Pages and accounts on social media circulated a video showing a Syrian woman criticizing what she described as exploitation by staff of Syrian Air, questioning why a tax was imposed on purchases from the duty free area, in a context suggesting that the incident was recent.
The fact-checking team followed up on the report and searched for the origin of the clip and its time frame. It turned out that the video is old and dates back to 17 May 2024, that is during the rule of the former regime, and not to the current period as the circulating posts suggest. A reverse search for the clip found a copy published by Syria TV on 17 May 2024, under the title: a Syrian actress complains about the treatment of Syrian Air at Dubai airport. Al Arabiya also published the clip on 20 May 2024 as documenting a complaint by the Syrian actress Alia Said about extortion by Syrian Air.
Why is this claim misleading?
Out of temporal context: A video dating back to May 2024 was recirculated and taken out of its original time frame, in order to suggest that it documents a recent incident involving staff of Syrian Air.
