Lucy Gilder
BBC Verify journalist

Thanks for joining us today.

The live page will be ending soon but our late shift reporter will be on hand monitoring the latest developments in Syria.

To recap, throughout today we’ve been delving behind the scenes into our investigation into the demolition of thousands of civilian buildings by the Israeli military in Gaza.

And we’ve been busy verifying footage showing armed clashes in southern Syria.

Verify Live will return on Monday but until then you can check out more of our open-source intelligence, fact-checking and data analysis work here.

Peter Mwai
BBC Verify senior journalist

We have been looking at two video clips posted online said to show the moment an Israeli strike hit a school building sheltering displaced people in central Gaza yesterday.

The clips show a huge cloud of smoke rising over an urban area as at least two major explosions ring out. In one, a young girl is seen putting her hands to her head, possibly to cover her ears, then fleeing across a road as the explosions occur behind her.

We have confirmed that they show the targeting of the Abu Helou school in the Bureij refugee camp, through matching the school buildings and other features to satellite imagery.

We also found corroborating footage of the young girl fleeing the strike taken from a slightly different angle which was published by Getty Images.

This appears to be the second time the school has been hit this month. Verified footage from 8 July shows people trying to extinguish fires among tents pitched in the building’s main courtyard.

Merlyn Thomas
BBC Verify senior reporter

I’ve been reporting on this war since the Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October 2023, and many of my stories have focussed on Israeli military actions in Gaza.

As part of our reporting - including our latest investigation into demolitions in the strip - we always contact the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and put allegations to them for comment.

We normally contact them by texting the IDF press office with our questions and they'll often call back to request further details, such as the coordinates where the incident took place or specific timeframes.

We do this for our longer-term investigations, but also for our daily reporting on this war.

They usually offer a comment through a spokesperson, but often we will need further details. This means I frequently have long back-and-forth conversations to clarify specifics.

Once we have the response we will include the IDF comment in our output, whether that is for TV, online or radio.

Increasingly we're seeing the IDF say "incidents are under review" and so a key part of my job is following up on each of the stories we've reported on.

Paul Brown
BBC Verify senior journalist

Satellite images play a central role in most verification tasks, as they help to establish a key piece of information - where an event occurred.

Mapping provided by companies like Google or Bing are often a good start point, as they provide high quality imagery over most of the Earth.

However, they are not updated very frequently, which is not ideal for places like Gaza where the conflict means landscape is constantly changing.

This is where specialist companies like Planet and Maxar can help, as they offer much more up-to-date imagery.

In our latest investigation on Gaza, satellite images allowed us to not only track the widespread destruction being wrought on the strip, but also to get a sense how rapidly it is occurring.

But it's not only destruction we can track. As with our recent investigation into a new North Korean holiday resort, we can also use satellite images to track the rate of new developments on the ground.

Image source, Planet Labs PBC

Benedict Garman
BBC Verify senior journalist

Moving back to our story on the demolitions of buildings in Gaza by the Israeli military, we're going to walk you through how our journalists carry out investigations like this.

We verified scores of videos showing scenes of destruction by the Israeli military. Israel restricts international journalists from entering Gaza, but at BBC Verify we monitor hundreds of social media feeds related to the war across TikTok, Telegram, X and Facebook.

Some accounts share videos filmed by soldiers and contractors working for Israel. As well as general scenes of destruction, many of these include the exact moment of demolition, either with controlled explosions, or with construction machinery like excavators and bulldozers.

By matching features in these videos to satellite imagery and pre-existing geolocated footage - for example, street level videos filmed by Palestinians - it was possible to establish their location. Then comparing satellite photos of the same places helped narrow down the time frame in which the demolitions happened, as the day a video is published is not necessarily the day it was filmed.

We only focused on videos depicting demolitions since Israel withdrew from the ceasefire in March.

There are many more verified videos which show construction vehicles moving around Gaza, under the guard of the Israeli military.

Lucy Gilder
BBC Verify journalist

Following President Donald Trump’s recent announcement that Coca-Cola agreed to use cane sugar in its drinks rather than corn syrup, I looked into what the evidence says about which ingredient is healthier.

You can see what I found out in the video below.

Simran Sohal
BBC Verify

Image source, Getty Images

The UK government announced yesterday that it will lower the national voting age so that 16 and 17-year-olds will be able to vote in the next general election.

So where else in the world can you vote before you hit 18?

Well often it varies depending on the type of election you want to vote in.

In Scotland and Wales, 16-year-olds can vote in local elections and those to their devolved assemblies.

In the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man 16-year-olds can vote.

Similarly, in parts of Germany, 16-year-olds can vote in local and European elections, while in Belgium they can also vote in EU elections.

Austria, Argentina, Brazil and Malta are among the most progressive states on the issue of young voting. They allow it at the age of 16 for national elections.

Meanwhile, Greece permits 17-year-olds to take part in national polls.

