An old video of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu whistling a tune inside a vehicle has recently been shared by Indian right-wing accounts with a false claim that it shows Netanyahu's reaction after the assassination of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah.
BOOM found that the video is unrelated to the airstrike in which Israel killed Nasrallah on September 28, 2024. The footage from March 2021 shows Netanyahu singing Likud’s anthem while seated in a car.
On September 30, 2024, the Associated Press reported that intensified Israeli strikes in Lebanon over the past week have resulted in the deaths of seven high-ranking commanders and officials from the influential Hezbollah militant group, including its leader, Hassan Nasrallah. This significant setback for Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed militia, has raised concerns about escalating conflict in the Middle East, as Lebanon’s most powerful military and political force now faces the challenge of recovering from the attack.
Amid this, multiple right-wing X accounts in India circulated the video, claiming that it shows Netanyahu's response to Nasrallah's death.
One verified X account, @epanchjanya, shared the video and wrote in Hindi, "Why is Netanyahu so happy? This video is said to be after the death of Hassan Nasrallah!" (Original Text in Hindi: नेतन्याहू इतने खुश क्यों हैं? हसन नसरल्लाह की मौत के बाद की ये वीडियो बताई जा रही है!)
Click here to view the post and here for an archive.
Other right-wing handles, including The Jaipur Dialogues and Baba Banaras, made similar claims while sharing the video.
Fact Check
BOOM ran a reverse image search using a keyframe from the viral video and came across a news report from the Israeli outlet Kikar, published on March 11, 2021, featuring the same footage.
The report in Hebrew stated that Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu is seen whistling his party Likud's anthem on March 10, 2021, while seated in a car.
It also added that Netanyahu engaged in discussions with his supporters while traveling in the car and streamed those conversations live on Facebook ahead of the elections that was held in 2021 in Israel.
One such live broadcast from March 9, 2021, can also be seen on Netanyahu's official Facebook profile.
Click here to view the post.
We also observed that the same video was uploaded to Netanyahu's official TikTok profile on March 11, 2021. The video has been captioned in Hebrew as, "Do you recognize the song?".
Click here to view an archived version of the post.
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