In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll discuss a specific propaganda/disinformation that the Kremlin likes to use – antisemitism. I also talk about how the Russian society itself has become riddled with antisemitism & how this has led to a decrease in Jewish population in the country.
1/19
Russian antisemitism works on many levels, and their narratives vary depending whether they’re targeting a local audience or people in Europe and the US. For example for the latter, Russia attempts to create a false narrative of Ukraine being an antisemitic “Nazi state”.
2/19
But before diving deeper, let’s look at a survey data of Russians in 2023: Nearly 30 million Russians harbour antisemitic attitudes, and 15% of those surveyed believed that “Jews were responsible for most of the world’s wars.” 38% think that the Jews have...
3/19
...“too much power in the business world”. There were around 2 million Jews in the USSR, approximately 880,000 of those were based in Russia. Half a million Jews had left the country by the time of its collapse, and by 2021, there were just 83,000 Jews remaining in Russia.
4/19
In 2018, Russian Levada Center noted that Russian Jews believed open antisemitism was falling in the country, but that it was artificially suppressed by the senior leadership openly pursuing a more pro-Israel position. They also felt that antisemitism…
5/19
…would become more open if Russia’s senior leadership changed its public position on Israel. After the Oct 2023 Hamas terrorist attack, the Kremlin did exactly this: they labelled Israel and the US as an aggressor instead, even welcoming Hamas leaders to visit Moscow.
6/19
After Oct 2023, Russia also had a surge in antisemitic attacks. For example, in Oct 2023, Russians attacked Jewish people at the Makhachkala airport. The pogrom was naturally later blamed on “foreign actors”, “miscreants” and - you guessed that right - Ukrainians.
7/19
All this didn’t go unnoticed in Israel – prominent politician and Likud member Amir Weitmann blamed Russia for supporting Hamas during an interview on RT, stating that “Russia will pay the price” for “supporting the enemies of Israel”.
8/19
But at the same time, the Kremlin is actively spreading age old antisemitic tropes and conspiracy theories of “Zionist globalist elites taking over the world”. These tropes and stories, like the Protocols of the Elders of the Zion and Golden Billion, originate from Russia.
9/19
After Feb 2022, Russia has tried to undermine Western aid to Ukraine by vilifying the Ukrainian leadership, and especially Zelenskyy. Several high-ranking Russian officials have portrayed Zelenskyy as an “inauthentic Jew”, and the whole invasion was justified with…
10/19
…the need to “denazify” Ukraine. Putin has called Zelenskyy “a disgrace to the Jewish people”, drunk Medvedev stated he’d “lost his Jewish identity”, and, when asked about Zelenskyy’s Jewish identity, Lavrov even stated that Hitler “had Jewish blood, too”.
11/19
Putin even went as far as attempting to diminish the Nazi role in the murder of Jews in Ukraine during the Holocaust, by claiming it was done by the Ukrainians and “Banderites”, and that “even the SS troops didn’t consider it [the mass killings] possible.”
12/19
In Russia, the “Zionists” have been vilified by the genocidal Russian philosopher, Alexander Dugin, who claimed that the Crocus Hall attacks could’ve been “Zionists’ revenge” for Russia’s position on Gaza, while urging his followers to look for “Mossad’s fingerprints”.
13/19
But long before that, Russia’s massive disinformation and hybrid operation machinery started spreading antisemitism online to sow unrest and polarize societies in the West. For example, the FSB-controlled SouthFront fake news blog has spread several antisemitic tropes.
14/19
In Europe, the Kremlin has complemented these narratives by conducting hybrid operations, such as the antisemitic graffiti campaign in France, further provoking online discussions on “European antisemitism”.
15/19
As we’ve seen, the conflict in the Middle-East has polarized even the pro-Kremlin bloc, and this type of division is ideal for any kind of online propaganda and disinformation campaign. Now, it’s worth mentioning that the conflict is very real and should be addressed,…
16/19
…but the Kremlin is cynically using this dire situation to do what they do best – spreading false narratives and half-truths, thus dividing societies, who instead of focusing on foreign policy issues like the war in Ukraine, resort to infighting.
