US military air show videos falsely shared as 'Iran attack on Israel'

Published on April 29, 2024 at 09:34
3 min read
By Ara Eugenio, AFP Philippines

A compilation of footage from a 2023 air show in the United States garnered hundreds of thousands of views in social media posts falsely claiming it showed Iran's unprecedented attack on Israel in April 2024. The clips, which were filmed months before Tehran's assault, show performances by US military aircraft during a show in Ohio.

"Iran Aircraft Attacking on (sic) Israel," read text superimposed on a Facebook reel shared on April 15, 2024.

The video -- viewed more than 216,000 times -- shows a clip of planes performing manoeuvres mid-air and another clip of a plane taking off from a runway, as apparent sounds of explosions play in the background.

In the bottom left-hand corner of the video, the text "AirshowSt" appears backwards, suggesting the footage had been flipped horizontally.

Screenshot of the false post taken April 26, 2024.

The post surfaced online two days after Iran carried out an unprecedented attack on Israel -- its regional foe -- in retaliation for the April 1 strike on its consulate in Damascus which killed seven Iranian Revolutionary Guards, two of them generals.

Israel intercepted most of the 300 missiles and drones with support from its allies and suffered no deaths.

The same video was shared across social media alongside a similar false claim here, here and here.

Airshow videos

Reverse image searches and keyword searches found a longer, unmirrored footage compilation shared online on September 7, 2023 -- months before Iran's attack (archived link).

The video, shared by aviation news site AirshowStuff, is titled: "Airshow Highlights - Cleveland National Air Show 2023" (archived link).

The mirrored clips in the false posts corresponded from the start to the one-minute, two-second mark, with a watermark at the bottom-right portion showing the text "AirshowStuff".

Two flags appeared in the third clip -- one that read "Cleveland National Air Show" at the 52-second mark and the US flag at the 57-second mark. They matched those seen in the last clip featured in the false posts.

The caption said the show was held at Burke Lakefront Airport in downtown Cleveland in the US state of Ohio, and featured performances by the US Air Force F-22 Raptor, US Navy F-18 Super Hornet and US Marine Corps AV-8B Harrier.

Below are screenshot comparisons between the clips in the false posts and the footage from the Cleveland Airshow video, with similarities highlighted by AFP.

Screenshot comparison taken April 28, 2024.

The first and third videos were published by Airshow Stuff on Facebook here and here (archived links here and here).

Other aviation accounts on YouTube published the first clip here and here (archived links here and here).

AFP has fact-checked a wave of misinformation following Iran's attack here, here and here.

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