WHAT WAS CLAIMED
An image shows Anthony Albanese and Joe Hockey with late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
OUR VERDICT
False. The image is fake.
AAP FACTCHECK - A selfie appearing to show Anthony Albanese smiling alongside the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat on social media is a fake.
While the prime minister did meet the then-Palestinian National Authority president in 1998, the image being shared online is synthetic.
The image, which shows Mr Albanese and former Liberal treasurer Joe Hockey smiling with Mr Arafat, has been posted on Facebook, X and Instagram.
"A terrorist, a socialist and a 'moderate' (Liberal leftie)," one post's caption reads.
"Birds of a feather!"
Mr Albanese and Mr Hockey did meet Mr Arafat in 1998 during a trip to the West Bank paid for by the Palestine Liberation Organization, according to a Sky News report.
In 2023, Ali Kazak, a former Palestinian ambassador to Australia, published a photo of the three meeting on an online blog.
However, the selfie image showing the trio smiling is fake.
Mr Arafat died in 2004, and before then, Mr Albanese and Mr Hockey looked significantly different to how they appeared in the supposed selfie.
Photos from 2004 and earlier show Mr Hockey's hair was not yet as uniformly grey as shown in the image.
Mr Albanese's appearance before 2004 also significantly differed from the image shared on social media.
In particular, Mr Albanese's teeth looked different before he received dental implants, as reported by The Sydney Morning Herald in 2015.
Video footage of Mr Albanese speaking in 2010, 2012 and 2013 shows how his teeth changed appearance during this period.
The black-and-white keffiyeh on Mr Arafat's head doesn't appear to be naturally folded either.
The triangular shape results from the Palestinian leader folding one side over the other, as seen in this Getty Images photo.
However, the fake image appears to show an implausibly closed triangle with no fold.
The lighting in the selfie image doesn't appear natural: the men's faces are lit at different levels and from different directions, so there's no clear light source.
The Israeli government confined Mr Arafat to his quarters in Ramallah, in the West Bank, for nearly three years between 2001 and 2004.
AAP FactCheck was unable to find any record of Mr Albanese or Mr Hockey meeting the Palestinian leader after 1998.
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