Image of Israeli soldiers posing with black-and-white ISIS flag is altered | Fact check

Chris Mueller, USA TODAY
Updated ·3 min read
5

The claim: Image shows Israeli soldiers posing with ISIS flag

A March 7 Facebook post (direct link, archive link) appears to show a group of Israeli soldiers holding two flags: an Israeli flag and an ISIS flag.

"ISIS was created and funded by Mossad and the CIA," reads the post's caption. "Israel treated ISIS fighters in their hospitals and John McCain met with their leader and supplied weapons."

The image also appeared on X, formerly Twitter, where it was reposted thousands of times.

More from the Fact-Check Team: How we pick and research claims | Email newsletter | Facebook page

Our rating: Altered

The original image shows the soldiers posing with a green-and-yellow flag, not the ISIS flag.

Image shows Israeli soldiers during Africa training exercise

The image has been altered to make it appear as if the soldiers are posing with the black-and-white flag used by the Islamic militant group ISIS.

The original image was posted on June 5, 2023, on X by the Israel Defense Forces. It shows the soldiers holding a green-and-yellow flag, not the ISIS flag.

"A delegation of 12 fighters and commanders from the Golani patrol unit left yesterday for the 'African Lion 2023' exercise led by the land arm that is taking place in Morocco," reads a translation of the Hebrew caption of the X post, according to Google Translate.

The Times of Israel also published the original image on June 5, 2023, with an article about Israel sending troops to participate in a U.S.-led training exercise known as "African Lion." In 2023, the training exercise happened between May 13 and June 18 in Ghana, Morocco, Senegal and Tunisia.

The green-and-yellow flag in the original image appears to be associated with the Israel Defense Force's Golani Brigade. Similar flags have appeared in other images of soldiers from the unit.

Fact check: No, Nike didn't make the Israeli flag shoe circulating online

ISIS, also known as the Islamic State group, is a militant organization that fully emerged in 2014 from what remained of al-Qaida in Iraq, according to the Wilson Center, a nonpartisan foreign policy think tank based in Washington D.C.

At one point, the group controlled about a third of Syria and 40% of Iraq, but had lost nearly all of its territory by the end of 2017, a Wilson Center timeline says.

Other parts of the post are also false.

In 2014, the late Sen. John McCain was accused of posing for a photo with "ISIS fighters," but the left-leaning political group that made the claim was not able to back it up, The Arizona Republic reported. The photo in question was taken in 2013 when McCain met with Syrian rebels – not ISIS fighters – fighting a civil war against President Bashar Assad's regime.

And while an Iraqi deputy prime minister suggested in 2014 that the CIA created ISIS, there is no credible news reporting to back up this assertion. The New York Times referred to the deputy prime minister's claims as "conspiracy theories." There is likewise no credible news reporting about Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service, being involved in the creation of ISIS.

USA TODAY reached out to the social media user who shared the post for comment but did not immediately receive a response.

Lead Stories and Check Your Fact also debunked the claim.

Our fact-check sources:

Thank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or e-newspaperhere.

USA TODAY is a verified signatory of theInternational Fact-Checking Network, which requires a demonstrated commitment tononpartisanship, fairness and transparency. Our fact-check work is supported in part by a grant fromMeta.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Image of Israeli soldiers holding an ISIS flag is altered | Fact check