17/19
It’s also worth mentioning,that not everything comes from the Kremlin spin doctors. First of all, Iran and the CCP are also very active in spreading disinformation with their massive troll and bot farms. Second,many of these narratives are created by conspiracy theorists,…
18/19
…which are then amplified by the troll & bot farms. We should also remember that people have real concerns for example over inflation, identity politics, antisemitism, and immigration in both Europe and in the US, and that Russia uses them cynically to polarize societies.
In today’s Vatnik Soup, I’ll introduce an American radio host and propagandist, Scott Horton (@scotthortonshow). He’s best known for blaming Russia’s genocidal war against Ukraine on the US, and for publishing a 700-page book full of Kremlin propaganda.
1/23
Most of you probably remember Scotty from this recent episode of Piers Morgan Uncensored, in which he was schooled for his revisionist propaganda by Ukrainian volunteer and activist Anastasiya Paraskevova (@UkrainianAna).
2/23
Let’s start with the obvious - Scott Horton is a hardcore Kremlin apologist who sees nothing wrong with what Putin does, but strongly condemns anything that Ukrainians do to defend themselves. For Horton,the enemy is the US and all of its allies. The way this works is that…
3/23
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll discuss the sad (but funny) state of Finnish vatniks. After Russia launched their full-scale invasion against Ukraine, the Finnish pro-Kremlin/conspiracy theorist scene experienced a dramatic devaluation and hasn’t been able to bounce back since.
1/20
I often get asked about the current state of the Finnish vatnik club, and there’s usually not much to report.
It’s not because these people have stopped, but because today their work has only comedic value.
So here’s the latest:
2/20
Master vatnik and traitor Johan Bäckman has relocated to Russia, and he was recently given a Russian citizenship. It’s obvious that Johan was recruited by Russia’s intelligence agencies a long time ago. He’s still producing videos on YouTube on his…
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll introduce a Romanian politician and conspiracy theorist, Călin Georgescu (@calin_georgescu). He’s best-known for his pro-Kremlin and conspiratorial views, running for president of Romania, and doing it by only campaigning on TikTok.
1/25
Georgescu has a doctorate in pedology (a branch of soil science), and held various positions in Romania’s environment ministry during the 90s.
Between 1999-2012, he was a representative for Romania on the national committee of the United Nations Environment Program.
2/25
He was proposed as Romania’s prime minister in 2011, 2012 and 2016 by Romanian far-right parties, but he rose to international infamy in 2024, when he ran for president of Romania independently and obtained the most votes (22,95%) out of all candidates in the first round.
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll introduce a Canadian journalist and alleged Soviet/Russian spy, David Pugliese (@davidpugliese). He’s best-known for his articles about “Ukrainian Nazis”, and for allegedly being a spy for both the Soviet Union and later Russia.
1/21
Several months ago I was anonymously sent a pile of documents from the mid-80s originating from the KGB archives in Kyiv. These documents outlined a KGB recruitment into “Stuart”, or David Pugliese who “works in foreign mass media” and who is…
2/21
..“studied with the perspective of possible operative use”. Another document described “Stuart’s” contact “Ivan”, who allegedly became his handler.Some have speculated that “Ivan” is Fred Weir, a correspondent of the Christian Science Monitor.He’s lived in Moscow since 1986.
3/21
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll introduce an American far-right social media personality, Nicholas J. Fuentes (@NickJFuentes). He’s best-known for his white supremacist, misogynistic and antisemitic rhetoric, and for being the poster boy for the so-called incel movement.
1/17
Like so many from the white supremacist movement, Fuentes dropped out of university after his freshman year. He studied introductory international relations, which apparently made him a geopolitics expert. Nick was introduced to the white supremacist movement at an…
2/17
..early age - he took part in the infamous Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville,Virginia. In 2017, Fuentes launched his political talk show “America First”. Initially the show was aired on Trump-aligned Right Side Broadcasting Network, but it was dropped after the rally.
3/17
In today’s #vatniksoup, I’ll discuss foreign malign influence operations during the 2024 US elections. As in 2016 and 2020, these recent elections were also a target of massive disinformation and hacking campaigns originating mostly from Russia and Iran.
1/17
First of all, my opinion is that these influence operations alone didn’t affect the elections so much, that they actually made a difference.
Unlike in 2016, Trump’s win over Harris was clear and these short-term campaigns didn’t really change that much this time.
2/17
Yet, many of these online campaigns attacked both Harris and Walz on various social media platforms. Especially Walz became a big target after his nomination, and many Russian efforts attempted to defame him.