Bellingcat

De Telegraaf, the Netherlands’ largest newspaper published an interview with a woman claiming to organise her own evacuation flights from Dubai, promoting seats at €1,600. Bellingcat found that the image in the interview was likely AI-generated, and flight-tracking data suggests no such plane took off. The Dutch minister of foreign affairs was confronted with the article’s headline in a television interview about efforts to repatriate citizens to the Netherlands, after Iran launched missiles and drones at targets across the Gulf in retaliation for US-Israeli strikes. https://lnkd.in/eadpVqWx

Bellingcat has geolocated eight videos showing US Tomahawks cruise missiles in Iraq heading towards Iran. The missiles appear to be flying low across valleys near Kirkuk and were likely fired from the Mediterranean sea. We also found imagery of Tomahawk fragments that we geolocated to outside Kafr Zita in Syria. Experts told Bellingcat that the presence of these missiles in Iraqi and Syrian airspace without an agreement with the countries they pass over might violate international law. Read the investigation in full here: https://lnkd.in/eAkszkwF #bellingcat #iran #iraq #USA #Tomahawks #missiles #Analysis #internationallaw #weapons

Young boys dubbed “lion cubs” in Sudan’s civil war are going viral on TikTok and Facebook. Videos of children celebrating battlefield victories have millions of views. Our investigation analyses the clips and how the content encourages young people to join the war. Watch here: https://lnkd.in/eHFWvbfD #sudan #lioncubs #war #conflict #analysis #TikTok #Facebook #childsoldiers

Israeli Air Force images posted on March 3 show a bomb not previously seen in Israeli service, reportedly from jets involved in strikes on Iran. Experts say the bombs appear to have an incendiary component and may be meant to destroy chemical or biological warfare agents. https://lnkd.in/eB2mrbE7

New video footage shows a US Tomahawk missile hitting an IRGC facility in Minab, Iran, showing for the first time that the US struck the area. The footage also shows smoke already rising from the vicinity of the girls’ school, where 175 people were reportedly killed, including children. The footage appears to contradict President Donald Trump’s claim it was an Iranian missile that hit the school on Feb. 28 https://lnkd.in/ey55bMjP #usnews #us #iran #bellingcat #minab

Exclusive: Two of the world's most wanted men, Daniel and Christy Kinahan, were photographed at a Mixed Martial Arts event in Dubai — their most recent sighting since the US issued multi-million dollar bounties. https://lnkd.in/e4PJeTP4 Bellingcat and The Times and Sunday Times found the images of the father and son cartel leaders at the 971 Fighting Championship last June, where they are seen with the event’s founder and former UFC athlete, Mounir “The Sniper” Lazzez.  The footage is the first visual proof that the narcotraffickers – who have been in hiding in Dubai for a decade – were still in the desert city as recently as last summer. 

Satellite images from NASA Worldview on March 5 reveal the extent of the blackout in Cuba. A failure at the most important power plant, combined with the US blockade on fuel shipments in the country has left nearly 70% of the island's inhabitants without power. Cuba has recently faced more major blackouts as its economic crisis deepens. The government blames decades of sanctions and new US actions that halt oil shipments from Venezuela, leaving the country with fuel shortages and a fragile power grid. https://lnkd.in/g-T9_93P #cuba #us #satelliteimagery

Trying to make sense of an aircraft’s movements during a conflict? Context is everything. That’s why we built Turnstone, an open source tool that searches historical flight data to allow researchers to explore flight patterns over time and in specific locations. https://lnkd.in/exY4db7a With Turnstone, it is possible to interrogate the baseline level of movement and spot unusual patterns. For example, flight data before both the June 2025 and February 2026 strikes showed a uniquely large number of American aerial tankers leaving the US and crossing the Atlantic towards Iran. This tool primarily uses Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast (ADS-B) data, the technology that enables open source investigators and enthusiasts to track flights. Turnstone aggregates ADS-B data for multiple aircraft over time, and allows users to search for flights across two areas of interest at once. The resource is open source and the source code for the tool can be found on Bellingcat’s GitHub. https://lnkd.in/eUJgQcru #tool #resource #flighttracking #aviation #history #research #Bellingcat #GitHub #Iran #USA #Israel #explore #notforprofit #opensource #opensourceresearch https://lnkd.in/exY4db7a

On Saturday, February 28, the United States and Israel launched a large-scale attack against Iran. While the US has released a list of military targets, including IRGC headquarters and missile systems, Bellingcat has reviewed strikes against another type of target inside the Islamic Republic — police stations. A satellite imagery analysis conducted by Bellingcat shows that at least 15 police stations or police-related buildings were targeted in strikes conducted in Tehran in the first days of the war. https://lnkd.in/ekaMj6wV #iran #iranwar #bellingcat

Israel used 2,000+ bombs in the first 30 hours of the Iran war; the US struck 1,000+ targets in the first 24 hours. Iran responded with at least 390 missiles and 830 drones in the first two days. Bellingcat has tracked the munitions used by all sides so far: https://lnkd.in/eXWR34Uk #bellingcat #iran #war #israel #USA #weapons #monitoring #analysis https://lnkd.in/eFP4QtWU