On July 20, 2022, a barrage of artillery shells struck the Barakh tourist resort, wounding 23 people and killing nine. The Iraqi government has blamed Turkey for the attack in Zakho, and there have been protests across the country and repeated calls for Turkish forces.
In the above context, an image of a burning building is widely shared on social media, claiming that it is the Turkish Consulate in Basra.
The image is shared with a caption: “#عاجل | الان حرق القنصلية التركية في البصرة . #صار اللعب خشن” (English translation: “#Breaking news | Now the Turkish Consulate in Basra is burning. #The game just got rough.”)
The link to the post can be seen here.
FACT CHECK
NewsMobile did the fact-check, and found it to be fake.
On doing a Google Reverse Image Search, we found the same image published by Tehran Times, dated December 1, 2019. The image was shared with a caption: “Iraq has recently witnessed many incidents, one of which is attack on the Iranian Consulate in Najaf by rioters. The latest reports indicate that the rioters were not natives of Najaf.”
The same image had also been uploaded by Getty Times with a caption: “Iraqi demon- strators gather as flames start consuming Iran’s Consulate in the southern Iraqi Shiite holy city of Najaf on November 27, 2019, two months into the country’s most serious social crisis in decades. Iraqi protesters torched the Iranian Consulate in the holy city of Najaf in a dramatic escalation of anti-government demonstrations that have left more than 350 people dead. (Photo by Haidar HAMDANI / AFP) (Photo by HAIDAR HAMDANI/AFP via Getty Images)”
We also found that The Turkish Consulate in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul was targeted by rocket fire on July 27, 2022.
Hence, we can ascertain that the viral image is old, and not associated with the recent attack on Turkish Consulate.
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