An Old video of a music festival organised by Israelis in the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron is shared with misleading assertions - FACTLY
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
November 17, 2023
A video depicting a group of people holding a music festival is being shared claiming that Israelis held a music festival inside the historic Ibrahimi Mosque in the Palestinian city of Hebron after prohibiting Palestinians from entering and praying inside. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: The video shows Israelis holding a music festival inside the historic Ibrahimi Mosque in the Palestinian city of Hebron after prohibiting Palestinians from entering and praying inside.
Fact: This video has been in circulation since 2022 and is not a recent one. The Hebron/ Ibrahimi Mosque was divided between Muslims and Jews. After the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre in 1994, ten days every year, Muslims get to take over the Jewish side, and ten days every year, Jews get to take over the Muslim side. Hebron’s website mentions holiday opening and closing schedules for the cave every year and mentions that this is done in coordination between the Muslim Waqf and the Israeli government. Hence, the claim made in the post is MISLEADING.
On conducting a reverse image search using the keyframes from the video, we discovered two posts that share the same video with a common assertion on X (here and here). According to these posts, the video is from before the war and is being disseminated by disinformation agents. The post further suggests that the location in the video is the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron and that it is accessible to both Jews and non-Muslims for 10 days annually and this access is coordinated and planned in advance with the cooperation of the Waqf and the Palestinian Authority.
Taking a cue from these posts we conducted a relevant keyword search and found that this video has been in circulation since 2022 (here, here, and here). On subsequent research, we found that the Hebron/Ibrahimi Mosque is divided between Muslims and Jews. This division was implemented in 1994 after the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre. Ten days every year, Muslims get to take over the Jewish side, and ten days every year, Jews get to take over the Muslim side in order to prevent further tensions and conflicts between the two communities.
Further, we found Hebron website mentioning holiday opening and closing schedules for the cave (here and here). This arrangement is coordinated between the Muslim Waqf and the Israeli government with collaboration among the IDF, Waqf, and emergency services from both sides of the city. The website also features images from a music festival previously held in the Ibrahimi Mosque that closely resembles the visuals in the viral video.
To sum up, an old video of a music festival organised by Israelis in the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron is shared with misleading assertions.