A viral social media post making inflammatory claims about Scottish citizens has been thoroughly debunked after a fact-check revealed the video at its heart was filmed thousands of miles away in Israel.
The Misleading Claim and Its Origins
The post, which spread widely online, asserted that people in Scotland had begun playing bagpipes during the Muslim call to prayer. It suggested this was a deliberate act to "combat the Islamisation of their country". The accompanying clip showed a lone piper playing, captioned simply "Bagpipes during Muslim call to prayer", heavily implying the scene was captured in Scotland.
However, digital investigation tools tell a very different story. A reverse image search traced the video back to its original source on Instagram, posted on 12 December 2025. The original caption read, "some consider this a Muslim country", and the post was geotagged with "TLV", a common abbreviation for Tel Aviv, Israel.
Pinpointing the True Location
Further analysis using Google Maps conclusively identified the setting. The distinctive amphitheatre and coastal skyline visible in the video match Abrasha Park in Tel Aviv perfectly. The specific landmark is the Tiroche Amphitheatre, with the city's beach and towers forming the recognisable backdrop.
The bagpiper in question is not a local protester but a travelling musician from rural Scotland. Their linked website confirms they have played the instrument in many countries worldwide. They uploaded the same video to TikTok a day after the Instagram post.
Context and Broader Facts
The call to prayer, or Adhan, is recited five times daily by a muezzin, often broadcast via loudspeakers from mosques. In Israel, Muslims constitute a significant minority. Official statistics from the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics estimated that 18% of the country's population was Muslim at the end of 2023.
This incident serves as a stark reminder of how easily context can be stripped from online content to fabricate a divisive narrative. The video, while genuine, was misrepresented to support a false claim about societal tensions in Scotland, when it was actually a recording of a musical performance in an Israeli park.
