After long hours of research, the death of Ebrahim Raïssi and his Minister of Foreign Affairs in a helicopter accident were finally made official this Monday, May 20 in the morning. None of the eight passengers on the plane survived. While the accident theory is favored, many conspiracy theories are circulating on social networks. The most widely shared claims, using false information, that India was at the origin of this crash.
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“ Ukrainian secret services are the culprits “, ” It’s definitely Mossad’s fault. “, ” the United States is responsible »: conspiracy theories around the death of the Iranian president are multiplying on social networks in recent hours. One of them claims, without any proof, that India assassinated Ebrahim Raïssi on the orders of Israel.
“ #BREAKING: Info Alert. According to reports, Iranian intelligence and special forces raided the Indian embassy in Tehran. Iran has been informed by unknown sources that India may act on behalf of Israel to assassinate Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. » In a few hours, this message published on X, formerly Twitter, accumulated nearly 850,000 views.
As proof, the Internet user behind this theory published a photo in which we see at least three soldiers advancing discreetly behind a building, in the darkness. Only verification made, this cliché has nothing to do with Iran or India. Thanks to a reverse image search, we found it published in a Reuters article, from June 2021. By consulting the caption, we learn that this photo actually shows an exercise carried out by German special forces (KSK), in Putgarten, Germany, on September 28, 2015.
A fake news pushed by Pakistani accounts
A few hours later, the same Twitter account did it again and claimed that a senior Indian diplomat on the run had just been arrested in Iran. “ One of India’s top diplomats, Sanjeev Mandia, from the Indian embassy in Tehran, tried to escape from Iran. He was arrested at the gate of Tehran International Airport by Iranian intelligence services and transferred to a secure location », he says in a post seen more than 31,000 times. The photo he shared shows a handcuffed man on his knees, surrounded by two soldiers.
But again, this is a crude attempt at manipulation. This photo appears in various online articles published at the end of 2022. It actually shows an Islamic State (IS) militant arrested by Iraqi counterterrorism services in 2022.
Although several Internet users have reported these misleading publications, the conspiracy theory of India’s involvement in the accident continues to spread on social networks, pushed in particular by pro-Pakistani accounts.
