Bizarre stupidity of the Hatzola ambulance ‘false flag’ conspiracy theories

Every time there is an antisemitic attack – in this country or any others – Jews feel it twice over. First, we have to cope with the attack itself. Second, we have to deal with an overflowing sewer of toxic bile from those who find their own particular way to label the attack as a ‘false flag’.

What surprises me the most is that a number of the people who publicly engage in this sort of behaviour appear to have no real motivation for doing so – and in fact, a large number of reasons for not acting in this way. This includes a variety of people who operate public-facing businesses, websites and initiatives. You would think that a level of basic caution, if nothing else, would prevent them from outing themselves – at best – as raging conspiracist cranks. Apparently not.

And as with so many conspiracy theories, the people promulgating them look absolutely ridiculous, if not downright sinister.

Apparently targeting four ambulances in London’s Jewish community is part of some cunning Mossad plan to do… what, exactly? In this grand conspiracy theory which you have built in your head, does Keir Starmer instantly commit to an Iran ground invasion? Or has ‘Israel’ done it to somehow engender support for Jews in the UK (in this scenario, why blame ‘Netanyahu’ for conflating Jews and Israel when you do it so effortlessly yourself?) Or are you trying on for size the more longstanding ‘Israel false flag’ conspiracy theory of Mossad attacking a Jewish community target to promote fear among Diaspora Jews and encourage them to move to Israel?

So, then, is Israel’s cunning plan burning several ambulances to induce Diaspora Jews to migrate to Israel now, when the country is being targeted by Iranian ballistic missile fire?

If you are genuinely someone willing to examine your own prejudices, how on earth do you not look at yourself and laugh helplessly at your own idiocy in having fallen for this?

But it goes far deeper. Take a tweet by Daniel Lambert, otherwise known as the manager of Northern Irish band Kneecap (the lads were last seen taking in the sights on a regime trip to Cuba).

“When will media openly consider the likelihood Israel stages ‘antisemitic events’ in Europe?”, said Lambert, who is also chair of the Irish football club, Bohemians FC.

If you are genuinely someone willing to examine your own prejudices, how on earth do you not look at yourself and laugh helplessly at your own idiocy in having fallen for this?

“Why? Blanket media coverage and distraction from their crimes. All that’s left to ask is would they go that low? Of course they would. They torture kids, bomb hospitals and execute medics.”

See, now here we have a much more insidious version of the ‘false flag’ conspiracy theory. For Lambert, Israel is unquestionably the most evil country in the world – and if you see something as unspeakably evil, then you are going to be willing to entertain the concept that they are willing to commit evil acts anywhere, against anything and anyone (the flip side is that those opposing them, no matter how foul, become almost saintlike in their ‘resistance’.)

In terms of brainpower, this expends the approximate wattage one would expect from a particularly dim pigeon.

“Blanket media coverage”? “Distraction from crimes”? I should note that a wide variety of national news outlets, including the UK’s own BBC, Sky and the Guardian, covered the ambulance fire-bombings in Golders Green and were simultaneously perfectly able to cover awful attacks in the West Bank carried out by Israeli settlers. You know which other publications managed? Israeli ones – not just Ha’aretz, but the Times of Israel and the Jerusalem Post, to name a couple. So much for this cunning plan to manipulate the media.

And then, of course, we reach the next level down. 80 years ago, even as the horrors of the Nazi death camps became clear, there were those who were already denying what had happened. The inevitable sub-clause of ‘the Holocaust didn’t happen’ is ‘the Jews made it up to engender sympathy among the gentiles for their own nefarious ends’. And this has been a regular staple among Neo-Nazis ever since – the idea that any attack against Jews is a false flag carried out by Jews themselves (the fact that such Neo-Nazis would wholeheartedly support such acts is rarely discussed – as a Jewish comedian said a while back, it would be nice to once in a while find a Holocaust denier who felt relief at their notion that it hadn’t happened.)

In the early 1990s, a neo-Nazi cartoonist going under the not particularly subtle pseudonym of “A Wyatt Mann” published a picture which can regularly be found in social media comment sections of statements relating to antisemitic attacks. The picture shows a Nazi stereotype of Jewish person, caught in the act of spraying a swastika on the wall of a synagogue. The caption underneath runs, “Hey Rabbi, watcha’ doing?” The meaning is clear – that Jews themselves are carrying out antisemitic hate crimes to trick non-Jews into feeling sorry for them.

As a Jewish comedian said a while back, it would be nice to once in a while find a Holocaust denier who felt relief at their notion that it hadn’t happened

Connected to this is the far right’s particular version of the Hatzola ambulance firebombing, shared on multiple extremist pages this week. It points to a screenshot of Google AI, which reads that “Hatzola North West London is currently in the process of replacing its older ambulances” – pointing to it as ‘evidence’ that the charity itself was responsible for torching the vehicles in order to claim the insurance money.

It is, if anything, an even stupider version of the conspiracy theory than the ones already mentioned. So, you’re suggesting that a charity which has operated for decades as a non-profit, providing medical care for all, Jewish and non-Jewish, and whose medics are volunteers who don’t get paid, have engaged in some major scheme specifically to benefit from an insurance payout (which may not even exist, given the tendency of a number of insurers to exclude what they term as ‘acts of rebellion or insurrection’)? Tell us, far right influencers, was involving the Met police in a major investigation of the incident also part of this oh-so-cunning plan? Or are you just too cowardly to come right out with your antisemitic charge that Jews are obsessed with money?

The one bright spot – if we can call it that – is that in the last 48 hours I have seen a number of examples of people publicly standing up to those vomiting out these different conspiracy theories. I can only hope that calling out such behaviour will continue. It can be tempting, particularly on social media, to simply block the cranks and move on. But if you encounter such behaviour in real life and wouldn’t look away then, consider whether it’s the right move to act differently online. Jewish people appreciate when others stand up and are willing to call out such sinister behaviour; it makes us feel less alone.