Documenting the war or fabricating it? AI-generated visuals on social media blur the line as Iran conflict escalates

by Ankita Mahalanobish

Amid the escalating conflict in West Asia, social media has been flooded with unverified images and videos claiming to show scenes from the war. Many of these visuals went into news reports by prominent media outlets.

On February 28, the United States and Israel launched a joint assault on Iran, targeting key military installations. The strikes reportedly killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, along with several senior figures of the ruling establishment. The attacks also caused civilian casualties, including children. In retaliation, Iran carried out strikes on US military bases across Central and West Asia, including in Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Jordan and Qatar. Late on March 7, four oil depots in and around Tehran were hit killing at least six people. The situation remains fluid and highly volatile at the time of writing, with developments continuing to unfold.

Here are fact checks of five misrepresented images or videos related to the war which continue to spread widely online.

Claim I

A video claiming to show multiple Iranian missiles striking Tel Aviv is going viral on social media. The footage shows plumes of smoke rising in a clear blue sky as several projectiles leave behind white smoke trails, forming distinct patterns over what appears to be a residential area.

The Times of India also featured the visuals in a video report. While the outlet cited footage shared by Iranian state broadcaster Press TV, it noted that the authenticity of the video remains unverified.

An X user, Abdulruhman Ismail (@a_abdulruhman), who claims to be a photojournalist, shared the video on March 3, 2026, as actual footage of Tel Aviv. The post garnered around 3.8M views.

Another Indian media outlet, Live Hindustan, shared a video report including this video on YouTube, claiming it to be true without citing any source.

News outlet TV9 Bharatvarsh (@TV9Bharatvarsh) also amplified the video in a report, but later deleted the X post. The post has been deleted now.

Fact Check

Upon closely examining the video, we noticed several inconsistencies that are typically found in artificially generated content. 

First, the parked vehicles in the video display irregular shapes and distorted proportions. Similarly, the rooftop solar panels appear to be in an inconsistent, distorted form. 

The pattern of the plumes arising from the supposed attacks was unnatural and unrealtistic. 

The missiles in the video appear to detonate before making contact with any visible surface or structure, and no debris scattering could be seen in the video. These further raise questions about the authenticity of the video. 

During our investigation, we found the original post on Instagram, posted by Paralelverse_net on March 3, 2026. In the caption, it is explicitly mentioned that the video is “created with AI” and intended for “entertainment purposes only”.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by ParallelVerse (@paralelverse_net)

So, to sum up, the video of multiple missiles striking on what appears to be a residential area in Tel Aviv, Israel, is not authentic. It is a synthetically generated video. 

Claim II

A 10-second video filmed from a balcony shows the night sky at the moment a projectile strikes, triggering a massive explosion and thick clouds of smoke. The footage is going viral on social media with claims that it shows real scenes from Tel Aviv after being hit by supersonic Iranian missiles.

An X user, Ahmed Wael Hamdan, who claims to be a journalist from Gaza, shared the clip on the platform suggesting it depicts authentic events in Tel Aviv. The post garnered 1.4 million views.

Makhdoom Shahab-ud-Din, a journalist from Pakistan, also shared the purported video, claiming it to be a real-time visual from Tel Aviv on March 4, 2026. 

The post amassed approximately 50,000 views.

Several social media users have shared the same video with similar claims. A few of them are shown in the gallery below.

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Fact Check

Upon a detailed examination of the video, we found various logical discrepancies that cast serious doubts on its authenticity, and these anomalies are commonly observed in synthetically generated videos.

First, the camera remains conspicuously steady for the majority of the clip. It registers only a slight movement at the moment of the alleged blast and immediately stabilises. Now, in real-world scenarios, the shockwave after a missile strike would destabilise humans, leading to a profound camera shake and abrupt repositioning. 

Second, even after the impact, the cameraman does not move from the original position. 

Third, the voices heard in the background appear staged and emotionally flat. Their reactions, instead of being spontaneous to such a life-threatening event was rather flat. In fact, their delivery resembled sequential dialogue. 

Fourth, the sound of the impact was recorded instantaneously, even though the site of impact was far away. Under normal physical conditions, a noticeable delay between the visuals and the sound of the explosion would have been expected.

Fifth, the smoke plumes rose straight up, while another stream moved leftward, suggesting conflicting wind dynamics in the same frame. Additionally, the rapid ascent of the smoke us unnatural.

