What was claimed
Video footage shows firefights between Israel and Iran.
Our verdict
False. The videos are from the war simulation game, Arma 3.
AAP FACTCHECK - Footage supposedly showing aerial warfare from the frontlines of the Iran-Israel conflict is going viral on social media.
But experts say several telltale signs, including the military equipment featured and visual anomalies, indicate the clips are from video games and don't depict real events.
The videos appeared after Iran and Israel began trading missile strikes in June 2025.
One X post features a video of a fighter jet firing a missile while an anti-aircraft gun returns fire.
“BREAKING: Terror in the skies over Israel as Iranians fire at Israelie [sic] defense jets,” the caption says.
A reverse image search traces the footage back to a 2022 YouTube video, which the description says is from military combat game Arma 3.
A Facebook video shows an aircraft flying over water before being shot down by a turret on land.
"Iran Army Shooting at Israeli F-35…" the caption says.
Footage showing a missile being fired at an aircraft with Persian text reading "long live the Iranian army" has been posted on Instagram.
An X post featuring another simulated combat scene has amassed at least three million views.
“Iran becomes FIRST nation in history to shoot-down F35 jet,” the caption claims.
“It’s now confirmed Iran shot down 2 F35 jets. The last country to shoot down an American-Made fighter jet was Serbia in 1999”.
Experts say there are telltale signs the clips are all from computer games and do not depict the current conflict.
David Conroy, a computer science lecturer at Queensland University of Technology, says claims that an F-35 Joint Strike Fighter has come under attack by ground-based weapons should be treated with "extreme scepticism".
He says the F-35 has an "absolutely huge" engagement radius — the maximum distance at which it can strike enemy targets, allowing it to strike long before coming within reach of most anti-aircraft weapons.
"So being shot at on the ground via anti-air weapons is already unbelievable," Dr Conroy told AAP FactCheck.
He also said the reckless movement of the aircraft in the various videos appeared "very game-like", noting there's "no way any aircraft that expensive would be pulling off such manoeuvres that close to the ground".
The anti-aircraft weapon firing upon the jet in the first X clip appears to be a NATO Praetorian turret, the lecturer said, which are usually mounted on navy ships, so it's extremely unlikely these would be situated in Iran.
Michael Hitchens, a computer game expert at Macquarie University, told AAP FactCheck the vehicle firing the missile in the Instagram video looks like a Soviet-era 9K33 Osa, which he said is not known to be among Iran's arsenal.
Brandon Haworth, a gaming and graphics expert at Victoria University in Canada, told AAP FactCheck that when slowed down or paused, video game footage tends to reveal artefacts.
These can include: straight lines or edges on objects that tend to be curved or smooth; perfectly repeated textures such as roads, walls or smoke; and simplified physics, such as fires spreading unnaturally or fluids moving in perfectly cyclical patterns.
Malcolm Ryan, a games researcher at Macquarie University, pointed to several features indicating the clips were artificial, including that objects appeared to be in perfect focus such as the moving jet, while real cameras have a limited depth of field, meaning objects in the distance appear out of focus.
"You can see this most clearly in video (1). The bullets in the foreground are perfectly in focus at the same time as the plane and the hills in the far distance," Assoc Prof Ryan told AAP FactCheck.
He said he would expect bright explosions and tracer bullets would also wash out the scene or make the sky appear completely dark if the footage had been shot with a real camera.
Dr Hitchens said in the Facebook clip, the terrain looks "awfully gamey" and the water had an unusual appearance (0:10).
Assoc Prof Ryan also mentioned the water's lack of realism in the first X clip, noting it doesn't get disturbed as the plane flies over its surface, and added that the same tree model seemed to appear several times.
Dr Hitchens noted that the bullets appear to pass right through the trees (0:28) without affecting them.
Dr Conroy said while the four clips did not generally look realistic, improved graphics in more modern games would make them hard to distinguish from authentic videos of conflict.
Assoc Prof Ryan added that issues around the trees and the movement of water will likely be less obvious in the coming years, as hardware improves and generative artificial intelligence is incorporated into video games.
Media outlets have also revealed Arma 3 footage has been used online to purportedly show firefights from the Ukraine-Russia war, the Gaza war and the 2025 India-Pakistan conflict.
The game's developers warned in a 2023 statement that gameplay footage had been "falsely used as footage from real-life conflicts", including even being shared by "various mainstream media or official government institutions".
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