Russia is deliberately trying to stoke fear of terrorism in Europe

At the end of a video it says ‘No time for games’, in English and Turkish. It is a 50-second film with historical footage. The lighting of the Olympic flame in Munich, great sporting achievements – and then images of horror: about fifty years ago, on September 5, 1972, eight Palestinian terrorists attacked the living quarters of the Israeli Olympic team, killing two athletes instantly, the other nine hostages died later.

In the top right corner of the video is the logo of the right-wing extremist Turkish ‘Gray Wolves’. A Russian disinformation network now wants to create a mood.

The video with historical footage is no more authentic than graffiti with an assault rifle, which is passed like a baton from Munich 1972 to Paris 2024. Photos from Munich with scandalous spray paintings that are supposed to represent ovens with a Jewish star in them are also manipulated.

What does Putin want to achieve?

The fear of attacks on Munich in 1972, the shocking hatred of Jews in Germany – and masses of links to fake articles on websites that deceptively resemble well-known news sites: these articles are the next chapter in a massive campaign by Moscow.

Russia is increasingly using the Gaza war and the debate over anti-Semitism and Jew-hatred to stoke sentiment and deepen conflict with fake accounts. Meanwhile, anti-Ukrainian propaganda continues unabated.

What do we know about the spray-painted Jewish stars?

German authorities are still silent on whether spraying works in Dortmund and Berlin could be part of this campaign in mid-October. French authorities have gone further: After a couple was arrested while spraying Stars of David in Paris in late October, investigators quickly discovered connections to Russia. The couple received an order from a pro-Russian businessman from Moldova, and the photos were widely shared on fake accounts that are part of the ‘Doppelgänger’ network.

The French Foreign Ministry has now officially and “decisively condemned the involvement of the Russian network (…) in the artificial amplification and initial distribution of photos.”

Why is the “double” scam so dangerous?

France was now at the center of the largest ever manipulation campaign on social media platforms.

It started a few weeks after the Russian invasion of Ukraine and is known to authorities by the working title “Doppelgänger” because it also creates deceptively realistic replicas of well-known news brands. These look like “Spiegel”, “Telegraph” or “Le Monde”. However, beneath the serious-looking logo lies pro-Russian, anti-Ukrainian and anti-Western content.

These links are shared in comments on Facebook, along with cartoons and images with supposedly satirical pro-Russian content – ​​and again and again with videos and photos such as those of the Stars of David.

The German Watson media partner T-Online has now evaluated a new wave from last week. Almost everything has a connection to Munich.

Case 1: Alleged anti-Jewish graffiti

T-Online came across hundreds of accounts sharing photos of houses in the Hasenbergl district with German and French commentary. The images are scandalous: an oven is spray-painted on a garage, the text above it also says ‘oven’ and there is a Star of David in it shortly before it is burned.

T-Online was able to locate the locations. The Munich police had no reports that could be expected after such graffiti. When we went to the addresses, patrols couldn’t discover anything.

It is unclear who took the photos. Likewise, who put the fake graffiti on the real photos. However, two weeks before the messages on The photos were spread within a few hours last week. The police continue the investigation.

Case 2: Ukraine vs Israel

A photo is also said to have come from a house wall in Munich showing Joe Biden twice: once helping Israel, once rejecting Ukraine. The location is unclear and no further reports are known.

Playing Israel and Ukraine off against each other is a popular motive. The fake accounts of ‘Doppelganger’ also posted a video claiming that a wave of fraud had been committed in Israel by Ukrainians.

The case is spreading: Hebrew news sites have recently been counterfeited, reports the Israeli daily Haaretz.

Case 3: Alleged threatening Olympic attack video

At the same time as the graffiti tweets, replies appeared with a link to the video from Munich ’72. After the beautiful Olympic moments, images of the terrorists are cut, followed by photos of the coffins with Stars of David and portraits of the murdered Israelis.

At the same time, graffiti was spread, which is also not real. In the image, an assault rifle is transferred like a baton from Munich in 1972 to Paris in 2024. The Olympic Games will take place there next year. Tweets about the video and the spray-painted motif say people should pray for the safety of athletes and spectators in France: “I hope the Parisian authorities take this threat seriously,” one message said.

But this threat to the Olympics is almost certainly an invention of the fake network. According to the Political scientist and historian Ismail Küpeli, who conducts research into Turkish extremism, contradicts everything about the video from the “Gray Wolves”. “There is no content at all, no content where you would say: these are their themes, symbols and codes.”

A similar act does not match the pattern of the ‘Grey Wolves’: ‘It is almost impossible for a commando of the ‘Gray Wolves’ to travel to Paris to commit such an act there.’ The attack in Munich has no relevance for the Turkish extremists. Küpeli’s conclusion: “The ‘Gray Wolves’ logo is the only clue, but anyone could have placed it there.”

Who discovered this?

The video was shared by 558 accounts, according to an analysis by Antibot4navalny, head of a group of anonymous activists who monitor trolls. More than a quarter of the tweets were written in German or French, the rest in English.

The bot network also sends tweets in Ukrainian or Russian. Not about the Olympic video – “there are topics that are more important and relevant to you,” Antibot4navalny suspects.

The extent of the troll network is evident from the fact that they are now sorted alphabetically and assigned to the languages ​​they write in, as shown by an analysis of Antibot4navalny documents.

And it goes on: For the hashtag ‘Hard but fair’, stories from the series Cain, Callie, Calvin, Camilla, Campbell and Candice sent pro-Russian links in German on Monday. Profile photos are generated using artificial intelligence and new ones are created all the time.

Some stories warning of the alleged Olympic threat from the alleged Turkish extremists also take aim at the Turkish side. That’s why they distributed photos of an alleged street artist from Israel: he allegedly painted a menorah on a wall, the seven-branched Jewish candelabra that sets a Turkish flag on fire. t-online was able to locate the location in East Jerusalem. It is said of a Talmudic institute a few buildings away: The graffiti was not seen.

Posted 5400 times and barely reached anyone

At the same time, the image is being spread by a Turkish scientist living in Moscow – so far without much response. That is certainly noticeable: the great effort is compensated by little measurable success.

This can be seen clearly and verifiably from figures in a video with the AfD politician Nicolaus Fest. The statement, in which he speaks, among other things, about Ukrainian refugees in Germany as ‘parasitic war profiteers’, was posted 5,400 times in comments by fake accounts of ‘Doppelgänger’. According to X’s numbers, it was only seen 25,000 times.

Now that the campaign has been running since the spring of 2022 and continues to take on new facets, customers are apparently hoping for something despite the low response to the individual tweets. The internet’s nervousness allowed attempts to go viral. And given the amount of messages, perhaps the principle also applies: constant dripping wears away the stone.

Sources