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X posts
stated on September 28, 2024 in an X post:
Video shows “the bunker-busting bombs that ended the lives of (Hassan) Nasrallah and Hezbollah’s leadership.”
true false
Smoke rises from Israeli airstrikes in Beirut's southern suburbs in Lebanon, Sept. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar) Smoke rises from Israeli airstrikes in Beirut's southern suburbs in Lebanon, Sept. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Smoke rises from Israeli airstrikes in Beirut's southern suburbs in Lebanon, Sept. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Jeff Cercone
By Jeff Cercone September 29, 2024

Video compilation doesn’t show deadly airstrikes on Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah

If Your Time is short

  • Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed at night in an Israeli airstrike Sept. 27 in a Beirut, Lebanon, suburb.

  • Social media videos that claim to show Israeli bombs striking buildings with Nasrallah and other Hezbollah leadership inside were taken in daylight, and many are from earlier bombings in Gaza.

Hezbollah confirmed Sept. 28 that its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was killed a day earlier in an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon.

Israel conducted the strike Sept. 27 at Hezbollah’s central headquarters under residential buildings in Dahiya, a Beirut suburb. 

An X video compilation posted Sept. 28 that had amassed more than 1.8 million views as of Sept. 29 shows clips of 17 buildings being hit by bombs and claimed to show the moment the airstrike that killed Nasrallah and other Hezbollah leaders landed.

"VIEWER DISCRETION: Moments of arrival for all the bunker-busting bombs that ended the lives of Nasrallah and Hezbollah’s leadership in their fortified underground bases," the post said. 

We found other social media posts sharing the video and claiming it was of the airstrike that killed Nasrallah, or saying the footage was filmed in Lebanon

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The compilation’s first clip, shared on X, shows men and boys standing on a street corner looking at a building in the background that suddenly went up in flames after an airstrike. The video also shows multiple buildings struck by bombs.

But the claim that this was the moment Nasrallah was killed doesn’t stand up under scrutiny.

First, all of the X post’s footage was shot in daylight. The Sept. 27 airstrike on Hezbollah’s headquarters happened at night. Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Daniel Hagari said in a video shared Sept. 28 that the strike took place "last night." News photos of the aftermath of the bombing show that the airstrike happened at night.

Second, a reverse-image search of several of the clips shows they are from airstrikes in Gaza.

(X screenshot)

We found the first clip in the video had been shared Aug. 18 by the Anadolu Agency, a Turkish state-run news agency, on its English-language X account.

The Anadolu X post said the footage captured the "moment of Israeli army’s attack on Zagout family’s home in Nuseirat Camp" in Gaza. The post linked to an Anadolu article about Israeli attacks in August that killed 16 people, including at the Nuseirat refugee camp. 

We also found the same footage shared Aug. 18 on X on two other accounts that described it as being from Gaza.

The X video that claims it shows the strike on Nasralla also contains other footage of Gaza airstrikes, including:

Our ruling

An X post containing 17 video clips claimed to show the "moments" that Israel’s "bunker-busting bombs" arrived and "ended the lives of Nasrallah and Hezbollah’s leadership."

Israel said and news photos show that the strikes that killed the Hezbollah leader happened at night; all the footage in the X post was shot in daylight. We found eight of the clips elsewhere on social media and they were taken in June, July and August in Gaza.

We rate the claim False.

Our Sources

X post, Sept. 28, 2024

Anadolu English, X post, Aug. 18, 2024

Anadolu Agency, Facebook reel, Aug. 18, 2024

Anadolu Agency, Israeli attacks kill at least 16 people in battered Gaza, Aug. 18, 2024

Palestine Info Center, X post, Aug. 18, 2024

TRT Haber, X post, Aug. 18, 2024

Reuters, Body of Hezbollah leader has been recovered, sources say, Sept. 29, 2024

The Associated Press, Hezbollah confirms its leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli airstrike, Sept. 28, 2024

The Associated Press, Israel strikes Hezbollah in a huge blast targeting the militant group’s leader, Sept. 27, 2024

Axios, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah killed in Israeli airstrike, Sept. 28, 2024

Daniel Hagari, Israel Defense Forces spokesperson, X post, Sept. 28, 2024

Facebook post, Aug. 17, 2024

X post, July 27, 2024

X post, June 3, 2024

X post, Dec. 4, 2024

X post, Dec. 4, 2024

Instagram post, Aug. 11, 2024

Instagram post, Feb. 15, 2024

X post, Aug. 27, 2024

Digital Forensics, Research and Analytics Centre (D-FRAC), Multiple videos from Gaza explosion falsely linked with Israel-Lebanon conflict. Here’s the truth, Sept. 27, 2024

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More by Jeff Cercone

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Video compilation doesn’t show deadly airstrikes on Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah

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