On October 10, the sound of multiple explosions was heard in Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul. The Taliban government and local Afghan media claimed these were airstrikes. The Taliban government blamed Pakistan for these alleged airstrikes. In this context, a video has been circulated on social media with the headline, ‘America bombed Kabul, Afghanistan, from a Pakistani American Airbus!’.
See posts circulated on Facebook with this claim here (archive) and here (archive).
Fact-check
An investigation by the Rumor Scanner team found that the circulated video is not from Kabul, Afghanistan; rather, it is of the bombing during India’s Operation Sindoor in Pakistan last May.
An investigation into this matter found a match between the viral video and a video posted on the TikTok account of the Australian media outlet ‘sbsnews_au’ on May 7.
The video’s caption states that on Wednesday, May 7, sounds of several powerful explosions were heard in various locations in Pakistan and Pakistan-administered Kashmir. India stated that it had attacked “terrorist infrastructure” in nine locations, while Pakistan announced it would respond. Eyewitnesses reported that power supply was cut off in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-administered Kashmir, after the explosions. However, the cause of these explosions was not immediately clear. Citing a Pakistani security official, it was stated that early on Wednesday, May 7, India fired missiles across the border into Pakistan-administered territory in at least three locations, killing one child and injuring two others. Tensions have reached a peak between the two nuclear-armed neighbors following a militant attack on tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir last month. India blamed Pakistan for that attack, but Islamabad denied the allegation.
Subsequently, the same video with similar information was also found on the website of the Irish media outlet ‘The Irish Sun’. At that time, several international media outlets published news reports (1 , 2, 3) on the matter.
Therefore, the video is not from Kabul, Afghanistan.
So, a video of a bombing in Pakistan last May has been shared with the claim that it shows a recent Pakistani bombing in Kabul, Afghanistan; which is false.