Sixth, an Israeli flag keeps waving on the corner in a way that it is visible in the frame almost all the time. 

Finally, the velocity and luminosity of the missile seem exaggerated. 

Besides, we could not find any credible news report that addressed this missile strike in Tel Aviv or used this footage.

These discrepancies in the video strongly suggest that the video is artificially generated. 

Claim III

A 10-second video shows the night sky over Dubai, with people seen running as several streaks of light resembling missiles move across the sky.

An X user, Morgan Ariel (@itsmorganariel), shared the video on X on March 4, 2026, claiming that it showed an Iranian drone strike on the US Consulate in Dubai. The post was later deleted, but not before it garnered over 1,00,000 views.  

An archived version can be seen here.

Several social media users shared the same visuals. One of them can be viewed here:  

Fact Check

A reverse image search led us to the original TikTok post by a user named tipserinjo from March 2, 2026. The video explicitly included a disclaimer stating that it contains AI-generated media.

So, the video in question is artificially curated and does not depict real-time footage.

Claim IV

On Saturday, February 28, a missile reportedly struck the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ elementary school in Minab in southern Iran. Iranian state media reported that at least 168 people — most of them schoolchildren — were killed in the bombing, while nearly 100 others were injured.

Soon after this, an image started circulating online showing several shrouded bodies with framed photographs placed on top, with mourners appear to be grieving over them. The picture is being shared with the claim that it shows the funeral of the girls killed in the attack.

Chris Hazzard, a Sinn Féin MP from the UK, shared the image on X, suggesting in his caption that it depicted the funeral of the 165 girls killed by US/Israel.

The post amassed around 224,000 views. 

Indian news outlet The Telegraph India (@ttindia) also shared the same image on X, asserting that it showed the mass funeral of 165 Iranian girls killed in a US-Israel attack. 

Similarly, local media outlet NewsTrack used the purported image without citing a credible source. The report is titled, “165 little buds buried in the soil during the funeral processions of more than 160 school girls in Iran.” 

Several social media users have shared and reposted the image across platforms with similar claims. 

Fact Check

A closer look at the image revealed multiple inconsistencies typical of artificially generated images.

First, two of the photo frames visible in the image that are placed over two different shrouded bodies have the same girl’s picture. This is an anomaly that strongly suggests that the image is synthetically generated. 

Second, all the other pictures in the photo frames are distorted with visible facial feature deformity. Again, in two places, two burqa-clad women are seen mourning over a corpse in a highly unnatural manner. In one of these photos, the facial features of at least one woman in distorted.

To further substantiate our findings, we scanned the picture using the AI detection tool Hive Moderation, which indicated that the image was 99% AI-generated.

To sum up, the image showing the shrouded bodies claiming to show the mass funeral of school girls is artificially generated.

Claim V

An image of a massive explosion and plumes of smoke rising into the sky is being widely circulated with claims that it shows a US base in Erbil.

An X user, Ashok Kumar (@broseph_stalin), shared the purported image on March 2, 2026, claiming that “Iraqi resistance lit up the US occupation base in Erbil, Iraq.” 

The post has garnered over 24,000 views. 

Another account, Pakistan Strategic Forum (@ForumStrategic), also shared the image, claiming that the ammunition storage was struck at the US base in Ebril. 

The post amassed around 32,000 views. 

Several other accounts have shared the image with similar claims, suggesting it is authentic and shows actual visuals of the impact. 

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Fact Check

The unusually good quality of the image and the sharp contrast raise doubts about its authenticity. 

A keyword search led us to posts on X which contained photos showing the Drone attack targeting Erbil International Airport. For example, this post by an independent news outlet: 

When we compared the viral photo with those, it appeared that the original image might have been upscaled using an AI generative tool. A comparison is shown below:

To confirm, we processed the image through Google Gemini, which identified that it was either generated or edited using Google AI. The image contains a digital watermark called SynthID, which is used to identify content created with Google’s AI tools.

SynthID is an invisible digital marker embedded in AI-generated content which enables platforms and researchers to detect that the content was produced by AI.

We would like to inform our readers that there are currently no conclusive reports regarding the impact on US ammunition storage in Erbil, Iraq. There have been reports of missile or drone attacks near the US base located close to Erbil International Airport, but no report has confirmed a strike on the ammunition storage itself.

To sum up, the image depicting a massive explosion in Erbil is digitally created or modified and does not represent real-time footage.

 

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