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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

The QuintReligion & belief

Muslims wear shoes inside a temple in Andhra Pradesh which has been made a quarantine facility

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a video showing people in skull caps and burqas leaving a building. It was shared as evidence that Kanipakam Ganesh temple in Chittoor district, Andhra Pradesh, had been made a quarantine centre for Muslims, with footwear allegedly being worn inside the temple. The review identifies the building in the video as an indoor lodging, not a Hindu temple. To check the building’s identity, the review says it examined a sign visible in the video, searched for the location on Google Maps, and compared frames from the video with images there. The sign read “Sri Ganesh Sadan”; the map search identified it as indoor lodging in Chittoor, and the review reports that the video frames matched the map images. This evidence addresses the central misidentification behind the claim: the people were seen leaving a lodging facility, not the temple named in the post. The excerpt does not establish that the lodging was being used as a quarantine centre or independently verify the people’s identities or footwear; those details should not be inferred from its finding about the building.

Deutsche Presse-AgenturReligion & belief

Mit Sorge erwarten Millionen Muslime weltweit den Ramadan, der Ende April beginnt. Wie der Fastenmonat in diesem Jahr ablaufen wird, ist wegen der Corona-Pandemie unklar. Nun kursiert in sozialen Netzwerken eine Information, die angeblich aus dem "Krisenzentrum für Berlin und Brandenburg" stammt: Falls zu Beginn des Ramadans "die Ausgangsbeschränkung noch gilt", gebe es eine Sonderregelung "nur für Menschen mit muslimischen Glauben" [sic].

Publisher’s rating: Es gibt kein gemeinsames Krisenzentrum für Berlin und Brandenburg. Der Zentralrat der Muslime geht davon aus, dass die Moscheen zu Beginn des Ramadan geschlossen bleiben müssen. Ob der Fastenmonat überhaupt stattfindet, ist offen. Die Maßnahmen zur Eindämmung der Corona-Pandemie gelten für alle Religionen gleichermaßen.

FACTLYReligion & belief

https://factly.in/old-photos-falsely-shared-as-ram-navami-celebrations-at-bhuj-mandir-gujarat-during-lockdown/

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The review examined social-media photos said to show Ram Navami celebrations on 2 April 2020 at Shree Swaminarayan Temple, known as Bhuj Mandir, in Gujarat. The posts used the images to criticize Prime Minister Narendra Modi, alleging that a large gathering had been allowed in his home state during the nationwide lockdown. The investigation instead identified the gathering as a different temple celebration, held before the lockdown.

Fact CrescendoReligion & belief

Claim: Pope Francis ran away in coronavirus fear

Publisher’s rating: False

The review examines an eight-second video circulated with the allegation that Pope Francis ran away in fear of coronavirus. In the clip, a woman grabs his hand; Francis strikes her hand and moves away. The review says the post offered no evidence that his actions were caused by concern about infection. It identifies the footage instead as an incident around New Year 2020, after a prayer service in St. Peter’s Square, when Francis was greeting people. The woman pulled his hand, he struck her hand and left, and he later apologized for his conduct. To check when the footage was made, the review says it searched for reports of Francis striking a woman’s hand and found news coverage and video from outlets including the BBC and The Guardian, as well as a News18 Tamil report carrying a CNN video. It describes that longer footage as showing Francis greeting people and moving to greet others when the woman pulled him. The review also checked the chronology of the coronavirus news: it cites reporting that China notified the World Health Organization on December 31, 2019, and says Wuhan authorities identified the infection as a new type on January 5. It concludes that the clip was from the New Year incident, not evidence of a coronavirus-related escape. The review’s account thus distinguishes what the video shows from the added interpretation in the viral post: the footage depicts a reaction after someone pulled Francis’s hand, while the post attributes his departure to coronavirus fear without supporting evidence. Its described chronology places the incident before the cited January 5 announcement identifying the pathogen as a new type.

FACTLYReligion & belief

People shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’ in Europe after the Coronavirus outbreak

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a video presented as showing people in Europe taking to the streets, reading an Islamic text and shouting “Allahu Akbar” after the coronavirus outbreak. FACTLY investigated the video’s provenance and timing. It reports finding the same video on YouTube, uploaded on 13 January 2020, with a description placing it in Hamburg, Germany. That chronology contradicts the claim that the footage was recorded after COVID-19 reached Europe: the review says the first European case was reported on 24 January 2020 and Germany’s first case on 28 January. Since the video was already online before either reported case, it could not show a post-outbreak event in Europe. The review also found Getty Images photographs of a similar-looking demonstration in Hamburg on 11 January 2020, described as a protest against oppression of the Uyghur Muslim minority in China. However, FACTLY cautions that matching-looking surroundings do not establish that the video depicts that specific demonstration. Its conclusion rests on the video’s pre-outbreak date, not on a definitive identification of the gathering.