In December 2023, covers of publications Titanic, El Jueves and Rodip Reb appeared on the Internet, ridiculing Ukraine and the country's President Vladimir Zelensky. We decided to check if these are real covers.
German magazine Titanic
On December 20, the cover of the German satirical magazine Titanic appeared on the Internet. It depicts a Christmas setting: a tree with gifts and a fireplace, above which, instead of traditional socks, are hung military boots with bones sticking out of them. Tags in the colors of the Ukrainian flag are attached to the shoes, and the caption reads: “Celebrating Christmas with Ukraine.” This cover was published by such Telegram channels as “Colonelcassad"(235,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Alexander Semchenko" (80,000) and "VОzrevenge"(22,000).
Titanic magazine is published once a month. The cover, which went viral on social media, states that it is a December 2023 issue. Meanwhile, in the online store on the official website of the magazine, where all issues for 2023 are presented, December The issue has a completely different cover. The original collage makes fun of the typical everyman. The headline reads: "It's Horrible: How We Learn to Cope with Bad News." Against the backdrop of ruins and fires are photographs of gossip columns and news about the rise in price of mulled wine.
In addition, on the real Titanic covers, the serial number of the issue is also indicated under the name of the month (for example, Nr.12 in December, as it is written on the original magazine). The cover that went viral on the Internet says “Christmas issue.” Meanwhile, neither December 2022, neither in December 2021 the design of the technical information column remained unchanged, and Titanic did not have any Christmas specials.
This is not the first time that fake Titanic covers have appeared on social networks: in October 2022, as well as in June And October In 2023, Russian Telegram channels distributed cartoons about Zelensky and Ukraine under the guise of new issues of a German satirical magazine.
The earliest mention of the new fake cover, according to the TGStat service, was a post on the Telegram channel of a Russian TV presenter Olesya Loseva, published December 20, 2023 at 13:17 Moscow time. “Verified” previously examined other cases when distribution began from this channel fake covers foreign magazines.
Spanish magazine El Jueves
On December 12, the cover of the Spanish satirical magazine El Jueves began to circulate on social networks. It was dedicated to visit Vladimir Zelensky at the inauguration of Argentine President Javier Miley on December 10. In the cartoon, the leaders of the two countries hug, while Zelensky takes a wallet from his Argentine colleague’s back pocket. This image is accompanied by the caption: “Ukraine helps Argentina support Ukraine.” Publications with an alleged El Jueves cover appeared, for example, in Telegram channels UK leaks (19,000 views at the time of writing this analysis) and Swiss🐈Vatnik (12,000).
The viral image indicates that this is #2.395 from the magazine's 46th year of existence (that is, 2023). Under the magazine number there is an inscription “special issue”. On the El Jueves website cover archive for 2023 there is no such image, and the last available issue was No. 2.394 and is dedicated not to Ukraine, but to the people of the year according to the publication.
However, the publication regularly publishes announcements of issues that have not yet gone on sale on social networks. December 12 at Facebook magazine's cover for the next issue.
True, it was again not dedicated to Ukraine. In addition, the numbering is also different: they decided to release No. 2.395 in several parts, and they are designated as No. 2.395-01, 2.395-02 And 2.395-03.
Fake El Jueves covers appear online some once. As a rule, the authors of the fakes depicted Zelensky in them.
The earliest publication with a caricature of Zelensky and Miley is a post in the Telegram channel “V🇷🇺Hand of the Kremlin🇷🇺Z"(6000 views), which appeared on December 12 at 15:00 Moscow time.
Indian magazine Rodip Reb
On December 16, the cover of a publication called Rodip Reb appeared on social networks. It depicts a broken Christmas tree ball in the colors of the Ukrainian flag; the picture is accompanied by the caption “Dragged into darkness: tragic prospects for Ukraine in 2024.” This image was not widely disseminated; the most views remained on the original source of this image, the TV presenter’s Telegram channel Olesya Loseva (12,000 at the time of writing the analysis).
No publication with this name could be found. The website Rodipreb.in, listed on the cover, is also not found by search engines. Fact-checking project "Myth detector» contacted Indian colleagues from Factly.in, and they confirmed that such a magazine does not exist.
However, the solution is much simpler. The name of the magazine is a thinly veiled insult (the name should be read from right to left), addressed to the founder of the Verified project, who regularly exposes the authors of fake covers of foreign magazines. From mid-2022 to the end of 2023, Verified wrote about 59 fake covers, including Charlie Hebdo, Courier International, Handelsblatt, Le Man, Newsweek and many other publications. After a series of revelations, pro-Kremlin Telegram channels responded fake that the fake covers were allegedly created by the editor-in-chief of “Verified” Ilya Ber.
The earliest mention of a fake magazine is fast in the Telegram channel of TV presenter Olesya Loseva. This channel regularly meets in analyzes “Checked” and often turns out primary source fakes.
Cover photo: collage “Checked”
- Is it true that foreign magazines published these covers dedicated to Zelensky and the Ukrainian church?
- Is it true that foreign magazines published these covers dedicated to Zelensky, Ukraine and Easter?
- Is it true that foreign magazines published these covers dedicated to Zelensky and Ukraine?
- Is it true that foreign magazines published these covers with cartoons dedicated to Zelensky, the Dalai Lama and Swiss banks?
- Is it true that a Spanish magazine published these covers with Zelensky and NATO leaders?
- Is it true that foreign satirical magazines published these covers dedicated to the words of the Pope about the Chechens and Buryats?
- Is it true that on three covers of Charlie Hebdo the President of Ukraine is depicted as a dog?
If you find a spelling or grammatical error, please let us know by highlighting the error text and clicking Ctrl+Enter.
