Video of pro-Palestinian march wrongly shared as ‘victory rally’ for France’s new government

Thousands of people have shared a video on social media with the claim it shows crowds gathered to celebrate “the new French government”. 

But this is not correct—the clip predates both the election results being announced on 7 July and the election being called on 9 June. 

The video shows a large gathering with many people flying the Palestinian flag, and a handful of Algerian and French communist party flags also visible in the crowd. 

Multiple posts on social media platforms, including Facebook, X (formerly Twitter) and Telegram, have recently shared the video with the caption: “The victory rally for the new French government has more Palestinian flags than French flags.” 

One post with more than 1,200 shares says: “When France celebrates an election victory by waving hundreds of communist and Palestinian flags then goes on to burn and smash up half of Paris and yet still the media reports it as a ‘Victory over extremists’ you know things have turned to rat s***. Mass immigration at work.” 

Another says: “And here are some more shots from France. The left is celebrating its victory in the elections. In this sea of ​​flags, even found one French.”

But the clip has nothing to do with the election, the results of which have been inconclusive, with no party winning enough to form a government. 

It was first shared to X on 1 June with the caption: “LYON: rally in support of Palestinians on Saturday 1st June” (translated from French), alongside other images and videos of the scene in the same thread. An Instagram account by the same name shared the clip on 2 June, adding that “Several thousand people gathered at Place Bellecour”.

This account holder confirmed to Full Fact (and others) that they had taken the footage in Lyon on 1 June, and that the gathering was “not related to the elections”. 

Similar footage of the rally has been shared in multiple French media reports, and images from Google Street View correspond with the footage circulating on social media being filmed in Place Bellecour in Lyon.  

We’ve seen more misinformation relating to France’s elections, including an image of a map suggesting it shows the results of the first round of voting in the general election, and a photo supposedly showing Marine le Pen crying in response to the election results.

Marine Le Pen’s party, National Rally (RN), was in pole position after the first round of voting but, along with its allies, came in third place with 143 seats, behind President Macron’s coalition (Ensemble alliance) of 168 seats and the New Popular Front with 182 seats in the second round. 

The existing Prime Minister Gabriel Attal has resigned but is expected to continue in a caretaker role. 

We’ve seen many examples of videos of protests being shared with incorrect details as part of our work fact checking online misinformation—we’ve published guides with tips on how to check whether images and videos show what they claim to before sharing them online.