Antisemitism permeates China’s internet after conflict broke out between Israel and Hamas

Despite Beijing not openly taking a side, nationalist commentators and netizens have eagerly expressed support for Palestine and dislike of Jews. Some even defended the Holocaust.

Scores of Chinese online commentators and netizens for the past few days have been making antisemitic remarks after conflict broke out between Israel and Hamas, leaving hateful comments under Israeli government’s Chinese social media accounts.

Beijing has called on both sides to end the hostilities. In a statement, it wrote it condemns “all violence and attacks on civilians”. The conflict has so far resulted in more than a thousand deaths.

But on China’s internet, influential accounts and social media users have quickly joined together, rallying for Palestine and Hamas, the radical Palestinian militant group that initiated the attack on Israeli civilians. Netizens accuse Israel of brutally oppressing Palestinians for decades and that Israel deserves the bloodshed.

“In the past, Germany persecuted you. Now you persecute Palestinians. In this world, do not force others to the corner because you would only be digging your own grave,” wrote Ziwu Xiashi, one of the biggest nationalist commentators with one million followers on Weibo, China’s popular microblogging platform.

Over the weekend, Chinese netizens’ criticism of Israel has been gradually overtaken by antisemitic attacks.

“Jews always talk about how bad they were treated during World War II and throughout history. But you can’t ask why. Otherwise, you are called a racist or that you envy their money,” a popular Weibo post with over 2000 likes states. “Actually, before the Holocaust during World War II, Jews’ reputation was down in the ghetto in the entire Europe.”

“Wherever the Jews have gone, they have always been massacred. There’s a reason why. You only love Jews when they are not in your area,” online commentator Vincent wrote.

Netizens have also flooded the comment section of posts made by the Israeli government on Weibo with criticism and attacks.

The account run by the Israeli embassy in China had to close off its comment sections after thousands of angry netizens left antisemitic comments in the wake of Hamas’s attack.

A Chinese-Israeli girl was reportedly abducted by Hamas militants. Responding to news about the girl’s ongoing ordeal posted by Israel’s consulate in Guangzhou, netizens accused the consulate of trying to drive a wedge between China and Palestine.

“Impressive divisive tactic,” one popular comment wrote. “Is that girl even Chinese?”

Under a different news post about the girl, a comment with over ten thousand likes asked “if she thinks she’s Israeli, this has nothing to do with us. Why even post it on China’s internet?”

Many commentators and influential accounts have brought up the death of Du Zhaoyu, a Chinese military officer killed in a bombing conducted by the Israeli air force in 2006 while on United Nations duties in Lebanon.

It is not rare to see comments praising Adolf Hitler, the Nazi Germany leader who was responsible for the Holocaust and the deaths of millions of Jews during the war.

“It’s really the fault of little mustache,” wrote a netizen, “if he had burned all of them (Jews), we wouldn’t have this much trouble.”

Many netizens refer to Hitler as “little mustache”, possibly in an attempt to evade censorship of his name.

Some users also believe the Jewish people have become just like Hitler. A popular online saying goes “Question little mustache, understand little mustache, then become little mustache”.

The online antisemitism in China didn’t appear out of nowhere. For years there have been conspiracy theories about Jews circulating on China’s internet, claiming that the Jews have, through organizations like the Freemasonry, secretly controlled the United States government and influenced the world.

Even Chinese state media outlets have flirted with these conspiracy theories. Multiple state media articles published over the past decade and beyond stated, without providing sources, that Jews, who only make up about 3% of the US population, are controlling over 70% of the nation’s wealth, with which they have disproportionately influenced American politics.

“We can’t blame the Chinese government for all of the antisemitism on the Chinese internet, but the government contributed it by actively promoting stereotypes and false narratives,” Wang Yaqiu, research director for China, Hong Kong and Taiwan at Freedom House, told me for my story for Voice of America’s Chinese website.

On Tuesday, a Weibo account run by China Central Television, one of the major three state media agencies controlled by Beijing, again brought up how the Jewish community has the most financial power in American politics and how the issue of Israel has often been a deciding factor in every US election.

Hashtag “the 3% Jewish population in the US control over 70% of American wealth” at one point became one of the top trending topics on Weibo.

Netizens believe this is the Chinese government signaling where it really stands on the conflict.

“Based on how this trending topic was arranged, now I see where our country really stands,” a popular comment wrote.

The comment has since been made invisible.