As news of Operation Epic Fury — the military engagement involving Israel, the United States, and Iran — spread across social media platforms, antisemitic themes spiked sharply in online conversation. Analyzing the period from Feb. 28 to March 3, 2026, the BSA Command Center recorded a 264% increase in overall tracked conversation, alongside a significant surge in hateful content. Posts glorifying Adolf Hitler, claiming Jews control the U.S. government, reviving 9/11 conspiracy theories, and using dehumanizing language targeting Jews and Israelis all climbed dramatically — in some cases by hundreds or thousands of percent.
The pattern is one the Command Center has documented before. When Israel launched Operation Rising Lion in June 2025, the BSA Command Center recorded a 165% spike in online conversation about Jewish culture, antisemitism, and Israel. Similar themes dominated then: Jewish control of U.S. government, false flag accusations, Hitler glorification, and dehumanizing language comparing Jews to rats and vermin. Operation Epic Fury appears to have activated the same playbook, this time at an even greater scale.
Hitler Glorification Surges Across Platforms
Over 466,000 posts mentioned Hitler in the days following the outbreak of hostilities — a 120% increase over the prior period. The content ranged from familiar antisemitic slogans to newly emergent phrases that spread rapidly across platforms.
“Hitler was right” appeared in approximately 7,500 posts, up 248%, generating over 816,000 impressions. More striking was the explosion of posts suggesting the world “owes Hitler an apology” — a framing the Command Center also tracked following Operation Rising Lion in June 2025. This time, that phrase surged 1,460%, producing over 22,000 posts and 1.4 million impressions.
Two phrases emerged as new entries in this conversation. “Hitler knew,” appearing in around 12,500 posts, implied foreknowledge or vindication of Hitler’s worldview in light of current events. The phrase “Hitler in heaven” appeared in 16,800 posts and an outsized 19.5 million impressions — the highest reach of any phrase in this category. It is worth noting that not all posts using this phrase were explicitly antisemitic; some expressed the opposite sentiment, such as: “Adolf Hitler in heaven seeing Jewish people succeed worldwide after everything he did to stop and erase them.” Even so, the framing carries troubling implications. A fabricated Hitler quote — “I could kill all the Jews in the whole world, but I’ll leave some so you guys know why I killed them” — also circulated widely, appearing in roughly 8,700 posts with 49,000 impressions.
Conspiracy Theories Frame Jews as Controllers of U.S. Policy
Conspiracy theories about Jewish power and influence rose 194% during this period, with accusations of Jewish or Israeli control over the U.S. government representing the most common thread. Top phrases in this category included “America first,” “Zionist lobby,” and “American soldiers” — language that frames U.S. involvement in the conflict as a betrayal of American interests on behalf of Jewish or Israeli power.
“Israel first” appeared in approximately 151,000 posts, up 294%, with 10 million impressions. References to an “Israel lobby,” “Zionist lobby,” or “Jewish lobby” totaled 100,000 posts — a 187% increase generating 11.7 million impressions — with “Israel lobby” accounting for the majority of usage at 47%. The conspiracies that America is a “puppet government” for Israel surged 749%, appearing in over 130,000 posts with 3 million impressions. “ZOG” — short for “Zionist Occupying Government,” a term with roots in white supremacist ideology — appeared in 13,000 posts, up 449%, with 3 million impressions.
A prominent sub-theme framed the conflict as American soldiers being sent to die for Israeli interests. Posts suggesting that “Israelis are sitting in shelters while Americans are sent to die” emerged as a newly tracked phrase, generating 65,600 posts and 16.6 million impressions. Closely tied to this framing was a sharp rise in use of the word “goy” or “goyim” — a Hebrew term for non-Jews that has been widely weaponized in antisemitic online spaces to suggest that non-Jewish people exist to serve Jewish interests. The term appeared in 263,700 posts, with 32 million impressions.
9/11 Conspiracy Theories Resurface
The conflict also triggered a significant revival of 9/11 conspiracy theories, which the Command Center tracks as part of a broader category of narratives blaming Jews for engineering crises and wars. That broader category increased 180% during this period.
The Command Center tracked 126,000 posts advancing 9/11 conspiracy theories — a 184% increase — generating over 16 million impressions. A recurring phrase in this conversation was “dancing Israelis,” a reference to a long-debunked conspiracy theory alleging that Israeli agents celebrated the September 11 attacks. The phrase is now being repurposed in the context of the current conflict, appearing in posts such as “every time there is war, there are ‘dancing Israelis’” and “dancing Israelis is never a good thing…?”
Dehumanizing Language Spikes to Record Levels
Dehumanizing language targeting Jews, Israelis, and Zionists increased 668% following the outbreak of Operation Epic Fury. The Command Center tracked over 190,000 posts using this language, which accumulated more than 17 million impressions.
Analysis of the 5,000 highest-reach posts in this category reveals the most common terms. “Rats” appeared in nearly half of posts at 42%, followed by “scum” at 27%, “parasites” at 20%, “insects” or “roaches” at 5%, “subhuman” at 3%, and “vermin” at 1%.
Israelis were the most common target, appearing in 75% of posts, followed by Jews or Jewish people at 38%, and Zionists or Zionism at 13%. Coded antisemitic terminology was also present, including “globalists” (1.18%), “Rothschild” (0.62%), “ZOG” (0.08%), and small mentions of “Khazar/Khazarian” (0.06%).
This type of language has historical precedent that makes its resurgence particularly concerning. As the Command Center documented following Operation Rising Lion, comparing Jewish people to rats, vermin, and disease-carrying pests was a central feature of Nazi propaganda in the 1930s and 1940s, used to dehumanize Jewish communities ahead of and during the Holocaust. Its reemergence in the context of the current conflict — applied to Israelis, Jewish people, and Zionists interchangeably — reflects a pattern in which modern geopolitical events become vehicles for some of the oldest and most dangerous forms of hate.
Taken together, the themes documented in this report reflect something more than a reaction to a military conflict. The conspiracy theories, the dehumanizing language, the Hitler glorification — these are not spontaneous expressions of political frustration. They are a coherent set of narratives that have targeted Jewish people for centuries, now spreading at a speed and scale that was not possible before social media. What makes them particularly insidious is that they do not always announce themselves as antisemitism. They arrive dressed as foreign policy critique, historical revisionism, or political commentary. But their target is consistent: Jewish people, collectively cast as manipulators of governments, instigators of wars, and threats to be eliminated.
What the data ultimately reveals is a deeper problem: antisemitism has become a reliable feature of how significant numbers of people process world events involving Israel and Jewish people. The conspiracy theories, the dehumanizing comparisons, the rehabilitation of Hitler — they are connected by a single, persistent idea that Jewish people are a problem to be solved. That idea has consequences. It shapes how Jewish people are perceived, how they are treated, and how safe they feel in their own communities. The Command Center has now documented this pattern across multiple conflicts and news cycles. Conflict does not create this hatred. It surfaces it — and gives it an audience. Tracking and exposing these narratives is not an academic exercise. It is part of a broader effort to ensure that hatred — however coded, however viral, however normalized it becomes — does not go unchallenged.
