Washington  - A magazine cover that portrays the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Barack Obama, as a terrorist has drawn severe criticism from Obama's campaign and Republican opponent John McCain.

The New Yorker's July 21 cover shows Obama inside the White House's Oval Office wearing a turban alongside wife Michelle, sporting an Afro with an AK-47 slung over her shoulder. The couple are giving each other a congratulatory fist bump. In the fireplace is a burning American flag.

The image was designed to satirize Obama's right-wing critics, but appears to have angered the Obama camp. Obama has attempted to distance himself from rumours painting his as un-American and linking him to radical Islam.

"The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Senator Obama's right-wing critics have tried to create," campaign spokesman Bill Burton said, according to Politico. com.

"But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree," he added.

The cartoon also drew a sharp rebuke from McCain's campaign.

"We completely agree with the Obama campaign, its tasteless and offensive," McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds told Politico. com. (dpa)