AI-generated video of Spanish military confronting migrants spreads in Islamophobic posts
- Published on August 6, 2026 at 11:41
- 3 min read
- By Devesh MISHRA, AFP India
A mass influx of migrants from Morocco into Spain's North African territory of Ceuta in late July triggered a wave of misinformation on social media, including fabricated footage of the military purportedly using pork to deter Muslims. The video, which spread widely in Hindu-majority India, contains visual inconsistencies indicative of AI-generated content -- and AFP traced it to a creator who confirmed the clip was fabricated.
"The Spanish army showered pork at illegal intruders entering Spain, causing a stampede among them," says a Hindi-language Facebook post shared August 2, 2026
The 15-second clip attached to the post appears to show uniformed personnel throwing pieces of flesh at a crowd while standing near an armed military vehicle whose side reads: "Bacon squad".
Pork is forbidden in Islam, the dominant religion in Morocco and Ceuta, and a minority faith in India (archived links here and here).
The clip appeared in similar posts on X and Facebook after tens of thousands of migrants entered Ceuta over just a few days from neighbouring Morocco (archived link).
The migrants, mostly Moroccans, started entering the Spanish territory of 84,000 people in late July on foot and by swimming, sparking a diplomatic crisis between Spain and its EU partners (archived link).
Many drowned as they tried to swim around a barrier in the Mediterranean Sea, with the Spanish government's delegation in Ceuta announcing a death toll of more than 70 people (archived link).
Madrid rushed troops, drones, divers and boats to the outpost that it has run for centuries. AFP journalists in Ceuta observed a massive police and military presence, and some young people were seen turning back for Morocco after saying goodbye to officers (archived link).
By August 5, Spain said 70,000 of the 72,000 who entered its territory had returned.
Islamophobic comments on posts sharing the supposed footage of Spanish troops throwing pork at migrants suggest some social media users believed it was genuine.
"The Spanish army has suggested the best solution. India should adopt the same approach in Kashmir -- and against the Muslim infiltrators from Bangladesh," one said.
But the video does not show the Ceuta crisis.
Fabricated footage
A Google reverse image search using keyframes from the clip found the same video shared July 31 on X and labelled: "Made with AI" (archived link).
"I made this video with Seedance 2.0 on Yapper! Ask me anything," the user said in a follow-up post the same day.
Yapper is a content creation platform that lets people fabricate videos using Seedance 2.0, an AI model from Chinese technology giant ByteDance (archived link).
An AFP analysis of the video found several visual errors, including the sudden disappearance of someone's torso and the unnatural appearance of another person's hands, that are indicative of synthetic content.
Hive Moderation, an AI detection tool, found the video was 99.7 percent likely to have been fabricated using Seedance 2.0.
AFP has previously debunked other misinformation related to the Ceuta migrant crisis.
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