Israeli military airstrike in Rafah kills 45, injures dozens
An Israeli military airstrike in a targeted area of Rafah killed 45 Palestinians, with dozens injured and many displaced.
The claim: Syrian artist built Statue of Liberty replica from his house’s ruins
A May 23 Facebook post (direct link, archive link) appears to show a destroyed building shaped like the Statue of Liberty.
“A Syrian artist built this with the ruins of his house,” reads the post’s caption. “With the slogan: ‘This is the Freedom they brought us.'”
The post was shared more than 12,000 times in a week.
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Our rating: False
An artist digitally created the image. It has been circulating online since 2012.
Image digitally created by Syrian artist
The image was created by Tammam Azzam, a Syrian artist now living in Germany. Azzam posted the image on his Facebook page in 2012 with a caption describing it as a photomontage.
“I created the photomontage using Adobe Photoshop,” Azzam told USA TODAY. “The image was intended to comment on the themes of freedom and oppression. It was posted on my Facebook account as part of a broader series I created while living in Dubai.”
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Azzam did not write the slogan included in the Facebook post. Instead, he said he created the image as a “symbol of the freedom that the Syrian people have sought and continue to seek in a country that has been devastated by the regime’s response to their demonstrations.”
“It was not built from the ruins of any house, nor does it carry the slogan attributed to it,” he said.
USA TODAY reached out to the social media user who shared the post for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
PolitiFact also debunked the claim.
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