Why Benjamin Netanyahu is finding it hard to prove he is not an AI clone?

Speculation around the whereabouts of the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is refusing to die down. Several conspiracy theory is circulating on social media, ranging from the idea that Netanyahu was killed or severely injured or replaced by an AI clone. There are videos with serious digital glitches with extra fingers, oddly filled coffee cups, and vanishing rings, all making it hard to comprehend the reality. Even though there is no credible evidence for a hasty conclusion that the Israeli Prime Minister is dead, the attempt by Netanyahu or his team to counter the social media narrative seems to be falling flat on its face.

It all started with a set of pictures of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, bloodied, injured and covered in dust, which went viral on social media. These images were circulated with false or unproven claims of the Israeli Prime Minister's demise and were branded as fake by X's AI-tool Grok. These claims were coming at a time when a war was raging with Iran after joint strikes with the US took out Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.

To quell those conspiracy theories, a press conference livestream was hosted by Netanyahu on Friday. A clip of the broadcast was widely shared by social media users, with distortion while gesturing near a microphone. Observers alleged that the footage was a "deepfake," with the anomalies of a "sixth finger" on Netanyahu's hand. Most of the generative tools can not properly render seamless anatomy.

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To address the claims of those deepfakes, Netanyahu released another video, this time in a local cafe, mocking the rumours of his death. Observers again pointed out several visual inconsistencies, such as a bottomless gravity-defying coffee cup from which Netanyahu was drinking. The video had several references to death and at the end a Hebrew greeting L'Chaim, which means to life. The comments, even though dismissed as misinformation, can be seen as having some merits, as again X's generative AI tool Grok identified the video as “deepfake”. The background counter in the video had a date from 2024. Netanyahu is usually left-handed, but he can be seen drinking using his right hand. The Prime Minister's office dismissed these claims as “fake news; the Prime Minister is fine.” Soon, the cafe where Netanyahu drank coffee posted a photo of Netanyahu and his team within the cafe. Next Day Netanayhu posted another video talking to citizens, but the video had another anomaly. While speaking, Netanyahu gestures with his left hand and his ring vanishes mid-air and reappears again.

The most uncomfortable truth is that these videos, which are posted on social media platforms that can't verify the use of AI or the source of generation. Most social media platforms strip the Content Credentials from the videos while transcoding or uploading them, thus removing the metadata of the video. So it is almost impossible to detect or flag deepfakes. Again, most of the AI detection tools are reactionary. They tend to provide false positive ocassionally. So, in a volatile atmosphere lack of clear evidence of manipulation is being used to spread misinformation and disinformation quickly.