Two videos of Afghan girls are circulating, falsely claiming to be children from Gaza

“GAZA WOOD” account shared videos, the first one showing a girl working to clean shoes, lying on the ground on a sidewalk, and the uploader claimed that the video was part of the “Pallywood” campaign to fabricate Palestinian suffering, casting doubt on the continuous skepticism of children’s hardships in Gaza during the ongoing aggression. According to the prosecution, the story of the “shoe polisher” girl is fictional, evident from her clean equipment and the presence of an oversized shoe next to her. The prosecutor adds skeptically, “Why are children forced to lie from a young age?”

In the second video, a girl lies on the ground, selling eggs, and she comments, “It’s just a film studio here. Sorry for making you believe it was real… everything is okay.”

The first video has been circulated and erroneously attributed to the aggression on Gaza, within the context of expressing sympathy through the accounts “Yasmine Zouzou” and “Nablus Gher,” claiming the child is from Gaza. The video gained a high rate of views and shares from both accounts.

The Palestinian Observatory “Tahaqaq” verified the circulating video by researching public sources, revealing that the two videos belong to girls in Afghanistan. They were previously posted on an account named “Ashiyaana Angels” on Instagram on January 16, 2024. The video’s uploader commented, “We have changed these children’s lives forever; she no longer begs, and her school life will begin soon.” This was part of a fundraising campaign for needy children.

The second video was posted on December 19, 2023, through the same account on Instagram. The observatory team reached out to the account owner, who denied to “Tahaqaq” that the first video of the shoe-polishing girl from Gaza, explaining that it was filmed in a small province in Afghanistan.

The account holder added that they included a link in the biography as part of a campaign to donate to the poor and needy, especially children.

Additionally, he confirmed that the video of the child in the second video was also filmed in Afghanistan, affirming that the girl no longer sells eggs, as they provide her family with a monthly amount to support her education.