Viral videos of IAF strikes on Pakistan flooding social media turn out to be fake and three years old, say reports

Soon after the Indian Air Force (IAF) carried out strikes in Pakistan’s Balakot and other locations on Tuesday, many videos claiming to be footage of the attack started doing the rounds on social media. However, the fact-checking website AltNews and news website The Quint determined that these videos are fake or uploaded three years ago and no credible footage of the strikes have been put out yet. This video, entitled ‘IAF Mirage 2000 jets in Pakistan Bombing Mission’, turned out to be three years old:

The following video, shared by some Pakistani Twitter handles who claimed it was footage of the Pakistani Air Force fighter planes scrambling after Indian jets entered their air space, turned out to be Pakistan F-16s flying over Islamabad at night, as per AltNews and  The Quint.  

Journalist Abhijit Iyer-Mitra replied to the video asking why the Pakistani plane was flying so close to the ground and issuing flares, which he said is only possible if some air-to-air action had occurred.

10n watch this video
1) why was this Pakistani fighter flying so close to the ground and
2) issuing flares ?

ANSWER: to avoid air to air missiles. A clear indication that some AIR TO AIR ACTION DID TAKE PLACE and the IAF Mirages came out SAFELY https://t.co/bd37lS9cHF

— Abhijit Iyer-Mitra (@Iyervval) February 26, 2019

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Another video showing an air missile targeting and exploding in a crowded area is an old clip of a modification to a video game, as per Boom Live.

At least 12 Mirage 2000 jets took part in the operation that dropped 1,000 kilogramme bombs on terror camps across Line of Control, completely destroying it, ANI reported. The operation was launched at 3.56 am on Tuesday morning.  Indian Air Force sources told ANI that a group of Mirage 2000 jets struck a major terrorist camp in Balakot sector in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir. The sources said that the targetted militant training camp was ‘completely destroyed’ and the pilots safely came back into the Indian territory.