Anti-Palestinianism during the Israel–Hamas war

Following the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023 and the outbreak of the Israel–Hamas war, there has been a surge of anti-Palestinianism, anti-Arab racism, and Islamophobia around the world. Palestinians have expressed concerns over increased anti-Palestinianism in mass media and anti-Palestinian hate crimes. Human rights groups have noted an increase in anti-Palestinian hate speech and incitement to violence against Palestinians.

Bahrain
In October 2023, a doctor of Indian descent in Bahrain was fired from the Royal Bahrain Hospital for anti-Palestinian tweets that were deemed "offensive to our society" by the hospital.

India
A large amount of anti-Palestinian, Islamophobic, pro-Israeli propaganda and disinformation has emerged from India during the war, especially among the Hindu nationalists. Anti-Palestinian disinformation from India often comes from supporters of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Belgium
On 11 December, The Brussels Times reported the Belgium's Foreigners' Office had instructed municipalities to strip the citizenship of Belgian children with Palestinian parents, though a spokesperson for the Secretary of State for Asylum and Migration denied this action was related to the ongoing war.

France
The interior minister of France ordered local authorities to ban all pro-Palestinian protests. French journalist Alain Gresh has said that Emmanuel Macron's Renaissance party has a "very strong anti-Palestinian position".

On 14 October, French-Algerian journalist Taha Bouhafs was arrested while covering a pro-Palestine protest in Paris. He told +972 Magazine that people were getting "strangled by the police", and that the police fined him for participating in an "illegal demonstration" despite showing his press card. He also claimed that the police threatened to break his legs if they saw him again at a protest.

Germany
Germany banned the display of a number of Palestinian symbols such as the Palestinian flag and the keffiyeh, including at schools. Palestinians in Germany described facing repression from authorities when they attempted to protest in support of Palestine, being subject to crackdowns, arrests and possible racial profiling. On 18 October, a video of German police stomping out a candlelight vigil for dead Palestinians was seen circulating on social media. Pro-Palestinian protesters in Neukölln were faced with displays of excessive force, including the use of pepper spray and water cannons. Hanno Hauenstein of The Nation described "a climate of fear" in the country created by the Israel–Hamas war, exacerbated by "hard-line" actions from the government. One Palestinian human rights advocate called Germany's response to these protests as "McCarthyism in the purest sense", and a protester told Al Jazeera English that she was unsure "whether we actually have freedom of speech in Germany [regarding Palestine]".

In response to these restrictions, human rights organizations urged authorities to ensure and enable the right of all individuals to express their opinions and peacefully assemble. Germany also faced criticism from Muslim countries such as Indonesia, who argued that they were preventing peaceful protesters from publicly showing support for Palestinians.

On 13 October, Litprom abruptly cancelled a LiBeraturpreis for Palestinian author Adania Shibli for her book Minor Detail, a novel partly based on the true story of a rape and murder of a Palestinian girl in 1949 by Israeli soldiers; it was originally set to be given at the Frankfurt Book Fair on 20 October. Following this, more than 1,000 authors and publishers – including Colm Tóibín, Hisham Matar, Kamila Shamsie and William Dalrymple, as well as Nobel prize winners Abdulrazak Gurnah, Annie Ernaux and Olga Tokarczuk – signed an open letter criticized this decision, saying that the Book Fair had “a responsibility to be creating spaces for Palestinian writers to share their thoughts, feelings, reflections on literature through these terrible, cruel times, not shutting them down”.

On 13 November, an Afrofuturism exhibition by curator Anaïs Duplan was suspended by Museum Folkwang after they expressed support for Palestine and "personally tak[ing] sides with the BDS campaign" on Instagram. The next day, Indian poet Ranjit Hoskote resigned from his position at the curator-finding committee of Documenta, after the exhibition publicly criticized him for signing a BDS India letter in 2019, calling it "explicitly anti-Semitic". The letter in question had denounced a "Zionism and Hindutva" event hosted by the Consulate General of Israel in Mumbai and co-organized by the Indo-Israel Friendship Association; the letter also called Israel an "apartheid state" engaging in "settler colonialism". Over the following two days, the entire committee resigned, citing the social climate created by the Israel–Hamas war in an open letter, and Documenta's "unchallenged media and public discrediting" of Hoskote in particular.

