Trump celebrates the release of suspected AI prisoners

Donald Trump’s grip on reality seems to be increasingly weak. The latest example of this is him celebrating the release of eight prisoners. And the reason it’s worrying is because there’s good reason to suspect that most of these women were AI generated images:

Trump seems to be inventing fake concessions given to him by the Iranians to make it appear that he is building leverage and goodwill for the negotiations that he is still trying to engineer.

Whatever the outcome this is very low IQ and mentally-ill behavior which should be… pic.twitter.com/FZrQn3mr7C

— Murtaza Hussain (@MazMHussain) April 22, 2026

Trump: unreality

The eight Iranian women were brought to Trump’s attention by the notorious propagandist Eyal Yakoby, who said:

BREAKING: The Islamic Republic is preparing to hang eight women.

Not a word from the international community or so-called human rights organizations.

The following is the image he posted:

Modern AI technology can produce images which are indistinguishable from real photos. What gives the game away here is that every woman bar one has an identical sun halo effect around their heads, suggesting they were generated using the same prompt.

Oh, and there’s something very interesting about the woman without the sun halo. The woman in question is Bita Hemmati – the one woman we know is real. As the Times reported:

Trump shared a post on Truth Social suggesting that the eight Iranian women, including two teenagers, would be executed by hanging — although human rights groups said only one of them, Bita Hemmati, had been confirmed as having been sentenced to death.

Hemmati took part in the anti-regime protests in January when tens of thousands of Iranians were believed to have been killed. She is set to be executed with her husband Mohammadreza Majidi-Asl, 34, and two neighbours, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA).

Reporting on 16 April, Sky News described Hemmati as the “first” female protester that Iran is set to execute over the protests. There isn’t reporting anywhere confirming that the other seven women are set to be executed, nor that they exist.

We don’t think Iran should be executing anyone (nor should the United States). The problem here is that Trump seems to be conducting his war efforts based on the unconfirmed posts of the most untrustworthy people on the internet. And his press team are celebrating his dubious claims as if they’re real:

Leavitt: "Only President Trump could save the lives of these eight beautiful Iranian women" pic.twitter.com/VQaW3QyUNR

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 22, 2026

If Iran has opted not to execute Hemmati, that’s good, but at this point Trump’s constant false claims mean we can’t even trust that.

Post-truth

There’s more to be concerned about too. As Skwawkbox wrote for the Canary on 22 April:

An Israel-based AI firm, Generative AI for Good, claims to be using deepfake technologies for positive ends. ‘Positive’ appears to mean creating deepfake videos to help the illegal US-Israel war on Iran.

Additionally:

Generative AI for Good claims that it uses AI to “help survivors testify safely — in their real voice, without revealing their identity”. But Israel and its mouthpieces have been shown to have used false allegations of rapes and other atrocities on 7 October 2023 to justify its genocide in Gaza.