How Antisemitic Narratives are Spread Using Online Video on Social Media

Video on social media has become a core battleground for contemporary understandings of Judaism, Israel and the wider Jewish story. Unfortunately, this battleground has become largely dominated by organised state and non-state actors determined to cement prejudicial views in the minds of Western audiences.

At the Contemporary Antisemitism Conference in London 2025, Phil ran through the techniques used to cement these antisemitic narratives using online video.

By using a combination of large web scrapers to pull in data from the two prominent video platforms and then using AI at scale to parse video transcripts, Phil has been able to build a comprehensive picture of how much antisemitic content is evident across these platform He shows that for the topic of Zionism, 69% of videos ranking on YouTube contained a clearly “anti-zionist” message, and 44% contained an explicitly antisemitic conspiracy theory.

Transcript

1. How Antisemitic Narratives are Spread Using Online Video on Social Media Phil Nottingham philnottingham.substack.com @philnottingham Contemporar y Antisemitis m , Londo n 2025
2. This is my company. We help businesses and non pro fi ts create and distribute video online.
3. Text = Context
4. You might, therefore, reasonably expect me to be most worried about the impact of new technologies
5. Very old technologies. I’m actually more worried about the impact of old technologies.
7. Most antisemitic bias is spread by hiding a lie within a truth Truth Lies
8. I’m actually more worried about the impact of old technologies.
9. A video of a fi ght at a football match between Israel and France in Paris. Like most football fi ghts, not entirely clear who started it. No one was seriously hurt and stewards broke it up quickly.
10. But how would you interpret what you see if you read this fi rst?
13. And what do you think you’re seeing in this video?
15. Nothing in the video shows what’s being claimed in the subtitles or title… but it’s enough to sew doubt
17. The video doesn’t show what the thumbnail suggests
18. Text = Context
19. We interpret what we see based on emotional triggers indicated by the copy
20. In this interview with Tzipi Hotovely, whole sections are cropped out and answers to questions moved out of context. So viewers are given a false impression of her position.
21. This Happens at Scale
22. I pulled data on the top 500 results for the term“Zionism”
23. Initially processed by an AI, and then manually veri fi ed with human review
24. Neutral 19% Anti-Zionist 69% Pro-Zionist 12% Neutral 5,584,337 Anti-Zionist 55,874,825 Pro-Zionist 2,677,080 Videos in top 500 View Counts
25. This is what people are consuming when searching for this topic.
26. Of course, not all “anti-zionism” is inherently antisemitic.
27. Although most of it is….
28. Here are some examples of videos ranking in the top 500 for “Zionism”
33. I’ve then run analysis to determine how many contain explicit antisemitic tropes
34. Contains Antisemitic Conspiracy Theory? View Counts Unknown 24% Yes 44% No 32% Unknown 8,282,597 Yes 26,271,608 No 29,582,037
35. It’s easy to point the fi nger at Google to blame for this. But it’s a hard problem to solve
36. This is how a reasonably sophisticated Claude.ai model interpreted the 500 videos, armed with information about speci fi c terms and language that would indicate a pro/anti-zionist perspective.
38. Because, again, the lies are smuggled in with the truth
39. Framed as an unbiased news report Truth Lies
40. Propaganda framed as a documentary Truth Lies
41. On the surface, this looks like it could be reasonable Truth Lies
42. On the surface, this looks like it could be reasonable Truth Lies
43. A troll explaining that he is a zionist because he wants Jews out of America. Truth Lies
44. The top ranking videos are a reasonable attempt to o ff er unbiased perspectives Truth Lies
45. But most of the content is being created by organisations with an agenda to deceive and distort
46. Top YouTube Channels for “Zionism” 5,627,809 Views 4,646,248 Views 4,417,904 Views Qatari-Owned Qatari-Owned Turkey-Owned
47. Most of this isn’t bots…the view patterns are consistent with genuine consumption
48. “Zionism” I’ve done the same for TikTok
49. Neutral 38% Anti-Zionist 47% Pro-Zionist 14% Videos in top 100 Contains Antisemitic Conspiracy Theory? Unknown 11% Yes 23% No 66%
51. Why does this work? Truth Lies
52. I think of Chichén Itzá
54. The Temple of Kulkulcán is a magic trick
55. Local people were invited to come to the temple at Spring Equinox to see the blessing of the great feathered serpent god
56. They would gather around, and clapping would reverberate like the sound of the Queztal bird, and then, as the sun fell…
58. They would see the outline of the snake. And feel blessed. For hundreds of years.
59. This, of course, seems preposterous to us
60. But imagine telling the Mayans that rain is a consequence of atmospheric pressure, not the will of a winged snake deity
61. Where antisemitism is concerned…we see the snake
62. A memetic recourse for those whose moral worldview falls short, to avoid intellectual disintegration Antisemitis m i s …
63. The belief that the Jews stand in the way of their vision for a just world
64. Contemporary Narratives Old Tropes Outsiders World Domination Rejecting The Messiah Host Desecration Blood Libel Colonisers Imperialists Exploiters Degenerates Génocidaires
65. Truth > Narrative Ho w ca n w e figh t thi s ?
66. Phil Nottingham philnottingham.substack.com @philnottingham phil@organicvideo.com