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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Religion & belief fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about religion & belief. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

3,371 published reviews in this topic

FACTLYReligion & belief

Photo of Dalit organisations’ Muslim solidarity rally in Bangalore for the Hijab cause

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerns a photo circulated as showing Dalit organisations in Bangalore rallying in support of the hijab cause. FACTLY says the image instead shows a protest by Dalit organisations against a judge, following an alleged removal of an Ambedkar portrait from a Republic Day program. The review reports that the incident behind the protest occurred in Raichur district on 26 January 2022.

FACTLYReligion & belief

Video of 200 years old Himalayan monk Maharudra

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a widely shared video said to show “200 years old Himalayan monk Maharudra.” FACTLY’s review says the person shown was reportedly about 109 years old and from Thailand, rather than a 200-year-old Himalayan monk. The review also notes that news agencies reported Kane Tanaka, at around 119, as the world’s oldest living person at the time; that comparison provides context for why the extraordinary age claim was implausible, but does not by itself identify the person in the video. FACTLY describes tracing the video’s on-screen TikTok username, “@auyary13,” to a profile where the same video had been uploaded five days earlier. The review says the profile contained other videos of the same person and regular updates on his condition, and that descriptions and visuals indicated the videos were taken in Thailand. It also reports that the account holder answered questions about his age in video comments, giving 109 in one reply. The review’s conclusion rests on this identification and account-linked age information: it says the person in the posted video was not the alleged 200-year-old Himalayan monk Maharudra. The supplied excerpt reports the account comments and other websites as sources of age information, but does not reproduce those underlying comments or identify those websites, so their contents cannot be independently assessed from this excerpt alone.

המשרוקית של גלובסReligion & belief

בעקבות חוק הגיור כל קטין ממשפחה לא יהודית יוכר כיהודי

Publisher’s rating: לא נכון

The review examined a February 20, 2022 warning by MK Galit Distel Atbaryan about a proposed conversion-law reform. It said the proposal would let any minor from a non-Jewish family—including children of infiltrators or people staying in Israel unlawfully—become Jewish. The legislation had been approved by the Ministerial Committee for Legislation, but still required consideration by the Knesset. The review checked whether the proposal’s provisions supported that warning: “בדקנו האם חוק הגיור שמוביל שר הדתות כהנא אכן יאפשר לקטינים, בפרט מסתננים ושוהים בלתי חוקים, להכריז על עצמם כיהודים.” The review described the proposal as allowing city rabbis, in addition to the existing rabbinical courts, to establish local conversion panels. But it said eligibility rules would exclude people who were not Israeli citizens, permanent residents, or holders of an immigrant certificate, subject to a narrow exceptions process. It also reported that the law explicitly barred infiltrators, people staying unlawfully, and certain other groups from that process: “מסתננים, שוהים בלתי חוקיים, תושבי השטחים שאינם ישראלים (כלומר פלסטינים) ועוד, לא יוכלו להתגייר בכל מקרה ופנייתם לוועדה תידחה על הסף”. The review distinguished those rules for foreign nationals from the separate debate over how minors might be converted. It said minors could already begin conversion under the existing system, while the reform could allow city panels to apply less stringent requirements to some minors. But, according to the review, minors from families of foreign nationals would still need an exceptions-committee approval and would have to use the existing rabbinical courts, not the new local panels. Its conclusion was that the proposed reform did not give the groups named in the warning the asserted route to conversion: “קטינים למשפחות של נתינים זרים, שהם בהגדרה חסרי מעמד בישראל, יאלצו לפי החוק לקבל אישור של ועדת החריגים, ולעבור גיור דרך בתי הדין ‘המחמירים’ הקיימים כבר כיום.”

dpaReligion & belief

Nederlandse ministers en leden van het koningshuis zweren hun eed op de duivel Baphomet.

Publisher’s rating: De verschillende gezagsdragers maken het Nederlandse (christelijke) eedsgebaar. Dit gebaar wordt al met eedaflegging geassocieerd van voor dat een gelijkaardig gebaar voorkwam in een afbeelding van Baphomet. Deze is trouwens niet transgender, maar hermafrodiet.

The claim concerns a hand gesture made by Dutch ministers and members of the royal family when taking an oath. The review examines images of Queen Beatrix, King Willem-Alexander, Mark Rutte, Hugo de Jonge and Ferd Grapperhaus. It describes their gesture as extending the right index and middle fingers while bending the other fingers, with the palm facing forward. Although this resembles a gesture in a depiction of Baphomet, the review says that resemblance does not establish allegiance to the demon.

FACTLYReligion & belief

Recent video of saffron flags on top of the houses in Karnataka as a reaction to pro-hijab protests

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerns a video of saffron flags on rooftops, presented as a recent reaction in Karnataka to protests by students seeking to wear hijab. FACTLY says it could not establish the video’s location, but concluded that the footage was old and unrelated to the Karnataka hijab protests. The review specifically cautions that the video’s setting was unknown, rather than establishing that it was filmed in Karnataka. To check the footage’s history, the review reports that it searched screenshots using Google Reverse Image Search and found that a Facebook page had posted the same video in July 2021. That predates the protests described in the review: it says the six students had been protesting in Karnataka from December 2021 after being barred from attending classes with hijab. The chronology therefore contradicts the claim that the video was a reaction to those later protests. The review also notes that the same footage had circulated in October 2021 with a claim linking it to communal violence in Kawardha, Chhattisgarh; it says Newschecker had debunked that attribution as old and unrelated. Taken together, the reported July 2021 appearance and the later start of the Karnataka protests support the conclusion that this video does not show the claimed reaction.