Lucy Gilder
BBC Verify journalist

Image source, Press Association

Turning to the UK, the chief inspector of prisons has raised serious concerns about “frightening conditions” in Pentonville Prison in a report released today.

An inspection of the London prison found a widespread cockroach infestation and dirty cells with missing bedding and furniture.

It also found that 60% of prisoners were sharing cells designed for one person.

It’s not uncommon for prisoners to be living in overcrowded conditions in England and Wales. Nearly a quarter of prisoners were living in crowded conditions in the year to March 2024, according to the latest available figures, external.

Of these, the vast majority were in “doubled accommodation”, which is where two inmates are held in a cell designed for one person.

At the start of this week, the total prison population was 87,618, external - only about 2,000 places short of being full.

Sebastian Vandermeersch
BBC Verify

We’re still looking at footage showing clashes between Druze and Bedouin militias in southern Syria.

Verified footage shows a fighter firing a PKM machine gun from a rooftop towards Suweida city, confirming that fighters - reportedly belonging to Bedouin tribal forces - have reached the provincial capital’s western outskirts.

Smoke is visible rising in the background, which corroborates reports of ongoing skirmishes between Druze and Bedouin groups.

The location was confirmed by matching distinctive building features and road layouts. Reverse image searches of screengrabs confirm that the footage has not been uploaded prior to today.

Image source, X

Matt Murphy
BBC Verify senior journalist

Its just hit 13:00 here at our London newsroom, and our team in continuing to look at footage emerging from both Syria and Gaza.

BBC Verify is dedicated to examining the facts and claims behind a story to try to determine whether or not it is true - whether that’s a political statement, a video shared on social media, or images from a war zone.

And we’re also keen to hear from you - is there something you think we should investigate?

We're particularly interested in claims you have heard or seen that maybe don’t seem right.

Or perhaps you’ve come across something online and want to know if it was created using AI or even a deepfake.

You can send your suggestions to the team here.

Sebastian Vandermeersch
BBC Verify

We're turning to Syria now, where reports of renewed fighting in Suweida province have emerged. Violence erupted in the region on Sunday between the minority Druze people and Bedouin tribal militias.

We have verified footage showing armed fighters in the Druze village of Walgha, located about 3km northwest of the provincial capital.

Days of fighting between Druze and Bedouin groups have left more than 500 people dead, according to the UK-based Syrian Observatory of Human Rights (SOHR).

BBC Verify has not been able to confirm those figures, but we’ve seen footage of dozens of bodies piled up in Suweida Hospital.

The new video shows men armed with AK-type rifles walking among burning buildings, with multiple fires visible. We confirmed the location by matching distinct buildings and terrain features seen in the footage, and used the length and angle of shadows to establish that the video was filmed in the morning.

Reverse image searches of screengrabs confirmed that the footage is a new upload.

Image source, Armed fighters seen among fires in Walgha village.

We’ll be bringing you more on our Gaza demolition story throughout the day.

There is no sign of a let-up in the pace of these demolitions and Israeli media reported last week that Israel’s military had received dozens of D9 bulldozers from the US, which had been suspended under the Biden administration.

In addition, our team has identified dozens of adverts posted to Israeli Facebook groups which were offering work in Gaza to demolition contractors. The majority of the posts have been shared by recruiters since May.

Many of the ads specify areas of Gaza where the work will occur, such as "the Philadelphi Corridor" and "the Morag Axis" - both areas controlled by the IDF.

When approached for comment by BBC Verify, one contractor replied: "Go [expletive] yourself, you and Gaza."

This morning we have rolled out a new investigation looking at satellite images from Gaza which show massive amounts of destruction to thousands of buildings across the strip under planned demolitions by Israel’s military.

Entire towns and suburbs have been levelled in the space of a few weeks following Israel’s withdrawal from a ceasefire with Hamas in March.

Israel's military claims to have these areas under "operational control". Already damaged buildings and ones that appeared largely intact have both been destroyed by the demolitions.

Multiple legal experts told us that Israel may have committed war crimes under the Geneva Convention, which largely prohibits the destruction of infrastructure by an occupying power.

An Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson said it operated in accordance with international law and only demolished infrastructure when “military necessity is demanded”.

You can read our story here and later today we will be walking you through how our team conducted their investigation.

Matt Murphy
BBC Verify senior journalist

Good morning from BBC Verify Live.

Its a busy Friday here, and our fact-checkers, data journalists and verification specialists are working on these stories today:

• Footage is continuing to emerge from Syria, where members of the Druze minority have been clashing with Bedouin tribes in the Suweida province.
• We will be looking at videos showing the aftermath of a strike on the only Catholic church in Gaza.
• And we have published our new story into the demolition of thousands of civilian buildings in Gaza by Israel. Our reporters will bring you behind the scenes on how we carried out that investigation.

All that and more to come this morning. And remember, if there's anything you want BBC Verify to look into you can get in touch using this form.