Hate speech targeting Jewish people on social media surged by more than a third in the year following Israel’s military response to the Hamas October 7 attacks, a new report has found.

The amount of content blaming Jews for the Holocaust and justifying violence against them has increased dramatically.

Analysis of social media platforms such as X, TikTok and Facebook, showed that anti-Semitic content rose by more than 36 per cent in the 11 months that followed the attacks.

That figure came following an initial 86 per cent surge in posts attacking Jews in the first three weeks after the killing of more than 1,200 Israelis, 815 of whom were civilians.

In the 11 months prior to October 7, CyberWell’s monitoring technology flagged 135,556 posts as highly likely to be anti-Semitic. In the 11 months following October 7 this number jumped to 185,229 – an increase of 36.6 per cent.

The report found a significant increase in content justifying harm to Jews, alongside a rise in Holocaust denial and distortion.

Calls justifying violence against Jews rose from 5.1 per cent to 13.3 per cent; blaming Jews for the Holocaust leapt from 1.4 per cent to 11.1 per cent; and denying Jews the right to self-determination rose from 1.6 per cent to 8.9 per cent.

The report by CyberWell, an independent non-profit organisation fighting the spread of anti-Semitism online, found that the tone of such abuse on social media shifted markedly before and after October 7.

In the 11 months before the Hamas attacks on southern Israel, including the Nova music festival and kibbutz communities, the report found that the most recurring anti-Semitic trope was the portrayal of Jews controlling world events.

This fell from 33 per cent to 29.2 per cent after October 7, but was replaced with a steep rise in posts depicting Jews as “the enemy”.

Additionally, the research found that the term “Zionist” has been increasingly weaponised in anti-Semitic discourse.

Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor, CyberWell’s founder and executive director, said: “October 7, 2023, was the largest attack directed at Jews since the Holocaust, and Hamas and its allies have successfully – that morning and in the year since – hijacked our favourite social media platforms leveraging gaps in existing policies and moderation efforts to turn these apps into weapons of mass psychological warfare and to normalise hate against Jews worldwide.”