No, Ronaldo did not donate $1.5 million to Palestinians in Gaza for Ramadan

By AFP |

Posts shared tens of thousands of times on social networks claim that Cristiano Ronaldo donated $1.5 million to Palestinians in Gaza during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, without giving any source for the claim. The Portuguese soccer player’s management company told AFP the story was false, “like many other stories about Ronaldo”.

Identical headlines in various online publications make the same claim, stating that the alleged donation was intended to feed Palestinians for Iftar, the meal eaten after sunset during Ramadan.

AFP first found the false information on May 7 in an Arabic-language Facebook post shared 7,000 times. Social media posts in Spanish and French shared it further.

On May 16, Venezuelan television channel Telesur picked up the story in an article on its English website, referring to a tweet from “Onwadan’s Charity Foundation”, which presents itself as a charity organisation in Lagos, Nigeria, on its Facebook page.

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