Claim: A widely shared 36‑second clip was presented as footage of Iranian missiles hitting a US military base during renewed US–Iran fighting in July 2026.
Findings: AFP traced the video to a July 29, 2020 Instagram post by the Kuwait Fire Force showing a warehouse blaze in Sulaibiya caused by exploding air‑conditioning/refrigerant gas canisters; local Kuwaiti outlets reported the same. The footage is unrelated to the recent escalation.
Social media posts circulating during renewed US–Iran hostilities in July 2026 falsely presented a 36‑second clip as footage of Iranian missiles striking a US military base in the Gulf. In reality, AFP verification traced the video to a July 29, 2020 Instagram post by the Kuwait Fire Force documenting a warehouse blaze in Sulaibiya caused by air‑conditioning/refrigerant gas canisters.
The clip — viewed more than 46,000 times on some platforms — shows a large nighttime fire with heavy smoke and emergency crews at the scene. The video was reposted with captions in Thai, English and Arabic claiming it showed an attack on a major US base as fighting resumed between the United States and Iran following a collapsed ceasefire in July 2026.
Source: A reverse image and keyframe search led AFP to the Kuwait Fire Force's official Instagram account, where the identical clip was posted on July 29, 2020. The original post — and contemporaneous local reporting — attributes the blaze to exploding refrigerant/air‑conditioning gas canisters in a warehouse.
Local reporting: Kuwaiti outlets including Dasman News and Kuwait Times reported on July 29, 2020 that several refrigerant cylinders exploded during the fire in the agricultural Sulaibiya area and noted that the warehouses were operating in violation of their agricultural licence.
At the time the video was reshared in 2026, tensions had escalated between Washington and Tehran, with attacks and reprisals affecting shipping lanes, Gulf allies and military bases across the region. The viral clip was misused to inflame perceptions of the conflict, but it is not connected to any recent Houthi or Iran‑linked strikes.
Short, dramatic footage is easy to recontextualize for current events, especially amid fast‑moving crises. Misleading captions, cross‑posting across platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Telegram and others), and translations into multiple languages increased the clip's reach and false impact.
• Check reverse image and keyframe searches (Google, InVID)
• Look for original posts on official agency or local authority accounts
• Confirm dates and local reporting from trusted outlets
• Be wary of posts that provide a dramatic claim without a credible source
Bottom line: The viral 36‑second video does not show Iranian missiles hitting a US base. It documents a 2020 warehouse fire in Kuwait caused by exploding air‑conditioning/refrigerant cylinders, corroborated by the Kuwait Fire Force and Kuwaiti news reports.
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