Old AI-Generated Visual Falsely Shared As Israel Wildfires

Claim

A viral image claiming to show Israel being devastated by wildfires that broke out on Wednesday, prompting police to shut the main Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway and evacuate thousands of people from nearby communities.

The archived version of the post can be seen here, which has clocked 411.3K views so far.

Fact

Newschecker first ran a reverse image search, which led us to this 11-second video shared on X on January 12, 2025 by Arabic news outlet BasNews, stating that it showed wildfires ravaging Los Angeles. A series of destructive wildfires affected the Los Angeles metropolitan area and San Diego County in California from January 7 to January 31 this year.

A comparison of a screengrab (right) with the viral photo (left) confirms that they are from the same video.

 A further search led us to the video first uploaded on Facebook on January 10, 2025, by SoyLand.AI with the hashtag #aiart, along with the caption stating that it depicts the fire in Los Angeles. The description of the page stated that it created AI content, indicating that the video was AI-generated.

We ran the video past Hive Moderation, an AI-content detection tool, which stated that it was 98.9% likely to contain AI-generated or deepfake content, further confirming the viral visual to be AI-generated.

Also Read: Pakistan Army Chief At The Front Lines? No, Viral Video Is Edited From Old Footage

UPDATE ON 06/05/2025

Claim

Video claiming to show the wildfires devastating Israel.

The archived version of the post can be seen here, which has clocked 829.3K views so far.

Fact

Newschecker ran a reverse image search of keyframes, which led us to a longer version of the same video shared on Facebook by a Trinidad-based media outlet on January 18, 2025, stating that it showed a massive fire that broke out at the Royal Yak Casino in Culiacán, Sinaloa, (which is in Mexico), starting at the Trampoline Park business and spreading to the casino at the Cinepolis shopping plaza.

A relevant search led us to a January 17, 2025 Daily Mail report on the fire, stating that a short circuit caused the fire that destroyed a casino and an indoor children’s park in western Mexico. A similar Times Now report, dated January 17, 2025, further confirms that the viral video is from Mexico and not related to the Israel wildfires that broke out on April 30, 2025

Source
X post, BasNews, January 12, 2025
Facebook reel, SoyLand.AI, January 10, 2025
Hive Moderation tool
Facebook post, Tringlobe Media, January 18, 2025
Daily Mail report, January 17, 2025