Old video shows US Army arriving in Romania, not Marines landing in Israel
FILE - A Romanian policeman watches as U.S. military personnel attend a transfer of authority ceremony from the 101st Airborne Division to the 10th Mountain Division in Bucharest, Romania, Wednesday, April 5, 2023. In October 2023, social media users are sharing an old clip of U.S. soldiers in Romania, falsely claiming it shows Marines landing in Israel. (AP Photo/Andreea Alexandru)
CLAIM: A video shows U.S. Marines arriving in Israel amid the latest Israel-Hamas war.
AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. The video is from 2022 and shows soldiers from the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division arriving in Romania.
THE FACTS: As Israel plans to launch a ground war in Gaza, social media users are sharing an old and unrelated clip to suggest that U.S. troops will be involved.
The video shows soldiers dressed in fatigues getting off of a plane at night, carrying their belongings and walking across the tarmac.
One post with the video on X, formerly known as Twitter, has more than 9,000 likes with text that reads: “HAPPENING NOW: Thousands of U.S. Marines Just Landed in Israel WW3 HIGH ALERT”
However, the video doesn’t show Marines nor Israel, and it isn’t recent.
The original can be found on the Defense Department’s media distribution website, which says it shows U.S. Army soldiers arriving in Romania in June last year. “101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) Soldiers arrive in Mihail Kogainiceani, Romania, June 28, 2022,” reads the video’s description.
The site says the unit was there “to reinforce NATO’s eastern flank” and conduct multinational exercises with allies across Europe.
Hours after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel, the U.S. did begin moving warships and aircrafts to the region.
The Pentagon said last week it sent the USS Bataan amphibious ready group, which consists of three ships carrying thousands of Marines from the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit. The ships carry helicopters and assault craft that can insert Marines into hostile territory or provide medical care or other assistance.
This week, the Pentagon sent military advisors, including Marine Corps Lt. Gen. James Glynn, to Israel to aid in its war planning.
The U.S. Army declined a request for comment and a U.S. Marine spokesperson declined to comment further about deployments in the region.
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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.
