A video (here, here, and here) is circulating on social media, claiming that Israel’s capital, Tel Aviv, is on fire due to a suicide drone barrage initiated by Yemen. The footage shows burning buses and is being shared in connection with the recent attacks on Israel. Let’s investigate the truth behind this video.
Claim: Visuals of recent Yemen suicide drone attack on Israel’s capital, Tel Aviv.
Fact: This video shows buses burning at the Safed bus station in Israel on 10 June 2022. A gang from Tova-Zangrieh, posing as a security company, is suspected of the incident. These visuals are not related to the recent Yemen drone attack on Tel Aviv, Israel. Hence, the claim is MISLEADING.
To uncover the truth behind this claim, we conducted a reverse image search on Google. Our search led us to a Facebook handle called Real Time Report, which shared the same video on 11 June 2022. The post, captioned in Hebrew, stated that nearly 20 buses caught fire at the central station in Safed, a city in Israel.
For further research, we used keywords from the Facebook post to search on Google, which led us to a report from the Israeli media outlet Ynet about the same incident. According to the report, a large fire broke out late at night on Friday, 10 June 2022, at the central bus station in Safed, damaging 18 buses. It is suspected that a gang from Tova-Zangrieh, posing as a security company, is responsible for the arson. The burned buses belonged to a Nazareth-based company that had previously faced harassment.
Furthermore, Al Jazeera Arabic channel also reported the same incident, stating that 18 buses caught fire at the Safed bus station on Saturday morning, 11 June 2022.
A comparison between the viral video and Google Street View of the Safed Central bus station platforms indicates that both locations are the same. Additionally, Safed is approximately at a distance of 171 kilometres from Tel Aviv.
On 26 September 2024, the Yemen Houthis claimed they had attacked the Israeli cities of Tel Aviv and Ashkelon, as well as three US Navy warships, using missiles and drones.
To sum up, an old video showing buses burning at the Safed bus station in Israel is being shared as footage of a recent suicide drone attack by Yemen on Tel Aviv.
