On March 15, 2021, a Facebook user Giorgi Gulikashvili published a post mentioning that all publicly conducted vaccinations raise questions and does not create ground for trusting the vaccination. The post comes with two videos, with one of them showing a fragment from the video showing the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, getting vaccinated. The second video shows a finger simply pushing the needle of the syringe inside the barrel.
As of March 20, 2021, Giorgi Gulikashvili’s post was shared by 527 Facebook users.
Giorgi Gulikashvili’s post is disinformative and is achieved by video manipulation. There is no evidence that would confirm that the PM of Israel did not get vaccinated. Using only a fragment of the video, in combination with the second video, which does not even show a medical syringe, but one from a movie, creates a perception that Netanyahu has actually not gotten vaccinated.
The video, disseminated by Giorgi Gulikashvili, only shows a fragment of Benjamin Netanyahu’s vaccination and it does not clearly show a needle of a syringe getting inserted under the skin of the PM. Netanyahu’s vaccination was broadcasted live and there are several footages, recorded by both international (NBC News) and local media, which show the uninterrupted footage. The full video of the vaccination clearly shows how the PM is getting injected with a full syringe and how an empty syringe, together with the needle, is removed from the arm.
Benjamin Netanyahu got publicly vaccinated with Pfizer’s anti-coronavirus vaccine on December 19, 2020 and became the first vaccinated citizen of Israel. According to the PM, he wanted to give a personal example to the citizens of Israel. Netanyahu spent half an hour under the observation of medical specialists after taking the vaccine. The Minister of Health of Israel and other political leaders got vaccinated on the same day.
As for the second video, published by Giorgi Gulikashvili, it got initially published by a YouTube channel crimson hands fx on July 24, 2016. According to the description of the video, this syringe is a prop of movies and video recordings. Crimson hands fx is a Florida-based company that manufactures and sells props for video recordings.
Another video from the company’s YouTube channel showing a retractable syringe was manipulatively disseminated by other social media users on March 9, 2021 and, like Giorgi Gulikashvili, claimed that such syringes were used for public vaccinations. However, there are no evidences showing that Benjamin Netanyahu or any other public figure got vaccinated with such prop instead of the medical syringe.
Myth Detector has verified video manipulations and disinformation related to public vaccination and syringes earlier as well. Read more in the following articles:
- How Stunt Syringe Became Source of Conspiracy Theory
- Video collage depicting the process of vaccination is manipulatively disseminated
- How Did a “Retractable Syringe” Become a Source of Conspiracies About Inserting Chips?
- Why Do People Use Retracting Syringes and What Does a TikTok Video Show?
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