Syrian Rebel Fakery

This page will gather proven or well-illustrated instances of rebel forces, activists, and any allied others, using outright lies, actors, fake images, fake blood, etc. Especially the visually verifiable instances. (more forthcoming)

Opposition (to Truth) Activists

 * Danny Dayem aka Syrian Danny
 * Omar Telawi ("caught embellishing" only)
 * Khaled Abu Saleh
 * Tom MacMaster aka Gay Girl In Damascus
 * Others...

Fake Videos
Fake defections: fake helicopter in Ukrainian museum, fake MIG 21 in Egypt. Fake GRAD rockets in Aleppo.
 * FSA - How they make FAKE videos to lie against Syrians
 * More Fake Propganda From Terrorists Uploaders Against Syria That is Broadcast Worldwide

Faking With Kids

 * Orphan sleeping between the graves of his parents: Independent: 'Heartbreaking' Syria orphan photo wasn't taken in Syria and not of orphan
 * l-Otaibi Directed Messaged the first Twitter user to re-purpose the image, @americanbadu, to ask them to correct it and explain why they claimed it was of Syria.


 * He received the response: "Why don’t you just let go and claim it is a picture from Syria and gain a reward from God. You are exaggerating."

Fake Guns

 * Fake Gun story


 * According to an analysis by a curator at a British arms museum, the 11 men were each holding a TD-2007, a Chinese-made toy replica of the MP-5 submachine gun, marketed as appropriate for children above the age of 5. To each, the men had affixed an extension — perhaps a painted dowel or a section of pipe — masquerading as a long barrel.  --Charles Wood (talk) 00:45, 18 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Disturbing Fake Videos Are Making The Rounds In Syria – TRACEY SHELTON, Business Insider, NOV 14 2012
 * ''Last month, a fighter in Aleppo handed a reporter his cell phone, shaking his head in disbelief. “Assad, Assad,” he said.
 * ''On the screen was a video of someone beheading a prisoner with a chainsaw. It had been circulating in Syria for at least a year. The footage itself is very real, but it is five years old, and was shot in Mexico. Drug lords carried out the crime. The video has been used by rebels in conflicts all over the world.

I have never figured out how you would upload videos to your cell phone, neither have the western war reporters. The story of "a fighter handing his cell phone to a reporter" was played over and over again in Libya. CNN even took porn videos for real. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 09:15, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Blast! I'm an expert again! My day job often involves meeting unsavioury ruffians who have been detected with illegal material on their phones. Depending on the OS they can download images and videos from their computer, or from the Internet, or have it sent by 'friends' to them. The last option seems to be common on Blackberries and very common in the Middle-East.
 * I did one case with a UAE national who claimed people sent videos to his Blackberry and he couldn't stop them doing it. The jury didn't believe him... --Charles Wood (talk) 10:18, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Fake snipers

 * What the Fake Syria Sniper Boy Video Tell Us About Media Experts – Maram Susli (a.k.a. Mimi Al Laham / SyrianGirl), 27.11.2014
 * ''Many mainstream media websites helped a fake video go viral this month. The video showing a young Syrian boy running through sniper fire to save a little girl, was exposed as a fake when the Norwegian producer Lars Klevberg made the fact public. One of the stated aims of the Norwegian film makers was to “see how the media would respond to a fake video.” This article examines how that experiment went.
 * ''The western press very quickly accepted the video as real and used it to support the US administration’s narrative on Syria. Many top US news sources began to spread the story. Even though the producer said he explicitly added big hints that the video was fake, like the children surviving multiple gun shots.
 * ''The fake sniper video wasn’t enough to support US government narratives by itself, as the now deleted original upload didn’t suggest the identity of the snipers. So the west’s media suggested that it was Syrian military snipers that were targeting the children without any evidence. Journalists failed to mention how they reached the conclusion that an actor in Malta was shot by the Syrian military. It may be that the western press is quick to trust pro-rebel sources, as the video was uploaded by the pro-rebel Sham Times along with their own twist.
 * ''The Guardian’s headline for the video was “Syrian boy ‘saves girl from army sniper’” and the Telegraph delicately suggested the Syrian military was responsible for the fake bullets. The International Business (IB) times stated, “the snipers, who reportedly are said to be the government forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.” IB Times never explicitly mentioned who reported this information. They then took it a step further and concluded the article with “the incident certainly is not the first time that Pro-Assad gunmen have targeted children”.