No, a CNN reporter didn’t ‘fake’ being near the Israel-Gaza border

Amid false claims that a CNN team staged a rocket attack near the Israel-Hamas border, a recent Instagram post suggests that they weren’t even there. 

"A long honored tradition at CNN to absolutely fake being somewhere they ain’t," the Oct. 11 post said.

The post shared an image of Clarissa Ward, CNN’s chief international correspondent, taking shelter on the roadside.

"CNN staging a dramatic live reporting of a barrage of rockets by them," text above the image says. "They cut off the footage when 2 men casually walking on the sidewalk with flipflops get into the camera view." 

This post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

We asked CNN about the post, and a spokesperson said Ward and her team were near the border "when a barrage of rockets flew close to their position." (This echoes CNN’s description of the Oct. 9 footage on its website.)
"Their location was close to the place where Hamas militants had first breached the border wall and begun firing at vehicles, resulting in multiple casualties," said Jonathan Hawkins, CNN’s vice president of communications. "The team was reporting on the aftermath of the weekend’s assault and the ongoing situation close to the border." 

Ward said as much in the broadcast. About two and a half minutes into the clip on CNN’s site, two men walk by, one wearing flip-flops, but the video doesn’t "cut off" as the post claims. Ward continues to describe the scene for another minute. 

Featured Fact-check

Bloggers

stated on February 17, 2019 in a Facebook post

Says 89 members of Congress "hold dual citizenship with Israel."

Hawkins said Ward was still reporting from Israel on Oct. 12 but declined to disclose her exact location. 

We found no credible evidence to doubt this. 

We rate this post False.