A shocking survey has revealed a significant proportion of young British Christians hold antisemitic views. An independent academic study of more than 2,000 Christians of all ages across the UK also found that one-third believe Jewish people “still talk too much about what happened to them in the Holocaust” – the Nazis’ systematic murder of six million Jews during World War II.
The groundbreaking study – the first of its kind in the UK – reveals that 33 per cent of Britons aged 18-29 express support for Palestinians versus 19 per cent for Israel. Roughly one in six agreed that it’s “definitely not antisemitic to say that Israel doesn’t have the right to exist” while a similar number feel Jews are “responsible for most of the world’s wars”.
“Young Brits are significantly more likely to hold very negative opinions of Jews and Israel than older British Christians,” said researcher Dr Mordecai Inbari, a professor of Jewish studies at the University of North Carolina and a co-author of the national study, ‘A Survey of British Christian Attitudes Towards the Israel-Palestine Conflict’, funded by a coalition of groups opposing antisemitism. “With antisemitism being openly celebrated, it’s important to understand why many British Christians, especially the young generation, still embrace old antisemitic Christian views,” he said.
“Young Brits are significantly more likely to hold very negative opinions of Jews and Israel than older British Christians”
A similar study carried out in the USA in March 2024 had revealed much stronger support for Israel.
Younger Christians were relatively keen churchgoers; 42 per cent of those surveyed attended church weekly. But more British under 30s believed antisemitic tropes of the sort that should have perished with the Nazis than their US counterparts. Unbelievably, 20 per cent of those surveyed think that Jewish people control our government! And just 52 per cent of British Christians agreed that Jesus was Jewish.
British Christians in general were also more likely to believe in same-sex marriage and abortion rights than the Americans.
The UK survey was conducted online in December 2024, with 2062 people interviewed. Christians from various denominations were interviewed and the keenest Bible readers were the Pentecostals, who read the Bible at least once a week. The survey’s findings were revealed to an invited audience of mainly Christian leaders at a lunch hosted by Chosen People Ministries (CPM) in London in late February.
Former MP David Burrowes introduced the event before Dr Inbari presented the results of the survey, which had been conducted by a polling company.
Just 52 per cent of British Christians agreed that Jesus was Jewish. Nearly 40 per cent think that the Jews have a right to the land of Israel.
Statistical analysis of the data reveals that Christians who believe God’s biblical covenant with the Jewish people has ended or never existed, and support the accusation that Jews are responsible for the murder of Christ, are the most likely to hold antisemitic views. Thirty-one per cent of British Christians in the sample endorsed the idea that the biblical covenant has ended and almost half believe Israel has committed genocide in Gaza. Nearly 40 per cent think that the Jews have a right to the land of Israel, but 23 per cent do not.
The survey backs up my contention repeatedly expressed over the years of both indifference and antagonism towards Israel within the churches, which is largely due to a lack of proper teaching from the pulpits, as a result of which Christians are grossly ignorant of the biblical and political issues involved, gullibly succumbing to social and other media bias instead. I guess many pastors stay silent because they are anxious not to offend or cause division. But the Gospel has always been an offence, and standing up for the Jews, from whom we inherit our precious faith, is part of it.
Christians who believe God’s biblical covenant with the Jewish people has ended or never existed, and support the accusation that Jews are responsible for the murder of Christ, are the most likely to hold antisemitic views.
Why do you think Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Corrie ten Boom suffered so much for their faith? It was because they stood up to those who were persecuting the Jews!
A proper study of the Bible as a whole, and the book of Romans in particular, should leave Christians in no doubt about the enormous debt we owe our Jewish forbears for the faith of Abraham. A colleague has suggested that much of the problem is down to social media, which prompts me to quote St Paul’s famous line to the Roman Christians: “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will” (Romans 12:2).
As to the big broadcasters, why was Al Jazeera, which accused Israel of genocide from the start of the Gaza War, given a free pass to continue broadcasting by UK regulators, yet Russia Today was banned soon after the Ukraine invasion? Moreover, politicians in general seem unwilling to join the dots – that the rise in antisemitism precisely parallels the increase in Muslim immigration (legal and otherwise).
But my main challenge is to the preachers. Stop being people-pleasers and take up your Cross as an example to your congregations.
As Jesus put it to the woman at the well: “You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews” (John 4:22).
Charles is a regular contributor to Israel Today at www.israeltoday.co.il and is author of ‘To the Jew First’, ‘King of the Jews’, ‘A Nation Reborn’, ‘Israel the Chosen’ and ‘Peace in Jerusalem’, variously available from Christian Publications International, Amazon and Eden Books (Eden.co.uk).