Old protest clip filmed in Pakistan-held Kashmir, not India
"The video is said to be from Jammu and Kashmir," reads the Hindi-language caption to the video filmed from a serpentine mountain road.
"After ceasefire, as CRPF and CISF troops were returning from borders, Muslim traitors attacked their convoy with stones," adds the May 26, 2025 Facebook post, using the acronyms for paramilitary organisations functioning under India's Home Ministry (archived link).
"In response, the forces opened fire. Chaos ensued, in which nine stone pelters slipped and died. The army recorded the entire incident via drone. Several security vehicles were damaged."
Similar posts also rocketed on X and Threads following the worst fighting between India and Pakistan in decades that brought the nuclear-armed rivals to the brink of war.
The crisis was triggered by an attack on tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir that New Delhi accuses it neighbour of supporting. Islamabad denies the charge.
More than 70 people on both sides died in the four-day military confrontation that ensued, which ended with an unexpected ceasefire on May 10 (archived link).
AFP found no official reports the incident described in the false posts occurred following the crisis, and the circulating video has been misrepresented.
A reverse image search of keyframes found a longer version published on Facebook on May 15, 2024 (archived link).
"Kashmiris Pelting Stones At The Convoy Of Pakistani Security Forces In Pakistan Occupied Kashmir," reads its caption.
An AFP journalist watched the video and was able to identify the mountain pass as Lohar Gali in Pakistan-administered Kashmir's Muzaffarabad region.
Corresponding visuals on Google Maps confirm the location (archived link).
Pakistani news outlets Dawn and Geo News Urdu embedded similar visuals in reports about the incident (archived here and here).
According to Dawn newspaper, at least three civilians were killed and several others injured after a paramilitary force operating under the Pakistan Army opened fire at people protesting against rising prices of wheat-flour and inflated electricity bills (archived link).
AFP has debunked the barrage of misinformation around the recent South Asia crisis here.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Opinion - Progressives push anti-Israel activism, are surprised by antisemitic violence that follows
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) is running for cover. After the horrific attack on Jews in Boulder, Colo., the Minnesota representative issued the kind of bland statement meant to deflect blame, posting this on X: 'I'm holding the victims and families in Boulder, Colorado in my heart. Violence against anyone is never acceptable. We must reject hatred and harm in all its forms.' As some noted, it took nearly 24 hours for Omar to issue even that statement, which notably failed to mention that the victims were Jews and the suspect is an Egyptian Muslim who attacked them while shouting 'Free Palestine.' A video has now surfaced in which the accused assailant ranted about his faith, saying 'Allahu Akbar.' After he firebombed a group of Jews, he told investigators he wanted to 'kill all Zionist people.' One of the victims, an 88-year-old Holocaust survivor, asked NBC News, 'What the hell is going on in our country?' It's a question everyone should be asking. Here's part of the answer: It is a very easy hop from college students intimidating Jewish students and chanting about Intifada and a Muslim man trying to murder Jews. It is similarly but a short leap from Omar, who applauded anti-Israel student protesters at Columbia University for being 'brave and patriotic,' voted against an antisemitism resolution in the U.S. House and suggested to aggrieved people acting out of anger that some Jewish students are just 'pro-genocide.' It is also easy to connect student demonstrations with terrorism. For the first time, a protester at Columbia University — an outsider arrested for hate crimes against Jews — has been linked to Hamas. He won't be the last. In recent months we have witnessed not only the hideous attempt to burn Jews alive in Boulder, but also the firebombing of Jewish Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro's home and the cold-blooded murder of two young Jewish people at the Jewish Capital Museum in Washington. All three suspects expressed anti-Israel sentiments, with the alleged perpetrator of the latter killings shouting 'free, free Palestine' after he shot the victims 21 times. The Anti-Defamation League reports that 2024 saw a record number of antisemitic attacks, up 344 percent over the past five years. This is intolerable. Radicalized students at some of our top schools are part of the problem. Recently, MIT's graduation was marred by a student speaker, Megha Vemuri, who donned the politically symbolic keffiyeh and told the commencement audience, 'We are watching Israel try to wipe out Palestine off the face of the earth, and it is a shame that MIT is a part of it.' She also accused MIT of complicity 'in the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people.' Writing in the Times of Israel, one alum panned the speech as a 'trite, TikTok-depth graduation speech on a tragic issue of devastating complexity'; she condemned the administration for not informing the audience of myriad programs funded by MIT that improves the lives and futures of Palestinians. MIT's president, Sally Kornbluth, did not defend the university or refute Vemuri's incendiary language; instead, she stepped to the podium and said, 'At MIT, we believe in freedom of expression. But today is about the graduates.' Not, apparently, about the Jewish graduates. A Jew graduating with a Ph.D in cryptography posted on X: 'I finally got my PhD from @MIT, with my 5-year-old twins, my 2-year-old and my parents (children of Holocaust survivors) traveling halfway around the world just to be there. Instead, MIT's student commencement speaker decided it was appropriate to use the moment for hate-filled rhetoric against Israelis and Jews … too many in the crowd erupted with cheers and anger. My kids might not have understood every word, but they felt the fear and hostility. … How could @MIT let this happen? How, indeed. It is not only schools that are allowing anti-Jewish and anti-Israel hatred to spiral out of control; because the fever is being staunchly condemned by the Trump White House, the media has gone mushy. After the Boulder incident, USA Today ran a sob-sister piece about the offspring of the Egyptian man who tried to burn Jews alive with the headline: 'Boulder suspect's daughter dreamed of studying medicine. Now she faces deportation.' After receiving massive blowback, USA Today quietly revised the offensive piece. Increasingly, it is progressives like Omar who are responsible for surging antisemitism. Apologists claim that supporting Palestine and