Fact Check: Old video of Houthis bombing Saudi warship shared as attack on US Navy in Red Sea
The video shows an attack on a Saudi warship off Yemen’s coast in 2017
By Md Mahfooz Alam Published on 12 Jan 2024 12:11 PM GMT
Screengrabs from the post making the false claim. (Source: X/@cveks)
Hyderabad: In response to the attacks by Iran-backed Houthis, a Yemeni militia group, on ocean freights in the Red Sea, the United States and Britain have launched military strikes on more than a dozen sites used by the Iranian Houthis in Yemen.
The strikes are in retaliation for Houthis’ persistent campaign of drone and missile attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea, which began after Israel’s war in Gaza broke out.
Against this backdrop, a video showing an attack reportedly on a warship is in circulation on social media with the claim it shows Houthi rebels attacking a US warship. The video also shows a close-up visual of the ship carrying a helicopter and the sudden attack that followed.
“BREAKING: Houthis attacked and possibly destroyed US warship in Red Sea! (sic)” wrote an X premium account, War Report, while sharing the video.
(Source: X/@cveks)
Fact Check
NewsMeter found that the video shows an attack on a Saudi warship off Yemen’s coast in 2017.
On performing a reverse image search of the video’s keyframes, we came across an X thread from 2017 by user Joseph Dempsey. The first and third posts carried videos which showed the explosion on the warship as seen in the viral video. The caption of the third post stated that Saudi Arabia state media has confirmed that the Saudi warship Frigate was attacked by the three Houthi suicide boats.
The sixth post of the thread showed the same helicopter on the warship and the sudden attack via water, as seen in the viral video. The caption stated that the footage showed the moment the Saudi Frigate was attacked by the Houthi suicide boats.
On January 31, 2017, BBC published a video showing the same visual of the explosion in a report. The channel mentioned that footage of an attack on a Saudi warship off the western coast of Yemen was broadcast by the Houthi movement’s al-Masira TV channel. Sky News also published the footage on the same date, crediting it to Al-Masirah. The channel mentioned that the Saudi warship was reportedly attacked by Yemen’s Houthi suicide boats.
On February 7, 2017, Business Insider published a report stating that the footage showed the moment when Houthi rebels bombed a Saudi warship. The report carried the footage of the helicopter on the warship and the sudden attack via the water. Al Arabiya published the footage on February 6, 2017, confirming that the Saudi Frigate belonging to the Royal Saudi Navy was attacked by the militia while it was on surveillance patrol in the southern Red Sea.
Hence, we conclude that the viral video shows Houthis attacking a Saudi warship in 2017 in the Red Sea, not a US warship. The claim is misleading.
