A video of a Ukrainian drone strike on the Russian capital Moscow in July 2023 has recirculated on social media, with posts falsely claiming it shows an explosion in Israel after an Iranian missile attack on October 1, 2024. The posts — viewed more than one million times — circulated online after a barrage of Iranian missiles hit Israel, which said most were intercepted, although several struck inside air force bases without causing casualties or damage.
“Iranian missiles struck a tower in the heart of Tel Aviv,” read the Indonesian caption on a Facebook post from October 2, 2024.
Text overlaid on the video says: “1 October 2024… Tel Aviv now,” suggesting that the strike occurred this month and in Israel.
Israel’s arch-enemy Iran supports Hamas in Gaza, and this week hailed the Palestinian militant group’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures. Of the 251 people taken hostage into Gaza by militants, 97 are still being held, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead (archived here).
Israel’s retaliatory assault on the Palestinian territory has resulted in the deaths of 41,909 people, the majority civilians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza. The figures have been deemed reliable by the United Nations.
Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza has expanded to multiple fronts, targeting Iran’s other allies in Lebanon, Syria and the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
On October 1, 2024, Iran launched a barrage of missiles at Israel, which said most were intercepted, although several struck inside air force bases without causing casualties or damage. Israel has vowed to retaliate, raising fears of all-out regional war.
Some social media users appeared to believe that the video shows the Iranian attack on Israel on October 1.
“Take that! Hopefully, Israel is devastated by the missile explosions,” one user commented.
“Waking up to good news like this makes me excited to go to work and enjoy breakfast… thank you, IRAN,” wrote another.
Similar videos were also shared on YouTube and X, which cumulatively garnered more than one million views.
However, the clip shows a Ukrainian attack on Russia last year.
Drone attack
A reverse image search on Google found the clip was previously published by English-language media including NBC and CNN in July 2023.
The footage shows Ukrainian drone attacks on Moscow, according to the US broadcasters (archived here and here).
Below is a comparison of the false post (left) and the video published by NBC (right):
The CNN video, titled “Shocking video captures drone explosion in Russia”, was captioned: “Video captured by a bystander shows the moment a drone hits a building in Moscow, the latest in a series of attacks that have brought the Ukraine war to Russia’s capital.”
On July 30, 2023, Russia said it had repelled two separate Ukrainian drone attacks overnight, one targeting the capital and the other annexed Crimea (archived here).
The former attack damaged two office towers and briefly shut an international airport, AFP reported at the time (archived here).
Several windows of a building were blown out, steel beams were exposed and documents were scattered on the ground, according to an AFP photographer.
A search using Yandex Maps, the Russian search engine’s mapping tool, provides visual evidence confirming that the video in the false post was recorded in Moscow, specifically in the business district in the western part of the city.
Below is a screenshot comparison from the false video (left) and Yandex Maps (right) showing the building and street in Moscow seen in the video (archived link):
Below is a photo of a Moscow office building taken by an AFP photographer which shows damage after the Ukrainian drone attack.
AFP has previously debunked similar claims related to Iranian attacks on Israel here and here.
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