Twitter user discovers strange anti-Ukrainian ad on Israeli Facebook

Published: JUNE 3, 2023 03:35

Updated: JUNE 3, 2023 03:36

A keyboard is placed in front of a displayed Facebook logo in this picture illustration.

(photo credit: DADO RUVIC/REUTERS)

The suspicious ad was set up by an empty Facebook page and attempted to trick users into believing it linked to an Israeli magazine.

A Twitter user uncovered an anti-Ukrainian ad on Facebook targetting Israelis aimed at reducing aid to Ukraine, on Wednesday.

The ad featured a bent-over man dressed in white with a Star of David drawn on him wearing a kippa and carrying a blue and yellow swastika, the colors of Ukraine. The text above it says "Israel should focus all attention on fighting the economic crisis. Supporting the conflicts of others is an unjustified luxury. Every shekel counts." Followed by a link to a website.

The link led to a website called theliberal.net , which had a similar appearance to an Israeli magazine of the same name. However, the magazine's website is theliberal.co.il.

The article on the website was titled "Ukraine is expensive" and was supposedly written by Joanna Landau the CEO of Vibe Israel, a TLV-based organization of data-driven storytellers, sharing Israel’s story with the world according to their Twitter.

This led Twitter user, Arieh Kovler, to become suspicious and he decided to investigate.

This paid anti-Ukrain propaganda ad, in Hebrew, just popped up on my Facebook. The cartoon's message is hardly subtle, but let's see what we can find out. pic.twitter.com/n4mPVCDISd
— Arieh Kovler (@ariehkovler) May 31, 2023

The ads publisher was a "nothing" Facebook page that targeted people in Israel who interacted with technology, consumer electronics, and graphic novels.

A boy waves a national flag atop of armoured personal carrier at an exhibition of destroyed Russian military vehicles and weapons, dedicated to the upcoming country's Independence Day, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in the centre of Kyiv, Ukraine August 21, 2022. (credit: REUTERS/VALENTYN OGIRENKO)

He also found that the page was running a second ad, with the same text but a different image.

The page is running another ad too. Both use the same text:"Israel should focus all attention on fighting the economic crisis. Supporting the conflicts of others is an unjustified luxury. Every shekel counts"The ad text does't mention the Nazi stuff. pic.twitter.com/EyewJl9OwB
— Arieh Kovler (@ariehkovler) May 31, 2023

Problems with Facebook's approval process

Summing up he said: "They had to buy the fake domain and the cartflower redirect domain, write the fake article in Hebrew, clone the Liberal, set up the Facebook page, commission the original cartoons and buy ads. All to target a tiny amount of humanitarian aid to Ukraine"

Kovler finished the thread by stating that Facebook's new approval process was broken, showing evidence of drugs being advertised on the platform and saying he had also seen gun advertisements. He questioned how much of this was going on in other language markets.

Another Twitter user pointed out a grammatical error, saying "I suspect the ad isn't written by a native Hebrew speaker.."; another user mused whether the error revealed the writer to be a native speaker of Russian or Farsi.