Antisemitic theories and Israel-related conspiracies surged in the aftermath of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, the Anti-Defamation League reported Friday.
Within hours of the conservative commentator’s death on September 10, and before a suspect had even been identified, the ADL found that many conspiracy theorists had attributed the incident to Israel or Jews.
Since September 10, there have been more than 10,000 posts on X that include the phrase, “Israel killed Charlie Kirk,” the ADL said. Some known accounts with “histories of peddling anti-Israel and antisemitic conspiracy theories” immediately accused Israel of Kirk’s assassination, it said.
“Pretty obvious that Israel ordered the hit after Charlie started noticing,” far-right conspiracy theorist Stew Peters wrote on X.
Ian Carroll, an anti-Zionist X influencer with more than a million followers said the killing would be a “turning point of US Israel relations,” because “he was their friend,” and “they murdered him in front of his family.”
So far, Carroll’s post had more than 10 million views and 100,000 likes.
Peters said Kirk was a “martyr for the JQ,” or Jewish Question, which the ADL said is a term from the 1800s used by modern antisemites to state their antisemitic bona fides and indicate that Jewish presence in society is a problem.
Some people endorsed the conspiracy theory that Kirk’s platforming of Dave Smith, a comedian who is critical of Israel, was Israel’s rationale for killing Kirk.
Anti-Israel influencer account Syrian Girl accused the IDF of carrying out the killing, tweeting that “targeting the neck is very IDF coded.”
The Jerusalem Post read through hundreds of the tens of thousands of posts with the words “Israel killed Charlie Kirk,” many of which contained obscure conspiracy theories.
“Ben Shapiro praising the Bible on Bill Maher last night was all the proof you need that they are on damage control because Israel killed Charlie Kirk,” one person posted.
Dozens of posts contained statements that Israel had killed Kirk like “they killed JFK” or “like they did with 9/11.”
There were also multiple posts using the phrase “Jews killed Charlie Kirk,” and the majority also connected his death to 9/11.
Great replacement, 9/11 conspiracy theories
“The Jews killed Charlie Kirk on the eve of 9/11,” one person posted. “They don’t want people talking about 9/11, the great awakening trying to keep people occupied with other things.”
There is even an X account named THE JEWS KILLED CHARLIE KIRK.
There was also a huge surge in Great Replacement theory comments, including tweets such as, “The jews assassinated Charlie Kirk. We’re in a f***ing war, Whites... It’s not only ‘white people’ that are under attack. It’s all Gentiles (non-Jews). Jews are out of control in my view, geo politically and culturally, and it needs to stop.”
Another post said: “I believe Mossad killed Charlie Kirk to send a message to Trump (obey or else).”
On Friday, the Combat Antisemitism Movement said: “Now, anti-Semites have latched onto alleged Jewish malevolence as the ‘great explanatory myth’ of Kirk’s senseless murder... These conspiracy theories are designed to manipulate those who are rightly outraged by the murder, which could encourage violence against Jews or Jewish institutions.”