After Iran's Revolutionary Guards said they had struck US military targets in Bahrain in July 2026, social media posts recirculated an old video falsely claiming it showed a massive fire at a US base in Bahrain. The footage actually depicts a fire at a market in St. Petersburg, Russia, in December 2025.
Misleading: The video is old and does not depict a recent U.S. attack on facilities or sites belonging to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Misbar's team found that the original video was posted on social media in April 2025, claiming to show an ammunition depot explosion in Kirzhach, Russia's Vladimir Oblast.
Claim: A video is claimed to show Iran attacking secret American facilities in response to a US attack in Bandar Abbas.
Fact: The video actually shows a massive fire at Pravoberezhnny Market in St Petersburg, Russia on 10 December 2025
The video is a fabrication. Al Jazeera has not published any investigation on this topic. In reality, UK, France, and Germany have led an international coalition countering Iran's blockade and pushing for the restoration of freedom of navigation.
Did Russian President Vladimir Putin say "Don't dare to touch the Strait of Hormuz" on April 1, 2026? No, that's not true: The posts attributing those words to him originated from self-described satire and parody accounts. The fake story was spreading across social media platforms paired with a well-known video meme showing Putin walking.
With the Pentagon potentially seeking a $200 billion supplemental package to fund the ongoing war with Iran, President Donald Trump defended that figure in part by saying U.S. ammunition "was taken down by giving so much to Ukraine." He then exaggerated the amount of aid to Ukraine and falsely said that former President Joe Biden "didn't rebuild anything" in the defense stockpile. Trump has a point that the military assistance provided to Ukraine reduced the U.S. reserve of weapons. But that aid largely has not affected the military operations in Iran, defense experts told us. Furthermore, Biden signed multiple spending bills passed by Congress that included funding to replace the older weapons that the U.S. gave to Ukraine with new items. Experts also told us that Biden's administration put money into increasing the production of munitions for the military.
In reality, the video features a woman talking about anti-government protests in Iran. Propaganda edited the footage and faked the heroine's voice using AI.
In March 2026, a rumor circulated online that Russian President Vladimir Putin posted (archived) on X that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu died in an airstrike. [...] However, the post originated from the X account @MrputinSpoof (archived) - not the Russian president. The account's bio identifies it as a "fan/commentary page" and the handle itself includes the word spoof, which Merriam-Webster defines as "a light humorous parody." Therefore, we found the post originated as satire.
Footage of a drone strike on a building has been shared on social media with false claims it shows a recent Iranian attack on Bahrain. But it actually predates the recent conflict in the Middle East and shows a Russian attack on Ukraine.
An unrelated video of a Russian drone attack on Kyiv in January 2026 is being falsely shared as visuals of an Iranian strike targeting a residential building in Manama, Bahrain.