Claim: A video shows Palestinian women wearing a burqa, a loose-fitting garment covering the whole body, participating in a beauty pageant.
Fact: The video is from Syria and it shows burqa-wearing women receiving awards for memorising the Quran.
On 9 October, X user @realMaalouf posted a video (archive) that shows burqa-wearing women walking down the aisle, holding Qurans, and receiving shields. The caption reads: “Miss Palestine 2024 finalists. Who deserves to win? Tough decision.”
The caption comes across as mocking towards Muslim women who chose to cover themselves in public. Moreover, it can be seen as perpetuating harmful, false and Islamophobic stereotypes about Palestinian women specifically and Muslim women in general not having autonomy.
Arab women seem especially vulnerable to this kind of disinformation since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, that has killed at least 42,000 Palestinians, the majority of whom are women and children. By mentioning “Miss Palestine 2024,” the claim is also making light of the war that has devastated Palestinians and that has no end in sight.
This is also reflected by significant viewership of the post, and comments made by users such as: “Bin bag parade queen!”; “Strange people”; “LOLOLOL…that culture is… cultureLESS.”
Fact or Fiction?
Soch Fact Check reverse-searched keyframes from the video and found several X posts from 6 September 2024 indicating that the footage shows women from Syria.
We also found an Instagram post that shared a clearer and longer version of the same footage, and described it as a ceremony that was likely held to honour women who memorised the Quran. According to the caption, the video shows a ceremony “…honoring the memorizers of the Book of God in the camps of northern Syria.” Here, we see people seated within the audience initially before the camera angle pans from left to right towards the burqa-clad women who walk down an aisle, wearing sashes while holding on to what appears to be a copy of the Quran.
The Instagram user Jaber Owayed’s bio describes him as a photographer documenting “the sufferings of the Syrian people in IDP camps,” another indication that he posted the footage from Syria.
Moreover, the term “memorizer” precedes the name of the woman on each of the sashes worn by them suggesting that the award is for the women who successfully memorised the Quran. The date of the award’s issuance is also stated as “8/15/2024” i.e 15 August 2024 on the sash, as shown in the image below:
This user also shared another video of the same event here. In this footage, we noticed a logo on the wall behind the women receiving awards, likely of the institute that conducted the award ceremony.
Soch Fact Check analysed the logo through Google Lens which yielded only two links, one for a YouTube Channel and another for a Facebook group named “سلسلة معاهد أجيال القرآن الكريم في سوريا”. According to a translation by Google, it means: “Series of Generations of Holy Quran Institutes in Syria.”
The logo from YouTube and Facebook matches the one on the wall in the original footage, suggesting that this organisation was perhaps behind the event or involved in organising the awarding ceremony in some way.
Moreover, “Syria” in the caption suggested that the institute is based there.
Soch Fact Check also found that Abdul Hamid Al-Mohammad is the administrator of the Facebook group. His post from August 2020, which is when the group was launched, said: “Welcome, my brothers, to this group to spread the teaching of the Book of God in the Generations of the Holy Quran Institutes in northern Syria,” which further confirmed that the group is based in Syria.
Additionally, the YouTube channel shared a complete video of the graduation ceremony on 10 September, “Honoring the female memorizers at the Generations of the Holy Quran Institute in Syria.” The keyframes from this video matched scenes from the video in the claim as shown below:
The Arabic words plastered on a banner in the background, visible at the end of the YouTube clip, also confirmed that the event was an “honouring ceremony for memorizers [of the Quran].” A screenshot of this banner is given below:
Soch Fact Check, therefore, concludes that the video of burqa-clad women participating in an award ceremony does not show Palestinian women participating in a beauty pageant. Neither does the video show a pageant called “Miss Palestine 2024” nor does it have any connection with Palestinian women.
Virality
The X post garnered 332K views and was liked 6,400 times, as of writing time.
It appeared on X here, here, here.
On YouTube here.
Conclusion: A video circulating on X does not show burqa-clad Palestinian women participating in a beauty contest. It shows a graduation ceremony for women who memorised the Quran in Syria.
Background image in cover photo: BBC
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