Note: The views and opinions expressed in blog/editorial posts are those of the author. They do not reflect the views or opinions of Misbar.
The proliferation of fake news covering the Ukrainian-Russian ongoing conflict has been remarkable.
On February 24, 2022, the Russian president Vladimir Putin ordained the beginning of a “special military intervention” that allowed a slew of Russian soldiers to target Ukraine by land, air, and sea. The operation, which has been described as an invasion, ended a period of significant peace that Europe enjoyed since World War II.
It took very little time for fake news, misinformation, and disinformation to inundate social networks.
Some of the photos and videos that were reported as pertaining to the Russian-Ukrainian crisis are, in fact, nothing but animated clips. A good example is a shared video claiming that it shows an explosion related to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine when in fact, it was an animated video shared on Instagram back in 2021.
A video purporting to show the bravery of a young Ukrainian girl in the face of a Russian soldier was one of the most shocking examples of fabricated evidence. The video, in fact, shows the Palestinian activist Ahed Tamimi as she bravely stood up to an Israeli soldier back in 2012. This incident was shocking to the Arab public opinion because Ahed Tamimi is an icon of resistance known throughout the Arab world.
Because of the pervasiveness of political violence and Israel's ongoing aggression against Palestinians, many other photos and videos that are circulating with the claim of documenting military interventions in Ukraine are Palestinian. For example, a photo that was claimed to show the bombing of Ukrainian military airports and depots is, in fact, a photo from an Israel-led airstrike on Gaza in 2021.
To be sure, a good proportion of the fake news surrounding the ongoing conflict has, in fact, relied on the systemic recycling of old photos and videos by recontextualizing them. One of the photos that were used within the context of the Russian military invasion of Ukraine is a photo of children emotionally bidding farewell to a Ukrainian tank. The photo, however, proved to date back to a conflict that took place in 2016.
Several statements were also falsely attributed to politicians and government officials. Some false claims have even been shared by very trustworthy sources, making discerning what is true from false extremely difficult. For example, news of Turkey banning Russian warships from the Black Sea was widely shared. The Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted to officially thank his Turkish counterpart President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, for an action that never took place.
There was also a video shared claiming to expose the staging of a film that falsely features victims of a Russian airstrike. Misbar’s investigation revealed that the video is, in fact, old and shows climate change activists who were protesting creatively in Austria.
The spread of misinformation will undoubtedly continue as the tension between Ukraine and Russia develops.
