In the midst of student protests on American campuses, a video is circulating on social networks, titled “Robert De Niro supports Israel”. This video is authentic but it is taken out of context. The actor is in the middle of filming a series, which has nothing to do with the conflict in the Middle East.
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The video is circulating endlessly on social networks, in the midst of the protest movement by American students. We see the actor Robert De Niro haranguing the crowd, making big gestures. At the top of the video, a title: “Robert De Niro Stands with Israel”, “Robert De Niro supports Israel”. The actor is difficult to hear, you have to listen carefully but his words are subtitled: “Now you are going to listen to me, you are going to do your job, go home”we can read, in English. “They say they’re going to do it again (October 7), again! And no one wants that!”
The video is taken up by pro-Israeli accounts, including Israeli media such as i24News. The deputy for French people abroad, Mayer Habib, is even delighted: “Robert De Niro is a king ! He defends Israel tooth and nail against the pro-Hamas left-wing Islamist demonstrators at American universities! The same ones that plague us at Sciences-Po!” Did Robert De Niro really defend Israel in front of American students?
A video taken out of context
It’s wrong. This video is authentic but it has been taken out of context. Robert De Niro doesn’t talk about the conflict in the Middle East at all. It’s him in the image but he’s in the middle of filming a series produced by Netflix. In this “conspiracy thriller”, as the production presents it, entitled Zero Day, the actor plays a former American president who faces a cyberattack. The dialogues do not refer at all to the conflict between Israel and Hamas, as confirmed by the production and the actor’s press officer.
By doing a reverse search from the images in the video, we find photos taken during filming. Robert De Niro wears the same clothes, we also recognize the places. Furthermore, in the video, we recognize several well-known actors.
The original video was notably shared by a specialist cinema account, Art of Dialogue, on X. The video was therefore modified, adding the title “Robert De Niro supports Israel” and putting subtitles. After the sentence “They say they’re going to do it again“, the person who “manipulated” the video notably added “October 7”, in parentheses, in reference to the attack perpetrated by Hamas, which left more than 1,000 dead on the Israeli side. Robert De Niro does not no reference to this event at all in this sentence, but the Internet user who is not listening, who does not know the context of the video, can believe it.
Robert De Niro has nevertheless already displayed pro-Israeli positions in the past. An element which makes the video even more credible. In recent hours, several personalities, such as Julien Dray, or the media, have deleted the video that they had initially shared, thinking it to be true. On the contrary, other accounts may share this false information on purpose. A real case of misinformation.