<\/p>\n
The creator of a controversial AI-generated video depicting battle-ravaged Gaza rebuilt into a seaside resort, shared by US President Donald Trump\u2019s official social media accounts, has said that the video was meant to be a \u201csatire about this megalomaniac idea about putting statues\u201d in the territory, British news outlet The Guardian<\/em> reports.<\/p>\n In February, the US president proposed<\/a> for the US to take over Gaza and create a \u201cRiviera of the Middle East\u201d after resettling Palestinians elsewhere, sparking widespread<\/a> condemnation. Arab leaders adopted<\/a> an Egyptian reconstruction plan for Gaza earlier this week that would avoid resettling Palestinians, in contrast to Trump\u2019s \u201cMiddle East Riviera\u201d vision.<\/p>\n Last week, Trump posted<\/a> an AI-generated video on social media, depicting Gazans\u2019 living in the bombarded territory coming out of caves to a beach with skyscrapers, with cameos from the president himself and Elon Musk, who is leading Trump\u2019s federal cost-cutting efforts, both enjoying life in \u201cTrump Gaza\u201d.<\/p>\n The video, which racked up more than 15 million views on Instagram and was shared thousands of times on Trump\u2019s Truth Social network, prompted some commenters to question whether the president\u2019s accounts had been hacked.<\/p>\n Speaking to British news outlet The Guardian<\/em> on Thursday<\/a>, the creator of the video, Solo Avital \u2014 a Los Angeles-based filmmaker \u2014 said he had decided to create \u201csatire about this megalomaniac idea about putting statues [in Gaza]\u201d while he was experimenting with the Arcana AI platform.<\/p>\n In an interview<\/a> with BBC<\/em>, Avital said he and his business partner \u2014 filmmaker and screenwriter Ariel Vromen \u2014 came across a new technology by an LA-based company called Arcana Labs, which had given them access to test the speed and quality of their latest AI model.<\/p>\n He said that the idea was to make something within eight hours, \u201cone shift, kind of like one seat between two cups of coffee\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cMy partner [\u2026] was in Las Vegas as the news broke out [of Trump\u2019s Gaza plan], literally at the same time, and he was just taking his phone, pointing it out to the Las Vegas Strip, and said, Las Vegas Strip, Gaza Strip,\u201d he said, gesturing to his phone as a camera.<\/p>\n Talking to NBC News<\/a><\/em> last week about the initial conception, Vromen said: \u201cThe idea was like, how Trump wants to turn Gaza into Vegas. We wanted to have an internal laugh about it. It was a joke.\u201d<\/p>\n He further added: \u201cWith humor, there is truth, you know, but it was not our intention to be a propaganda machine.\u201d<\/p>\n The report said that for the pair, the video was about \u201ctaking Trump\u2019s proposal and pushing it to an extreme level of imagination\u201d.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Avital told BBC<\/em>: \u201cWe test, we share [it with our] friends and colleagues and, you know, the reaction was, obviously, everybody realised that it\u2019s satire,\u201d adding that his partner then posted the video from his Instagram account, which had over 130,000 followers.<\/p>\n \u201cIt took me two hours to catch it, and seeing that he posted, and I called him, I said, \u2018Ariel, please take it down.\u2019 We thought that we were going to get into trouble with the president,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cI thought it was going to [\u2026] offend the White House [\u2026] so he took it down, but I think by that time it was too late,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He said that the \u201cdanger point\u201d regarding the video was how they had only put in eight hours of effort, adding that if they had spent a week on the video, one \u201cwouldn\u2019t be able to tell if it was AI or a video that was filmed\u201d.<\/p>\n According to The Guardian<\/em>, Avital said that he found out about the video after he woke up to \u201cthousands of messages\u201d on his phone regarding the president\u2019s post.<\/p>\n He said that they took down the video on the grounds that \u201cit might be a little insensitive, and we don\u2019t want to take sides\u201d. Avital said that he was surprised by the reaction to the video, stating that if it were a skit for the show Saturday Night Live<\/em>, the reaction would have been the opposite.<\/p>\n \u201cLook how wild this president is and his ideas, everyone would think it\u2019s a joke,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He said the experience reinforced \u201chow fake news spreads when every network takes what they want and shoves it down their viewers with their narratives attached\u201d and \u201cspark[s] a public debate about rights and wrongs\u201d of generative AI.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are storytellers, we\u2019re not provocateurs, we sometimes do satire pieces such as this one was supposed to be. This is the duality of the satire: it depends what context you bring to it to make the punchline or the joke. Here there was no context and it was posted without our consent or knowledge,\u201d Avital was quoted as saying.<\/p>\n The video was slammed by UN Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights Francesca Albanese as \u201cabsurd\u201d in a post on X.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat the new US administration is doing is very clear and strategic: it is called psychological overwhelming. Hitting us every day with XXL doses of baffling rhetoric and erratic policies serves to \u2018control the script\u2019, distracting and disorienting us, normalising the absurd, all while disrupting global stability (and consolidating US control).\u201d<\/p>\n Amnesty International Secretary General Agnes Callamard had said she had \u201cno words indeed. Beyond indecency?\u201d<\/p>\n In Gaza, people who had watched the video were in disbelief.<\/p>\n \u201cThis video of Trump is full of fallacies and shows a lack of cultural awareness \u2026 Gaza won\u2019t become a tourist spot like Italy or Spain,\u201d Nasser Abu Hadaid, a 60-year-old resident of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, had said.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat I know about Trump is that he is a strange but bold president who does what he says he will do. What matters to him is money and investments \u2014 there is no humanity,\u201d Manal Abu Seif, a 23-year-old lawyer in Gaza City, had said.<\/p>\n \u201cGaza needs freedom, open border crossings and jobs for young people, and is not a playground for tourism and investment,\u201d she had added.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nHarsh criticism<\/h2>\n