Fact Check: Old video shared as Muslims doing namaz at New York’s Times Square on Christmas Day 2023

Hyderabad: A video of Muslims doing namaz in what looks like a busy traffic intersection is being circulated on social media. The video contains two clips; the first few frames show a man wearing a black jacket leading the prayer, and the last few frames show the same man leading the prayer in a different winter attire in an open area surrounded by huge flashing billboards. The claims accompanying the posts suggest that the videos show Muslims praying at Times Square in New York on Christmas Day.

“Times Square - New York, Christmas Day, 2023, (sic)” an X user captioned the post with the video.

Several X users shared the video claiming the same.

Fact Check

NewsMeter found that the video is old and the claim is misleading.

Upon a reverse image search of the video’s keyframe, we found the first clip on X, posted by a user on February 11, 2023. The caption and text accompanying the video stated that it shows Muslims praying in New York City.

We also found an image similar to the visuals in the viral video in a report by The Siasat Daily published on March 29, 2023. It featured the same man leading the congregation into prayer.

The report said that 'hundreds of Muslims observing Ramzan broke their fast and offered Taraweeh prayers in New York City’s Times Square.’ It also mentioned that ‘Quran reciters Faraj Hassan and Faisal Latif’ had led the prayers. The report carried prayer videos of Hassan posted on Instagram.

Taking this cue, we skimmed through the Instagram account of Faraj Hasan and found the first clip posted on April 6, 2022. Hassan identifies himself as the Public Figure in his Instagram bio.

The second clip was also posted by Hasan on March 27, 2023. “Ramadan behaviour #timessquare #taraweeh.” read the caption.