Israel's Channel 13 News mistakenly broadcast a clip taken from Star Wars as supposed war footage from Ukraine on Monday, Walla! reported on Tuesday. The "footage"– which at first appears to fit the overall combat setting of snow-covered terrain in the embattled country – eventually shows in one of the frames people who are playing stormtroopers, the fictional soldiers from Star Wars.
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It's unclear why the network made this error, but the most likely explanation is that this clip was deliberately placed within actual war footage or that it was bought from some third-party aggregator. It appears that the fake footage was first spread by a Telegram channel that has been covering the ongoing conflict.
הזיית ההזיות. סרטון מתוך ״מלחמת הכוכבים״ נכנס לדיווחים של חדשות 13 מאוקראינה. הסרטון אתמול במהדורה ובהיום שהיה, ואולי בעוד תוכניות. pic.twitter.com/n3enckupFS
— 🟢 קרן אור (@0bgIpKtjmOpzNOP) March 1, 2022
Further analysis of the fake footage shows that it was in fact a mashup of two genres: highway cameras from Russia and the Star Wars franchise. The Israeli outlet has yet to officially acknowledge the error, despite it being on the evening newscast and on other primetime slots.
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