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It is a positive story in a publication that the president has consistently praised – with one exception. The magazine's cover photo, the president decreed, ""could be the worst ever".

Time magazine's praise to Trump's role in mediating a ceasefire in Gaza, featured on its November 10 cover, was presented alongside a photograph of the president taken from below and with the sun shining from the back.

The result, he says, is ""extremely poor".

"The publication wrote a relatively good story about me, but the picture may be the lowest quality in history", the president posted on Truth Social.

“They eliminated my hair, and then had a shape drifting on top of my head that resembled a hovering tiara, but an very tiny one. Really weird! I consistently avoided taking pictures from underneath angles, but this is a extremely poor picture, and deserves to be called out. What is their intention, and why?”

Donald Trump has shown obvious his ambition to feature on Time magazine's front page and achieved this multiple times in the past year. The obsession has reached his golf courses – in 2017, the magazine asked him to remove fabricated front pages shown in some of his properties.

This issue's photograph was taken by Graeme Sloane for a news agency at the White House on 5 October.

The shot's viewpoint highlighted negatively his chin and neck area – an opening that California governor Newsom seized, with the governor's office tweeting a version with the problematic part pixelated.

{The hostages from Israel detained in Gaza have been released under the initial stage of the president's diplomatic initiative, in exchange for a freeing of Palestinian inmates. This agreement could be a major success of his next term, and it could mark a strategic turning point for that part of the world.

At the same time, a support for his portrayal has been offered by a surprising origin: the spokesperson at Russia’s ministry of foreign affairs intervened to condemn the "damaging" image choice.

It's remarkable: a photo exposes those who selected it than about the person in it. Just unwell persons, people obsessed with malice and resentment –maybe even degenerates – could have picked this picture", the official posted on her social channel.

"And given the complimentary photos of President Biden that that magazine displayed on the cover, notwithstanding his health issues, the story is simply self-incriminating for the magazine", she said.

The answer to Trump’s questions – why did they choose this, and why? – could be related to innovatively depicting a sense of power according to a picture editor, a media professional.

The image itself technically is good," she explains. "They chose this shot because they wanted the president to look heroic. Staring up at someone evokes a feeling of their grandeur and his expression actually looks reflective and almost somewhat divine. It's rare you see photos of Trump in such a calm instance – the picture feels tender."

Trump’s hair looks erased because the sunlight behind him has overexposed that part of the image, creating a halo effect, she explains. Although the article's title marries well with the president's look in the image, "one cannot constantly gratify the subject matter."

"No one likes being photographed from below, and although all of the conceptual elements of the image are very strong, the aesthetics are not complimentary."

The news outlet reached out to the magazine for comment.