Denial And "False Flag" Claims Following Antisemitic Attacks Are Latest Evolution Of Holocaust Denial

CyberWell’s report documents how online discourse in the immediate aftermath of violent attacks against Jews and Israelis, from October 7th, 2023 through the last year, frequently shifts toward rhetoric questioning the reality of the violence, disputing documented evidence or attributing responsibility of the attack to Jewish victims themselves. According to CyberWell, these narratives mirror longstanding Holocaust denial mechanisms: erasing victimhood, inverting responsibility and replacing facts with conspiracy.

“By analyzing the online response to the repeat violence targeting the Jewish community across the world in the last two years, this research reveals an important development in current Jew-hatred: denialism is being repackaged for the masses online,” said CyberWell Founder and CEO Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor. “The current denial narratives that go so far as to blame Jews for orchestrating attacks against themselves draw directly on the framework of Holocaust denial and distortion. Violence against Jews is denied, responsibility is inverted, and conspiracies replace facts. Whether it is the Holocaust, October 7th or other recent violent attacks against Jews, denial of well documented attacks against Jews is meant to dehumanize them further by erasing their victimhood—now at digital speed and global reach.”

The analysis outlined in the report is based on a series of real-time alerts and reports that CyberWell shared with major Social Media Platforms, documenting and addressing recurring behavioral patterns that emerge after antisemitic attacks. The report identified two interconnected current narratives: Denial, which dismisses attacks as fabricated, exaggerated or staged; and Conspiratorial Self-Victimization (CSV), a growing online trend in which Jews are accused of staging violent attacks against themselves to gain sympathy, political advantage or shape public opinion—rooted in the classic antisemitic trope that paints Jews as master manipulators.

The report illustrates how denial today functions in ways comparable to Holocaust denial, while blaming Jews for the attacks that befall them aligns with Holocaust distortion by reframing Jewish victims as deceptive or complicit actors. Together, these narratives fuel radicalization by normalizing suspicion toward and rejection of Jewish suffering and undermining accountability for violence.

The report analyzes online discourse following attacks worldwide across Meta (Facebook and Instagram), TikTok, X and YouTube. The sample dataset of content examined more than 300 examples which collectively generated nearly 14 million views and more than 500,000 user interactions, demonstrating the outsized reach of denialist and conspiratorial narratives during moments of public attention.

The overwhelming majority of posts analyzed (88 percent) included claims of Conspiratorial Self-Victimization asserting that Jews staged, provoked or carried out violence against themselves, often alongside explicit denial. In many cases, attacks were labeled as hoaxes, while simultaneously framed as coordinated “false flag” operations.

Nearly half of the content analyzed (47.4 percent) featured denial and conspiratorial narratives related to the October 7th massacre, the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. More than two years later, these narratives continue to circulate widely, with low removal rates (only 17.8 percent), despite extensive documentation of the attacks.

Overall, the report highlights critical gaps in how Social Media platforms address denial and conspiratorial narratives linked to present-day antisemitic violence. While most major platforms explicitly ban Holocaust denial and distortion, denial and Conspiratorial Self-Victimization related to current waves of antisemitic attacks are addressed less consistently, enabling these narratives to flourish during periods of heightened vulnerability.

Platform-level analysis identified X as the primary source of both volume and engagement for this content. Across platforms, enforcement was inconsistent: fewer than one in five posts in the dataset were removed after being reported, even when content violated existing platform policies.

TikTok emerged as a partial exception due to their explicit Community Guidelines banning denial of well-documented violent events and CSV narratives. Even so, enforcement remained limited and below the average rates of removal of antisemitic content documented by CyberWell, underscoring the need for stronger, more consistent moderation across platforms.

CyberWell is an independent, tech-based NonProfit combating the spread of antisemitism online, operating globally. Its AI-technologies monitor Social Media in English and Arabic for posts that promulgate antisemitism, Holocaust denial and promote violence against Jews and their allies based on the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism, expanded to include emergent antisemitic tropes not explicitly covered in the working definition. Its analysts review and report this content to platform moderators while indexing all verified posts in the first-ever open database of antisemitic Social Media posts, democratically cataloging it for transparency at: https://app.cyberwell.org. Through partnerships, education and real-time alerts, CyberWell partners with social media platforms and their moderators to help them enforce their policies more effectively, promoting proactive steps against online Jew-hate.

For more information, visit: https://cyberwell.org/.