at all that Christians have been the main target of the attacks.

Another statement from the Catholic Church in Latakia says that it’s not true that Latakia’s churches are opening their halls to Syrian families and civilians. “This news is not true because the current situation in Latakia city does not require taking such measures,” it says in the statement. Even according to local news reports Christians are not the main target of the current attacks. Both local and international reports conclude that the Alawites have been the main targets of the recent attacks.

Video does not show a beheaded man

Claim: One video (archived here) allegedly shows a man who was beheaded by rebels from the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, who toppled Assad in December. In the background, you can hear women and children crying.

DW Fact check: Fake

This man is not beheaded. In a later section of the original video (screenshot on the right side) you can clearly see the head of the person. Image: X / youtube

The video was posted on several accounts across several social media platforms. A reverse image search shows that it’s not related to the current events in Syria — and it does not show an executed person. Also, the audio has been manipulated.

Via a reverse image search, we found the original version of the video on YouTube, dating back to at least 2022. In the original video, we see a man who is alive during a dance performance while hiding his head under his body. Later in the video, you can even see his head.

Also, in the original video, music is heard in the background, hinting at a performance and fun event. The video on X is fabricated and is not connected with the current conflict in Syria.

Many civilians died in recent clashes in Syria — but false rumors about deaths have also been spread online Image: X

Many people falsely claimed as victims

Claim: In a viral post (archived here), it says @Reemmnzer was an Alawite female citizen who was killed on the coast of Syria and that she had been posting on her account minutes before she was killed, adding that “these massacres against the girls of the coast must stop immediately.”

DW Fact check: False

This woman was not killed, as she revealed on X in a post herself. She makes fun of the false claim, saying “May God have mercy on me. We belong to God, and to Him we shall return.”

الله يرحمني ان لله وان اليه راجعون https://t.co/RCBXWz4TVa

— Réem_almnzer (@Reemmnzer) March 9, 2025

But this is not the only fake death related to the current events in Syria that has been announced online. Many were shared similarly, with users posting a photo of a person with a black mourning band.

One such supposed victim was Sahar Boutros — but she’s alive, and lives in the US state of Nevada. On her X account, she has condemned the use of her image in the ongoing conflict in Syria. She stated that US law prohibits the falsification and fabrication of inaccurate information about individuals, as well as the unauthorized use of her image.

Many social media posts also claimed that a young girl named Dahab Munir Allou had been killed in Syria. But a reverse image search reveals that the photo was taken from the internet where it had been shared by several online platforms . There is also no news indicating the killing of a Syrian girl by this name.

This video is not related to the current conflicts in Syria Image: X

A return to barrel bombs?

Claim: Some accounts on social media, including Facebook, have posted a video (archived here) purportedly of barrel bombing in Syria by the current regime forces. One such post reads: “Yesterday, the Syrian opposition was screaming that Bashar is hitting them with barrel bombs.”

DW Fact check: False

The video is from November 2024 and was filmed in the Qusaya area in the Bekaa Valley region, in one of Israel’s raids on Lebanon during battles between the IDF and Lebanese Hezbollah, just a day before the implementation of the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah.

Several accounts have reposted the video and deliberately misrepresented it as a newly recorded video in Syria.

No naked women paraded among dead

Claim: Social media accounts on X and TikTok posted a video (archived here) claiming “1,000 Killed, among them Naked Women Paraded,’ and Street Executions — Syria Plunges Into 48 Hours of Brutal Violence.” The video itself shows people covered in blankets sitting on the ground during the night. In the background, the voice of a man speaking in Arabic can be heard. He is talking about some people who were taken into custody mostly from the fallen regime of Assad.

DW Fact check: False

With a reverse image search, we found several videos showing the same setting. These are related to the repatriation of 1905 Syrian soldiers from Iraq who sought refuge the day before the fall of Bashar Assad’s regime on December 7 and entered Iraq. This video was published on December 20, 2024, by Anadolu English a Turkish news agency and was filmed in the eastern Syrian city Deir ez-Zur at the Al-Bukamal border crossing with Iraq.

The video does not show any “naked women“ or dead people at all. Through a keyword search, we found a video on the Turkish News Agency‘s Facebook page (archived here) where Syrian soldiers were seen wrapped in similar blankets.

Anna Schild and Daniel Ebertz contributed to this fact check.

Edited by: Rachel Baig

This article is republished from DW. Read the original article.