Israeli media sows ‘Armageddon’ panic
Hebrew sites pick up report on an asteroid nearing Earth, but misquote facts to add frightening spin
Israeli readers may have reassessed their plans for the weekend on Wednesday after coming across a slew of reports on various Hebrew news sites that the world could be swiftly coming to an end within two days.
“Is an asteroid going to crash into Earth?” Israel Hayom asked readers on its website.
“Will a massive asteroid hit Earth the day after tomorrow?” Mako, the website for Israel’s leading TV Channel 2, said.
“Experts warn of a massive asteroid on a collision course with Earth,” blared the headline on the popular Walla news site.
The various Hebrew-language news sites, all widely read in Israel, seemed to have sourced their alarming reports from British tabloid The Express, which on Tuesday reported that a “1,000-meter wide monster” was said to be hurtling “terrifyingly close to Earth.”
Yet, the British report made clear that the “2014-YB35” asteroid would pass Earth by at a distance of 2.8 million miles — perhaps a short distance in astronomical terms, but still, at 10 times the distance to the moon, posing no existential threat to humanity. Astronomers say asteroids of this size often pass by Earth at such a distance.
Even the Express’s headline made clear that the asteroid would “skim past Earth.”
Did the news sites misunderstand the same original report, or was this just an extreme case of clickbait?
The sites all quoted a British space expert who was interviewed by The Express, but some seemed to have misread his remarks.
“A British space expert fears an asteroid rapidly advancing toward Earth could cause a disaster that could end life on Earth,” Channel 2 claimed.
In truth, Bill Napier, a professor of astronomy at the University of Buckinghamshire, did not at any point claim that the asteroid could be in a collision course with our planet.
Napier did warn that there is a “very real risk” of a comet or asteroid hitting Earth at some point, though he never even mentioned the “2014-YB35” object as a candidate.
Maariv, too, changed the meaning of the expert’s remarks, claiming he had said “there is a very real risk” of that specific asteroid crashing into Earth.
Even after Israeli media watchdog The Seventh Eye summed up the day of misreporting (Hebrew), the sites made no corrections or clarifications, so it is possible some Israelis are still walking the streets thinking this is their final day on Earth.