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Last month, during the week of July 16-23 when new British Prime Minister Andy Burnham took office, CAM’s Antisemitism Research Center (ARC) recorded 34 antisemitic incidents in the UK capital alone.
Many of the incidents were linked to a large demonstration in London organized by a coalition of anti-Israel organizations the day after Burnham assumed the premiership. The protesters denounced former Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s handling of the war in Gaza and demanded the UK adopt a hostile stance toward Israel, including a full arms embargo.
The content of the rhetoric documented by the ARC at the demonstration illustrated not only the persistence of antisemitism in the UK, but also a growing embrace by the British left of classical antisemitic tropes historically associated with the far right.
Placards carried by marchers accused UK government officials of being “bought” and “owned” by Israel, particularly singling out Shabana Mahmood, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, and Peter Mandelson, among others.
Other banners and signs read “End Zionist Control Over the UK” and “UK Sold Out to Zionists.”
In a street interview, a female demonstrator holding an “End the Power of the Zionist Lobby” placard used language with unmistakable echoes of Nazi-era propaganda, claiming Zionism’s “tentacles go everywhere… our governments are owned, all the businesses are owned, Hollywood is owned, you name it, it’s owned by the Zionists.”
Taken together, the preponderance of the 34 incidents tracked in London from July 16-23 essentially represented a repackaging of the “ZOG” (Zionist Occupied Government) antisemitic conspiracy theory, which posits that Western governments have been secretly infiltrated by “Zionists,” a thinly-veiled substitute for “Jews.”
Notably, the term “ZOG” was coined in the 1970s by American neo-Nazi activist Eric Thomson, underscoring how this rhetoric traces directly back to explicitly white supremacist origins, regardless of the contexts in which it now manifests.
Antisemitic conspiracy theories of this sort are nothing new, of course. But their now open popularity among far-left activists points to a troubling ideological convergence that should concern all who are committed to combating hatred, regardless of where it surfaces across the political spectrum.
