A claim has been circulating on social media that a video of a man giving a speech about accepting Islam as his faith features legendary astronaut Neil Armstrong. Here is a fact-check about the claim.
Claim: The video shows Neil Armstrong speaking about his conversion to Islam.
Fact: The man in the video is not Neil Armstrong but a Czech national named Milan Shultz, who converted to Islam. According to a Washington Post article and his biography, Neil Armstrong never converted to Islam and even sent letters to embassies rejecting this claim. Hence, the claim made in the post is False.
Firstly, a quick keyword search on the internet led us to a 2018 article titled ‘The false, but persistent, rumor that Neil Armstrong converted to Islam’ by The Washington Post. This article states that the claim of Armstrong’s conversion is an old hoax and quotes Armstrong from his biography: “…So many people identify with the success of Apollo. The claim about my becoming a Muslim is just an extreme version of people inevitably telling me they know somebody whom I might know.” Armstrong also reportedly sent letters to embassies and consulates rejecting this claim (here and here). The same claim was even debunked earlier by BBC.
Next, we performed a keyword search on the internet, focusing on the video accompanying the viral posts. This search led us to the viral video posted on DailyMotion and YouTube (also here) 15 years ago and also on Facebook almost 13 years ago.
These sources identify the speaker as Milan Shultz, a Czech national. In a Facebook video, he is heard pronouncing his name, leaving no room for speculation about his identity. However, we could not find news reports from credible sources to know more about the person shown in the video.
To sum up, the video being shared falsely claims to show Neil Armstrong speaking about converting to Islam. The speaker is actually Milan Shultz, a Czech national.
