In July 2025, a video of a burning mosque went viral. It was alleged that the video was filmed in Barcelona, and the temple was set on fire by local residents in response to an attack by migrants from North Africa on a Spanish pensioner. We checked whether these shots are true.
Telegram channels began distributing the video on July 15. Channel "Release the KrakenZ!” (65,000 views at the time of writing this analysis) noted: “Officially, the “causes of the fire are being investigated,” although it’s a no brainer that this happened after an incident with Moroccan migrants beating a 70-year-old man, which led to powerful clashes with stabbings between locals and illegal immigrants.” Similar posts were published in the channels “Migrants - everything is as it is"(83,000 views), "Russian sword"(66,000), "Sledgehammer 18+"(53,000), etc., videos were also published by users X, Facebook, Rutube And LiveJournal.
On July 12, in the Spanish city of Torre Pacheco, a group of young people beat up A 68-year-old pensioner, allegedly for the sake of recording a video challenge. The victim reported that the attackers were from North Africa. News of the incident quickly spread across social networks, and far-right activists called to “hunt” migrants and residents of North African origin. Subsequently crisis poured out into street clashes in a city where, of the 35,000 inhabitants, approximately third - foreigners.
On the same day, July 12, in the Catalan town of Piera happened fire in the building of a mosque under construction. At the time of writing this analysis, the official cause of the fire was not named, however, as emphasized Internal Affairs Advisor to the Catalan Government Nuria Parlon, the available evidence pointed to deliberate arson.
Social media users connected these two events, claiming, that the fire (which, according to them words, did not take place in Pierre, but in the largest mosque in Spain in Barcelona) was staged in retaliation against the Muslim community. A video of a burning building with the captions: “The Spaniards burned down an Islamist mosque in Pierre, Barcelona,” also circulated on the Internet.
A reverse image search on Google revealed that this video was in fact published back in 2022 on TikTok. In original footage captured by Indonesian news agency Tribun Network, imprinted fire at the Islamic Center of Jakarta, which occurred on October 19, 2022. Many others Media then they published similar rollers, which showed the burning dome of the temple. The mosque's imam, Muhammad Subki, said the fire broke out during renovations, most likely due to the carelessness of the builders, and quickly escalated due to strong winds.
The mosque in Jakarta has nothing in common with the mosque in the Spanish city of Piera, located 55 km from Barcelona. The building of the Catalan mosque does not have a dome: it represents is a one-story building with an arched roof.
Another inaccuracy made by social media users is the temporary discrepancy between the two events. The attack on a pensioner in Torre Pacheco happened on July 12 at about 6 a.m., and the fire at a mosque in the city of Piera happened almost three hours earlier. That is, the alleged arson could not have been a response to the beating, as claimed many Telegram channels.
One of the first to publish a three-year-old video from Jakarta with an incorrect caption was blogger Tommy Robinson. On July 14, 2025 at 21:35 Moscow time, he posted a video on the social network X, which fast received 1.4 million views and 3,000 retweets. At the same time, the blogger superimposed footage of a burning building in Jakarta photograph of the interior of the mosque in Pierre before and after the fire - apparently to add authenticity to the video. On the Russian-language Internet, the earliest “Verified” publication with a video found appeared in the Telegram channel “Release the KrakenZ!» July 15 at 06:43 Moscow time. This channel regularly publishes critical posts about Western countries, including about Spain.
Thus, the footage of the burning mosque that spread on the Internet has nothing to do with the fire in Pierre and the attack on a pensioner in Torre Pacheco. The video was filmed back in 2022 in Indonesia.
Cover photo: social networks
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