A fleet of helicopters flying over Moscow’s Red Square, transporting French humanitarian aid to Palestine in the context of the war between Israel and Hamas? This is the surprising scenario that a video posted on TikTok accumulating several hundred thousand views.
The images show several dozen rows of military helicopters flying over the Cathedral of Saint Basil the Blessed on Red Square in Moscow, Russia. A sentence in English informs: “Watch the humanitarian planes leave France”, followed by emojis of the French flag and the Palestinian flag.
FAKE OFF
These images do not show a fleet of French helicopters transporting humanitarian aid to Palestine. The video was filmed in 2021, during rehearsals for the annual Russian army parade.
The fact that dozens of French helicopters are flying over the most important square in Russia with humanitarian equipment on board heading towards Palestine seems surprising to say the least.
The actual context of these images is less convoluted. When we look at the origin of this sequence, it appears that it was extracted from a longer video, posted on YouTube on May 5, 2021 named (in Russian) “Rehearsal for the 2021 Victory Parade “. This is also what a BBC journalist specializing in the fight against disinformation demonstrated on her account.
The video shows the “Rehearsal of the aerial part of the Victory Parade over Moscow” on “May 5, 2021,” as its description states. The YouTube channel, called “rusknight”, which posts numerous videos of planes in flight, appears to be that of an aviation enthusiast, who also has an Instagram account of the same name.
These helicopters are therefore those of the Russian army, which is rehearsing in anticipation of the parade on May 9, “Victory Day” which celebrates Russia’s victory over Nazi Germany.
100 million euros in French humanitarian aid for Palestine
If these images are false, France does indeed provide humanitarian aid to Palestine, particularly since the war following the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023.
As announced during the “International Humanitarian Conference” on November 9, 2023, France has committed 100 million euros for humanitarian aid to the Palestinian territories, in particular via UN agencies and NGOs on site. Several humanitarian flights have already made it possible to transport medical equipment such as medicines and emergency medical kits to the Gaza Strip or Egypt.