opposing Israel do not constitute antisemitism. Perhaps they would not in in isolation, but the protesters have taken pains to muddy the waters as much as possible. As the New York Times recently noted, 'the sprawling protest movement against the war in Gaza has scrambled efforts to distinguish opposition to the actions of the Israeli government, or even to the state of Israel itself, from hostility to Jews. Critics of the protesters have argued that slogans like 'globalize the Intifada' are thinly veiled calls for violence in any Jewish space.' A rabbi in Boulder was quoted by the Times writing, 'Jews in America have mostly felt the threats of antisemitism from the far right in the form of White Supremacy, yet now many of us have experienced hatred, bigotry and intolerance from progressives, those who many of us have considered friends and allies.' In City Journal, Charles Fain Lehman writes, 'The American radical anti-Israel movement has built the intellectual scaffolding for—and in many cases all but invited—the violence now playing out in places like Boulder. When you call for 'Intifada,' you cannot feign surprise when someone takes that call literally. Whatever your legal right to speak, that is the outcome you invoked.' Lehman is correct: The Intifada is here and must be confronted. Our government must protect free speech criticizing Israel or supporting Palestine, but it must also deploy all resources to punish acts of violence — including on college campuses — before more people get hurt. If it were blacks or Asians under attack, we would not have to defend efforts to stave off hate crimes. Jews should be afforded the same protections. Liz Peek is a former partner of major bracket Wall Street firm Wertheim and Company. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
'No Eid' for West Bank Palestinians who lost sons in Israeli raids
Abeer Ghazzawi had little time to visit her two sons' graves for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha before Israeli soldiers cleared the cemetery near the refugee camp in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin. The Israeli army has conducted a months-long operation in the camp which has forced Ghazzawi, along with thousands of other residents, from her home. For Ghazzawi, the few precious minutes she spent at her sons' graves still felt like a small victory. "On the last Eid (Eid al-Fitr, celebrating the end of Ramadan in March), they raided us. They even shot at us. But this Eid, there was no shooting, just that they kicked us out of the cemetery twice", the 48-year-old told AFP. "We were able to visit our land, clean up around the graves, and pour rosewater and cologne on them", she added. Eid al-Adha, which begins on Friday, is one of the biggest holidays in the Muslim calendar. According to Muslim tradition, it commemorates the sacrifice Ibrahim (known to Christians and Jews as Abraham) was about to make by killing his son, before the angel Gabriel intervened and offered him a sheep to sacrifice instead. As part of the celebrations, families traditionally visit the graves of their loved ones. In the Jenin camp cemetery, women and men had brought flowers for their deceased relatives, and many sat on the side of their loved ones' graves as they remembered the dead, clearing away weeds and dust. An armoured car arrived at the site shortly after, unloading soldiers to clear the cemetery of its mourners who walked away solemnly without protest. Ghazzawi's two sons, Mohammad and Basel, were killed in January 2024 in a Jenin hospital by undercover Israeli troops. The Palestinian Islamic Jihad militant group claimed the two brothers as its fighters after their deaths. Like Ghazzawi, many in Jenin mourned sons killed during one of the numerous Israeli operations that have targeted the city, a known bastion of Palestinian armed groups fighting Israel. -'There is no Eid'- In the current months-long military operation in the north of the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, Israeli forces looking for militants have cleared three refugee camps and deployed tanks in Jenin. Mohammad Abu Hjab, 51, went to the cemetery on the other side of the city to visit the grave of his son, killed in January by an Israeli strike that also killed five other people. "There is no Eid. I lost my son -- how can it be Eid for me?" he asked as he stood by the six small gravestones of the dead young men. The Israeli military did not offer details at the time but said it had carried out "an attack in the Jenin area". "There's no accountability, no oversight", lamented Abu Hjab. "One of the victims (of the strike) was just a kid, born in 2008 -— so he was only 16 years old." "I still have three other children. I live 24 hours a day with no peace of mind", he added, referring to the army's continued presence in Jenin. All around him, families sat or stood around graves at Jenin's eastern neighbourhood cemetery, which they visited after the early morning Eid prayer at the city's nearby Great Mosque. The mosque's imam led a prayer at the cemetery for those killed in Gaza and for the community's dead, particularly those killed by the Israeli army. Hamam al-Sadi, 31, told AFP he has visited the cemetery at every religious holiday since his brother was killed in a strike, to "just sit with him." -'Our only hope'- Several graves marked "martyr" -- a term broadly applied to Palestinian civilians and militants killed by Israel -- were decorated with photos of young men holding weapons. Mohammad Hazhouzi, 61, lost a son during a military raid in November 2024. He has also been unemployed since Israel stopped giving work permits to West Bank residents after the Gaza war erupted. Despite the army's continued presence in Jenin, Hazhouzi harboured hope. "They've been there for months. But every occupation eventually comes to an end, no matter how long it lasts". "God willing, we will achieve our goal of establishing our Palestinian state. That's our only hope," he said. "Be optimistic, and good things will come". vid-lsb-lba/acc/dcp
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Man charged with murder of woman, 26, in Croydon
A man has been charged with murder over the fatal stabbing of a 26-year-old woman in south London. Simon Hinsta Ghebremedhin, 33, of Streatham in south London is due to appear at Thames Magistrates' Court on Saturday, the Metropolitan Police said. Marjama Osman was declared dead at the scene from a single stab wound on Frith Road, Croydon just after 09:00 BST on Saturday. Her family have been told and are being supported by specialist officers, the force added. Mr Ghebremedhin has also been charged with possession of a class B drug. A 32-year-old man arrested on suspicion of murder has been released on bail. Listen to the best of BBC Radio London on Sounds and follow BBC London on Facebook, X and Instagram. Send your story ideas to Metropolitan Police
