By Johan Romin
Every time I write something on X that Israel-hating antisemites dislike, it doesn’t take many minutes before someone has written things like “how much is Israel paying you right now?”
It’s an antisemitic dog whistle, where those who understand the context know exactly what is meant. This trope plays on the ancient image of how Jews control the world with money and influence. Sometimes the trope is reinforced with an octopus or a spider web.
Like when Francesca Albanese, the UN’s heavily criticized rapporteur on issues related to Palestinians, used a spider web around a globe a few weeks ago to depict how Israel controls the world with its weapons and money.
Albanese’s standard response when criticized is to look puzzled, “but it’s just a spider web.” But those who know, know.That’s how a dog whistle works.
One who is “skilled” at spreading this type of dog whistle around him is the incoming New York mayor Zohran Mamdani. He has proven so good at the populist craft that not only did a majority of New York’s electorate give him their support, but he has also convinced people in Sweden that he is just “an ordinary social democrat.
”Zohran Mamdani is in fact a left-wing populist who says things that sound good to the ears of those standing in front of him at the moment. If he’s holding a megaphone in front of radical Israel-haters, he pulls out phrases that fit that context. But if he’s in a debate with TV cameras pointed at him, the message is different. To analyze Mamdani’s way of cranking the populist gramophone, you have to look at context, timing, and above all the choice of words he uses.
A populist can thus use an antisemitic dog whistle by simply avoiding saying certain things in certain contexts, or by phrasing things just right.Example: On October 7, 2023, the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust was committed. Those behind the mass murder and rapes were Hamas. This organization is not waging a freedom struggle; they are not fighting any “occupation” or “apartheid.” Hamas is an antisemitic sect that has written into its program that Jews must be murdered. This is known to everyone who has studied the organization.
If you are then a political candidate in a city like New York, which has a significant Jewish population, and you do not condemn Hamas’s massacre in speeches after October 7, but instead stand and shout about apartheid, occupation, and genocide (even though the Gaza war hadn’t even started at that point), then you are giving Hamas your support. For even if you don’t say outright “I support Hamas,” you are helping Hamas with propaganda and narrative. That is what a dog whistle is. You say something that can sound harmless but that you know resonates with those listening.
“But wait,” someone objects, “he did condemn Hamas ahead of the 2025 mayoral election.”Yes, but that’s exactly what a genuine populist does. He says certain things after October 7 when he wants support from radical activists, but other things when the major media are filming and he needs to attract broader voter groups.
If it’s true that the Palestine issue is what awakened Mamdani politically, then he should have been able to analyze Hamas many years ago. For Hamas has been conducting terror since the 1980s, suicide bombings and car bombs since 1994, and rocket attacks since 2001, all with the aim of sabotaging every peace attempt.
Zohran Mamdani could have told this to the screaming activists after the October 7 attack, if he had been brave. But then he wouldn’t have been a populist either. And hardly elected mayor now.
Johan Romin is a Swedish journalist and historian specialized in issues related to historical and modern antisemitism. He has produced several documentaries about the Holocaust and World War II and and has written two books in history. His documentary “My Grandmother and the Holocaust” received the Micael Bindefeld Foundation’s scholarship in 2015 and was broadcast on Swedish TV4. Johan Romin is currently working on his third book in the field of Holocaust studies.