Musk's Grok slammed for false claim about photo of malnourished Gaza girl

A photo of a severely malnourished girl in Gaza has sparked controversy after Elon Musk’s AI chatbot, Grok, incorrectly claimed that it was taken in Yemen in 2018.

The photograph, captured by AFP photojournalist Omar al-Qattaa, shows skeletal nine-year-old Mariam Dawwas in the arms of her mother in Gaza city on August 2, 2025, where Israel's blockade has fuelled fears of mass famine.

Yet, when social media users turned to Grok for verification, the chatbot misidentified the image as depicting Amal Hussain, a Yemeni child who died of starvation in 2018.

The error, which was circulated widely online, led to accusations of disinformation against French MP Aymeric Caron, who had posted the Gaza image in support of Palestinians. Grok's response was later corrected but the chatbot reportedly repeated the same misinformation in subsequent queries.

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The incident raises broader questions about the reliability of AI tools as sources of verification, particularly as internet users increasingly rely on them for fact-checking and image sourcing.

Grok, developed by xAI, a start-up founded by Elon Musk, has previously come under scrutiny for producing biased or controversial content, including remarks defending Adolf Hitler and perpetuating antisemitic stereotypes. Critics say its inaccuracies reflect deeper issues in how such models are trained and aligned.

“AI tools like Grok are not built to tell the truth, they are designed to generate content,” said Louis de Diesbach, a researcher in technological ethics. “You could think of them as friendly pathological liars, they may not always lie, but they always can.”