In the Digital Age, misinformation travels faster than fact-checkers can work. Israel and the Jews know this well from very personal experience. X/Twitter, TikTok, and other social media networks have spawned an entire universe of antisemitic and toxic conspiratorial content that spreads like wildfire.
This reality manifests across many domains, including the viral spread of demographic data about European Muslims used to paint a dire picture of civilizational collapse and radical Islamic takeover.
Imagine my surprise upon seeing two recent incidents involving Israeli figures sharing unverified data and unsourced graphics to amplify anti-Islamic narratives that have migrated from Europe’s far Right fringe into mainstream Israeli discourse.
Naftali Bennett
The first incident involved former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett sharing an unaccredited graphic claiming to show the percentage of Muslim children in primary schools in major European capital cities.
Bennett’s post cited a lengthy list of sources, including the key researcher who could not be located and studies that bore little resemblance to his inflammatory conclusions. Most tellingly, a major Pew Research report he referenced, a highly credible source on European Muslim demographics, contained none of the data specific to the dark threat that he highlighted. The gap between source material and sensationalist interpretation reveals a deliberate or negligent pattern of distortion.
The second incident saw Israel’s official Arabic-language social media account share an old graphic purporting to show the number of mosques across European countries. The image, which dates at least as far back as 2016, carries no attribution or source, and was accompanied by inflammatory text describing mosques as representing “the true face of colonialism” and calling them a “fifth column” that Europe must “remove.”
Remarkably, that text was lifted verbatim from an anonymous X account that had posted the identical graphic earlier that same day. Israel’s official government account was literally copy-pasting incendiary content from an anonymous social media user whose entire feed was full of anti-Islamic content. What possible policy goal could justify this approach?
For a country that suffers so much at the hands of toxic and slanderous social media content, it would seem an odd and worrying tactic to use.
Islamophobic currents
The graphic claimed the UK has 1,825 mosques [a 2025 report by the UK’s Religion Media Center notes 1,884 mosques and prayer halls based on registered charities, and the Muslims in Britain database lists 1,850.] Of course the number of mosques cannot justify the jump to describing the entire Muslim population as a fifth column or a threat to civilization.
Would British Jews feel comfortable if a foreign government’s official social media account began circulating graphics about synagogue numbers while warning of Jewish demographic threats? The answer should be obvious.
These incidents don’t exist in a vacuum. They align perfectly with Islamophobic currents that have gained mainstream legitimacy in European politics. The migration of these ideas from extremist forums to parliamentary debates and newspaper columns represents one of the most concerning political developments of recent years. In the UK, as in other Western European countries, it is upending traditional political alignments.
The broader European debate about immigration and integration is legitimate and critical.
Citizens have every right to discuss the challenges of managing migration flows, ensuring successful integration, and addressing security concerns.
There are indeed mosques in Europe that foster extremist ideologies, and combating radical Islam remains a genuine priority. But these real issues become distorted beyond recognition when filtered through the lens of demographic panic and civilizational fear-mongering.
The distinction matters
The distinction matters. Addressing specific problems, such as radical preaching, integration failures, or security threats, requires targeted, evidence-based responses. Promoting generalized fear about Muslim demographic growth treats an entire religious community as an inherent threat, regardless of its members actual beliefs or behaviors. It incites hatred and is incendiary.
Violent and other racist attacks against Muslims are on the rise in Europe.
The Israeli government is rightly focused on the steep rise in antisemitism since the October 7 attacks, but has missed that there is a parallel rise in hate crimes against Muslims in Europe over the same period.
For those who study racism, this should not come as a surprise, and should drive Jewish, Israeli, and Muslim community leaders to tackle racial hatred together, rather than allow those on both sides to use the politics of religion and demographics to increase the tensions.
Why would Bennett, as well as the government’s Arabic-language social media account, choose to amplify European Islamophobia using questionable data or incendiary language? A possible clue was given by Amit Segal of Channel 12 on a podcast with Dan Senor, in which he explained that the lack of concern over Israel’s diplomatic crisis with Europe will be solved when the populist Right gains power.
If the calculation is that Israel’s security somehow depends on European far Right parties gaining power through anti-Muslim sentiment, this represents a profoundly misguided strategy that threatens to undermine Jewish communities’ own security and values.
Using this type of misinformation, it is hard to see how Bennett offers an alternative, all the more surprising given that he was prime minister in the first Israeli government that included an Arab party – Israel’s own Islamic party.
Success story
Rather than trafficking in demographic panic about European Muslims, Israeli leaders like Bennett could instead highlight one of their country’s genuine success stories: the integration of Israel’s Arab citizens, who comprise over 20% of the state’s population and serve as judges, doctors, engineers, and members of parliament.
That is a compelling narrative of coexistence and integration that could inspire rather than inflame, yet it is abandoned here in favor of spreading alarm with unverified graphics and manipulated statistics. At a time when multiculturalism is coming under increased pressure in Europe, Israel’s domestic story stands out like a beacon.
In the current fractious political environment, we need leadership that distinguishes between legitimate security or societal concerns and demographic fear-mongering.
Israeli politicians have a choice: Amplify the success story of their own diverse democracy, or continue sharing anonymous anti-Muslim content from the dark corners of social media. For Jews and Israelis, the choice should be obvious.
The writer is founding partner of Goldrock Capital and founder of The Institute for Jewish and Zionist Research. He chairs a number of NGOs, including Leshem, ICAR, and ReHome, and is a former chair of Gesher and World Bnei Akiva.