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Fact check: Video of stadium singing for Palestinians is from 2019, not World Cup

Ana Faguy, USA TODAY
·2 min read

The claim: Video shows stadium singing for Palestinians at World Cup

Soccer fans from around the globe have descended on Qatar for the 2022 World Cup, and some attendees have been captured on camera waving the Palestinian flag in the Al Bayt Stadium.

Social media users are claiming that the entire audience at one of the World Cup matches in Qatar recently broke out in song to demonstrate their support for the Palestinian people.

"Whole Football Stadium Sung For Palestine || FIFA World Cup || Goosebumps," reads the caption of a Nov. 22 Facebook post, which has received almost 500 likes and was shared more than 70 times in six days.

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But the video is not from the World Cup. It is from a September 2019 soccer match between Moroccan and Palestinian teams.

USA TODAY reached out to the user who shared the post for comment.

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Morocco's midfielder Hakim Ziyech controls the ball during the Qatar 2022 World Cup Group F football match between Belgium and Morocco at the Al-Thumama Stadium.
Morocco's midfielder Hakim Ziyech controls the ball during the Qatar 2022 World Cup Group F football match between Belgium and Morocco at the Al-Thumama Stadium.

Video is from 2019

The video in the Facebook post is from a Sept. 23, 2019, soccer match between Raja Casablanca, a Moroccan team, and Hilal Al-Quds, a Palestinian team. In 2019, the video was posted on YouTube by multiple accounts.

Morocco World News, an English-language Moroccan newspaper, published a story about the 2019 soccer match, reporting fans waved Palestinian flags and held banners opposing Israel.

Footage from the video in the social media post and the 2019 video appear to be the same. In both videos, smoke billows from the top of the stands and fans can be seen waving the Raja Casablanca flag. The camera also pans to close-ups of attendees chanting, including a small boy holding a Palestinian scarf over his head.

The video also shows a red track surrounding the soccer field, but none of the eight World Cup stadiums have red tracks on the outside of their soccer fields, videos of each of the venues show.

Fact check:Fabricated image claims to show limitations on fan conduct at 2022 World Cup

Our rating: False

Based on our research, we rate FALSE the claim that a video shows a stadium singing for Palestinians at the World Cup. The video is from 2019 and shows fans demonstrating their support for the Palestinian people at a game between Moroccan and Palestinian teams.

Our fact-check sources:

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fact check: Video of stadium singing for Palestinians is from 2019