Weeks into a fragile US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, a months-old video of a Brazilian hostage rescue simulation was shared in posts falsely claiming it showed an Israeli commando shooting a “Hamas terrorist”. The footage has circulated in posts by Brazilian news outlets since July 2025, when the country’s military police carried out a public demonstration.<\/p>\n
“Look at the precision. An Israeli IADN commando, hanging upside down from ropes, took down a Hamas terrorist at point-blank range,” reads the Hindi-language caption of a video\u00a0shared<\/a> on X on October 30, 2025.<\/p>\n The dramatic footage shows a masked man holding a gun to the head of a hostage on a balcony. Officers stationed above the hostage-taker rappel down the building, before appearing to shoot him and rescue the hostage.<\/p>\n It surfaced weeks into a US-brokered\u00a0ceasefire<\/a> between Israel and Hamas, following more than two years of war sparked by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel which resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people (archived link<\/a>).<\/p>\n Israel’s retaliatory assault on Gaza has killed at least 69,513 people, according to figures from the health ministry that the UN considers reliable.<\/p>\n The fragile truce has endured occasional flare-ups since October 10.<\/p>\n Screenshot of the false X post taken on November 4, 2025, with a red X added by AFP<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n The video was also shared in similar\u00a0Facebook<\/a> and Instagram<\/a> posts.<\/p>\n “This is the right treatment for jihadis,” read a comment on one of the posts.<\/p>\n Another said: “The Indian Army should learn from the Israeli commandos.”<\/p>\n But the video in fact shows a simulation of a hostage rescue carried out by Brazilian police.<\/p>\n A reverse\u00a0image search<\/a> on Google using keyframes<\/a> from the falsely shared video led to similar footage<\/a> shared by Brazilian news outlet O Popular Net on Facebook on July 8 (archived link<\/a>).<\/p>\n Its Portuguese-language caption reads: “The Special Police Operations Battalion (BOPE) of the Military Police of Minas Gerais (PMMG) thrilled the audience with a hostage rescue simulation during a commemorative race at the Academy of PMMG, in Belo Horizonte, with officers from the elite squad that is always ready to protect lives, even in the most extreme situations.”<\/p>\n It adds that the video, which it credited to the PMMG, confused some internet users who thought it was a real situation.<\/p>\n