In a recent video widely circulated online, Israel’s top justices and its attorney general are seen being dragged by security guards from a chaotic anti-government protest that never took place. The 33 seconds of emotionally-charged footage was originally posted by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a fierce opponent of the judiciary, and triggered an immediate backlash. Critics said it incited violence, while supporters said it was justified because they accuse the leaders of Israel’s legal system of a left-wing plot to stymie the government’s policies.
But the depicted scenes are fake — no such protest took place and the video carries a tell-tale watermark to identify content made using artificial intelligence. Smotrich’s post was just the latest example of a deluge of AI-crafted distortions that are saturating the Israeli information environment just weeks before the country’s most consequential elections in decades.
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