Benjamin Netanyahu
AFP News

Benjamin Netanyahu sparked a fresh wave of online conspiracy theories on Friday after a televised address from Jerusalem, in which the Israeli prime minister appeared to have 'six fingers' on one hand, triggered claims the video was generated by artificial intelligence and that he was already dead.

For context, Netanyahu's video message was released amid the continuing confrontation with Iran, following joint US–Israeli strikes that killed former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. His son and successor, Mojtaba Khamenei, has become the new focal point of a fraught standoff involving Netanyahu, former US president Donald Trump, and Tehran's leadership. Against that backdrop, rumours that Iran's earlier strikes had already 'taken out' Netanyahu have repeatedly circulated online, only to be disproved by official statements and mainstream reporting.

This latest round of speculation began when Netanyahu posted a clip on his official X account addressing Israelis about the conflict with Iran. Within hours, users were zooming in on a freeze-frame of his hand at the podium, insisting that an extra digit proved the footage was fabricated and that an AI 'double' had replaced the prime minister.

One user wrote under the post: 'Hey Bibi, are you so special that you've got 6 fingers, or have you been gone from us a long time ago?' Others went further, folding the supposed glitch into a broader narrative that Netanyahu was secretly dead and his government was hiding it.

Viral 'Netanyahu Dead' Claims Collide With Fact-Checks

The six-finger theory did not appear out of nowhere. In case you missed it, rumours about Benjamin Netanyahu's death had already been bubbling on X, fuelled by anonymous geopolitical accounts and partisan commentators.

One widely shared post declared: 'Heads up EVERYONE. @netanyahu is DEAD Official X handle of @IsraeliPM just deleted this tweet.' The account behind the claim trades on a Kremlin-style brand but, notably, has no connection to Russia's government. Its allegation that the Israeli prime minister's office had posted and then removed a death announcement was quickly scrutinised.

According to a fact-check by xAI's Grok chatbot, no such deletion occurred. 'No, Israeli PM did not delete any tweet. The screenshot in that post is fake—no such statement exists on their account (their only recent post is a National Security Council announcement). Netanyahu is alive; death rumors from Iranian media and social posts have been debunked by Snopes, Times of Israel, and others as unverified misinformation. Rely on official verified sources,' Grok stated on X.

That response did not end the matter. Instead, some users tried to join the dots between the death rumours, the hand image and an apparently unrelated moment in Washington involving US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

The same pseudo-Kremlin account claimed that Bessent had abruptly left a press conference to take a call from Trump and returned 'visibly shaking'. Dutch political commentator Johannes M Koenraadt jumped on the clip, telling followers: 'Netanyahu is dead! That's what I get from this. It fits the dead stiffness in Scott Bessent's body and hands, and his upset voice after returning from the Situation Room.'

There is, at this stage, no evidence linking Bessent's demeanour to Netanyahu's health. The Treasury Secretary has not commented publicly on the speculation, and the interpretation of his body language remains just that: personal conjecture. Nothing is confirmed yet, so everything should be taken with a grain of salt.

'Six Fingers' And The Question: Is Benjamin Netanyahu Safe?

The heart of the current controversy sits with that single still frame of Benjamin Netanyahu's right hand. In the original video, the prime minister gestures as he speaks at the podium. In an edited screenshot circulating online, a red circle is drawn around his hand, and at that specific angle, the overlapping fingers appear distorted, which some viewers have read as a sixth digit.

Grok, which has been repeatedly pulled into the fray by users asking for clarification, rejected the AI-clone theory outright. 'No, Netanyahu has five fingers on each hand like most people. That's his right hand in a typical pointing gesture at the podium—the red circle and angle create an optical illusion making it look off. Just a still from the press conference video,' the chatbot said.

Despite that, a number of accounts have continued to insist the video is AI-generated, folding the alleged 'glitch' into a broader distrust of official wartime messaging. The logic is circular but familiar. If you already suspect a cover-up, a blurred screenshot can look like proof rather than what it almost certainly is: a compression artefact or a trick of perspective.

The anxiety runs deeper than pixel-counting. Beneath the comments about finger maths, users have been asking more blunt questions. 'Is Bibi safe?' one person posted under Netanyahu's address.

Grok again pushed back, citing the very footage under dispute. 'Yes, Prime Minister Netanyahu (Bibi) is safe. He just posted a video today from his press conference, actively leading Israel's operations against Iran and its proxies. Iranian claims of attacks on him or his family were dismissed as fake news by his office, with no confirmed incidents. He's been public and operational throughout the conflict,' it replied.

That answer will reassure some and convince almost none of those who have already decided Netanyahu is gone. The sixth finger theory has become less about anatomy and more about a familiar 2020s cocktail of real conflict, digital opacity, and deep mistrust, where even a routine address from a wartime leader is scoured for signs he might not exist at all.

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