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REL: Iran uses old footage in reporting on conflict with Israel

2025-06-21 22:20:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

As tensions in the Middle East continue to rise, Iranian state media is recycling old visual content — from Russian missile launches to Pakistani drone debris — to present a distorted picture of the conflict with Israel.

Videos and photos showing drone strikes, explosions and missile strikes have been taken out of context and reused to support false narratives.

On June 13, the first day of the conflict, Iranian state broadcaster IRIB TV1 showed dramatic footage of missiles exploding over the sea, accompanied by images of pro-government rallies and commentary on the ongoing hostilities.

However, these images had no apparent connection to Iran.

A simple "reverse image search" of the first image of the video takes you to a YouTube channel called Navy Lookout, which had published the same video in March 2022, identifying it as Russian missile launches in the Black Sea.

After this video was broadcast in Iran on June 13, it was shared several times on social media the next day, falsely presenting itself as footage of Iranian missile launches.

A week later, the same TV channel went even further, using silent footage of an Israeli attack on Iran — filmed near Lake Chitgar in Tehran and published on June 16 — while talking about Iranian attacks on Israel with long-range missiles.

Footage from Ukraine and Pakistan
IRIB TV1 is not the only state channel using old footage. PressTV, the English-language channel run by the Iranian state, has published at least two recycled photos, falsely presenting them as footage from the current conflict.

On June 17, PressTV published a photo of a downed drone with the caption: "Israeli drone downed near Natanz nuclear facility."

Natanz is one of Iran's nuclear facilities that was reportedly targeted by Israeli strikes last week.

But this photo had already circulated a month ago in Pakistani media and was accompanied by the claim that the Pakistani military had shot down an Israeli-made drone launched from India.

A day later, PressTV published another photo on the X account, showing smoke rising from multiple explosions over a city skyline, with the caption "Tel Aviv, now."

Although the photo is new — it first appeared on June 17 — it does not show Tel Aviv, but another Russian attack on Ukraine, distributed by Ukrainian media and several social media accounts.

In addition to state media, several private accounts — including some claiming to be affiliated with the state — have also circulated old footage from Ukraine, falsely presenting it as scenes from Israel, including manipulated videos or images generated with artificial intelligence./ REL