Is the video of Egyptians delivering water and food across the border to residents of the Gaza Strip true?

In mid-October 2023, a video circulated on social media showing people walking through the desert with loads on their backs. It is alleged that it is the Egyptians who deliver food across the border into the Gaza Strip. We decided to check if this is true.

A video of people walking through the desert appeared in the Russian-language segment of social networks on October 14. The fact that the author of the video captured the delivery of water and food to the Gaza Strip was written by many popular Telegram channels, including “Russia now» (312,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Uncle Slava"(245,000), "Truthfulness" (214,000) and "Putin on Telegram"(192,000).

October 7 Palestinian group Hamas attacked Israel: After a massive rocket attack on cities, militants invaded settlements near the border of the Gaza Strip. As a result of the attack died, according to the latest data, at least 1,400 people. In response, Israel began regular shelling of the northern part of the Gaza Strip, as well as completely blocked supplies of water, fuel and electricity to the Palestinian enclave under Hamas control. Following this, the Israeli authorities called on residents of the northern sector to evacuate, the UN statedthat evacuation will lead to an even greater humanitarian catastrophe. At the time of writing, the analysis of the authorities of the Gaza Strip reported about 2808 killed as a result of the bombings.

Against this background, a video circulated in which Egyptians allegedly bring food to residents of the Gaza Strip. Most posts say that the people depicted in the video are crossing the Egyptian-Palestinian border. The length of the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip is 14 km. In 2009, two years after coming to power in the Hamas sector, Egypt started construction walls on the border. The height of the fence is 7 m, on the Egyptian side there is a security zone adjacent to it, the only pedestrian crossing is the Rafah checkpoint.

There are no fortifications in the video, not even on the horizon, so we cannot talk about the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip.

Google reverse image search results in TikTok videos, posted online on August 13, 2023, that is, almost two months before the Hamas attack and Israeli response. The user user1368146280095, who published the video, accompanied it with the hashtag “Es-Saloum, Western border, Egypt and Libya.” The city of es-Saloum is located near the Mediterranean coast, and the border with Libya passes near it. This settlement is located approximately 1000 km from the Gaza Strip.

In the profile of the alleged author of the video there are several more similar videos where people with luggage sneaking through barbed wire or transporting cargo through the desert. Fact-checking project Misbar assumesthat these videos are of traders transporting their goods across the Egyptian-Libyan border, possibly smugglers.

Thus, the video itself appeared much earlier than the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in 2023, and it depicts the Egyptian border not with the Gaza Strip, but with Libya.

Cover photo: Screenshot “Verified” / social networks

Not true

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on topic:

1. Is it true that the video shows the consequences of the shelling of Gaza?
2. Is it true that there are such posters with Putin in the Gaza Strip?
3. Did the Israeli Defense Minister say that the country's authorities have abolished all rules of war?