Claim: Al Jazeera reported “Pakistan provides air corridor for US military flights to and from Afghanistan”.
Fact: Al Jazeera did not confirm the news. The Al Jazeera logo and headline have been doctored onto the image to make it look like a screenshot from Al Jazeera TV.
On 2 August 2022, US President Joe Biden announced that Al-Qaeda leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri had been killed via a CIA operated drone. Questions were raised regarding the route of the aircraft. Some analysts have speculated that Pakistan may have provided airspace for the drone, however, the news has not been confirmed by any US or Pakistani authorities.
In this context, an image which includes an Al Jazeera logo, a picture of Biden with some advisors, and a headline stating that “Pakistan provided an air corridor for US military flights” went viral on social media. However, this image has been doctored.
Fact or Fiction?
Soch Fact Check conducted a TinEye Reverse Image Search of the screenshot and found multiple articles that include the photograph of Biden which were first shared on 2 August 2022. According to Fox News, the image is from a meeting with President Biden and his national security team prior to the attack. It was captured on 1 July 2022 and released by the White House. The Reverse Image search did not turn up any images containing the Al Jazeera headline. Furthermore, Al Jazeera has not published any articles corroborating this claim.
Soch Fact Check reached out to a correspondent from Al Jazeera to confirm whether the news organization has reported on the matter. The correspondent, who requested to remain anonymous due to restrictions on speaking to the media, responded, “Al Jazeera did not confirm the news! An image was shown from a screenshot and the social media went ballistic by quoting Al Jazeera.”
Virality
Soch Fact Check conducted a CrowdTangle analysis for the 30-day period since 16 July to 15 August using the following search terms:
- “Pakistan air corridor military flights”
The search term turned up 31,605 interactions across 436 posts. It has been shared here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here. A South China Morning Post article has also been cited in digital news such as infonomic.pk and Global Village Space. The latter states, “Multiple international reports are emerging claiming that Pakistan allowed the US to use its airspace to carry out a drone attack in Afghanistan.”
The screenshot has also made rounds on Twitter. It was shared by current affairs host, Imran Riaz Khan, receiving 30,100 likes, 14,100 retweets and 1,107 quote tweets. It was also shared on Twitter with the hashtag #AbsolutelyYes, #BajwaSoldTheNation. Tweets with the viral screenshot and following news can be found here, here, here, here.
Conclusion: Al Jazeera did not report that Pakistan provided airspace for the US drone strike on Al-Qaeda leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri on 2 August 2022. The image in question has been doctored to look like a screenshot from Al Jazeera TV.
The only to airspaces are available which leads to Afghanistan “Pakistan and Iran” and Iran can never provide his airspace to America for drone attack in Afghanistan,so it is cleared that the Pakistan has provided his airspace for drone attack.
It is possible……
The Taliban’s interim Defence Minister Mullah Yaqub on Sunday has claimed that the United States drones were entering the war-torn country through Pakistan.
While narrating the one-year performance of the ministry alongside Army Chief Mullah Fasih Uddin and the spokesperson of the ministry at a press conference in Kabul, Yaqub said: “We hadn’t caught all routes of the drones but our intelligence reported that the United States drones were entering through Pakistan.”
#etribune #news #latest #Taliban #Afghanistan #USDrones #MullahYaqub
[…] our fact-check published on 16 August 2022, we concluded that the image had been doctored as a reverse image search did not turn up any […]