On February 28, the United States and Israel carried out missile attacks in various places in Iran, including the capital Tehran. In response to this incident, Iran launched retaliatory missile attacks on US bases in the Middle East. Following this, a video claiming that “Iran’s revenge has turned Tel Aviv into a ghost town, look at the scale of this massive destruction” has been circulated on social media.
See the posts circulated on Facebook with the said claim here (Archive), here (Archive), here (Archive), and here (Archive).
Fact Check
The Rumor Scanner team’s investigation reveals that the circulated video is not of Iran’s attack on the city of Tel Aviv, Israel. In reality, a video of the damage caused by the earthquake that occurred in Turkey in 2023 has been circulated with the discussed claim.
Investigating this matter, a video broadcast on February 6, 2023, titled ‘The devastation and screams in Kahramanmaras were caught on camera like this.’ (translated) was found on the YouTube channel of the Turkish media ‘T24’. The first 9 seconds of the said video match the video circulated with the discussed claim.
According to the description of the video, a 7.4 magnitude earthquake struck the Pazarcik district of Kahramanmaras, Turkey. Numerous buildings were destroyed in the center of Kahramanmaras city in the earthquake.
Investigating further on this matter, it is known from a report published on Reuters’ website on February 6, 2023, that more than 3,700 people were killed in a massive earthquake in Turkey and northwest Syria that day. The 7.8 magnitude earthquake wiped out entire apartment blocks in Turkish cities and piled more devastation on millions of Syrians displaced by years of war.
At that time, other media outlets also published news (1, 2, 3) regarding this.
Therefore, a video of earthquake damage in Turkey in 2023 has been circulated as scenes of Iran’s attack on Tel Aviv, Israel, which is false.