Although media coverage of the S-200 projectile that crashed into a hillside in the north on Monday was accurate overall, some outlets could not resist the temptation to slide into hyperbole and click-bait.
In Britain, The Sun ran a story under the banner Travel Safety – Latest Cyprus travel advice after a ‘Syrian missile’ explodes in Nicosia nature park.
The headline draws readers in with the expectation that British authorities were issuing a travel advisory for Cyprus. But only a few lines into the article, The Sun wrote this: “The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) hasn’t updated its travel advice for Brits.”
It added: “They simply advise that terrorist attacks in Cyprus can’t be ruled out and that they could be indiscriminate, including in places visited by foreigners. Worried Brits can sign up for travel alerts to be sent to their email via the FCO’s website.”
Perhaps further missing the irony it was contradicting its own sensationalist headline, the publication then added:
“In fact, Cyprus is considered the 36th safest country in the world according to the World Economic Forum (WEF) – who publish a Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Report every two years.”
The article opened with stating that the area struck by the missile is “popular with Brits.” It went on to say that the missile “landed in park near Nicosia.”
It is well established that the missile was fired by Syrian forces defending against a massive Israeli airstrike launched from Lebanese airspace, over the Mediterranean. The projectile is believed to have missed its target and carried on its westward path toward Cyprus.
But Cypriot website Sigmalive ran a piece titled “Here is the possible trajectory of the missile that struck Cyprus.”
It then attached a link to a video that went viral on Monday, showing a projectile whizzing through the sky. Sigmalive said the video was the same one posted by Israeli newspaper Haaretz earlier in the day.
It said the footage was taken by someone standing on a beach in Lebanon. That part was correct.
But then Sigmalive went on to state that this was likely the missile that ended up in Cyprus:
“A video is doing the rounds of the Internet, capturing frame-by-frame the potential trajectory of the missile which was aimed at Syria and crash-landed on the Pendadactylos mountain range.”
Haaretz itself had clearly stated that the footage was of an Israeli missile fired toward Syria.
The caption in English accompanying the Haaretz video read: “Very important footage showing probably the #Israeli Delilah cruise missiles above the #Lebanese coast heading to #Syria this night.”