Masha Gessen (a Jewish, Russian-American journalist who lost family members in the Holocaust) wrote an essay on 9 December, arguing that Germany's remembrance culture regarding the Holocaust was being used as a "cynically wielded political instrument" by the AfD to target Muslim immigrants. Gessen condemned the atrocities committed by Hamas on 7 October, but was also critical of the Israeli bombings of the Gaza Strip, which they considered to be highly destructive and comparable to an Eastern European ghetto "being liquidated" by the Nazis. Following this, the Heinrich Böll Foundation announced that they were withdrawing their support for Gessen winning the Hannah Arendt Prize, rejecting the comparison of Gaza to a Jewish ghetto as "unacceptable".

United Kingdom
Since the war, Islamophobic hate crimes increased by 140% in London. According to British journalists Peter Oborne and Imran Mulla, "Britain has experienced an epidemic of almost unchallenged anti-Palestinian racism and anti-Muslim bigotry" since the war began. Oborne and Mulla have accused Home Secretary Suella Braverman for being "inexcusably silent" on anti-Palestinianism and Islamophobia.

Former British Home Secretary Suella Braverman stated that waving Palestinian flags in public "may not be legitimate".

Israel
Palestinian students attending the Netanya Academic College in central Israel were trapped in their dorms after a large Israeli crowd gathered in front of the building chanting "death to Arabs" and attempted to break into the building. The crowd accused them of disrupting an earlier Shabbat prayer service at a Chabad synagogue by playing loud Arabic music and hurling two eggs. The allegations had been reviewed and investigated by police who had ruled out the students involvement. Additional Palestinian students are reportedly facing suspensions after receiving emails accusing them of "supporting terrorism" due to posts condemning the continued attacks of the Israeli military on Gazan citizens.

Since the outbreak of the war in early October, reportedly thousands of Palestinians have been arrested and detained in Israel and the occupied West Bank. Many of those imprisoned alleged that they were tortured or otherwise mistreated while detained in military prison facilities, while the International Committee of the Red Cross stated they were repeatedly denied access to arrestees, who Israeli officials had classified as "enemy non-combatants". On November 3, Israel reportedly deported 3,200 Palestinian workers into the Gaza Strip, with the UN Human Rights Office expressing their concern over the status of the deportees and indicated they were being sent into an incredible dangerous situation.

A video posted of young Israeli children drew outrage online after being posted on 19 November 2023, by the Israeli state broadcaster Kan News aired it under the title We'll annihilate everyone in Gaza. The video has since been deleted, but showed the children singing an old song written by Israeli poet Haim Gouri after the 1948 war, that had been amended to reference Gaza. While some debate has been raised about the translation of some of the words, some of the Google translated lyrics have been posted as, In another year there will be nothing left, And we will return safely to our home within a year, We will eliminate them all, And then return to plowing our Fields.

"Harbu Darbu" (חרבו דרבו) was released by musical duo on 14 November 2023. Ness (Nessya Levi) and Stilla (Dor Soroker) stated that they wrote the song to raise the Israeli people's morale, deciding it was "time to replace the sadness with anger". "The song celebrates soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and criticizes celebrities who voice anti-Israel sentiments. It also calls for revenge on everyone who planned, executed, and supported the Hamas-led attack in Israel. The rappers repeatedly use the phrase "every dog's day will come" in Arabic. This is directed at Hezbollah and Hamas leaders, along with Western celebrities such as Bella Hadid, Dua Lipa and others who have expressed support for Palestinian people and criticized Israel.

There have been ongoing protests in Israel against humanitarian aid being allowed to enter the Gaza Strip which continued after the decision in the South Africa v Israel International court case which indicated humanitarian aid should be allowed in. The protests began in December 2023 when activists attempted to block the Kerem Shalom crossing to prevent humanitarian aid from entering the Gaza Strip. The protests have continued with National Security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called on Netanyahu to cease sending aid to Gaza in the end of January 2023 and in February 2024, Channel 12 reported that 132 aid trucks had been prevented from entering the Karem Abu Salem crossing.

Between February and March 2024, mainstream Israeli television networks Channels 14 and 13 aired videos, reportedly described as "snuff films" which show detained Palestinian prisoners being mistreated inside Israeli prisons. The videos are described as the actual interrogation sessions of prisoners, who are shown in the films were bound and blindfolded, while being made to kneel on the floor. A warden is recorded stating "They have no mattresses...They have nothing…we control them 100% — their food, their shackling, their sleep…[we] show them we are the masters of the house" Footage documented at least one area in where prisoners sleep with one room only having bare metal bunkbeds and a hole in the floor for a toilet.

During a meeting of the political-security cabinet in June 2024 during a discussion about the repatriation of the bodies of suspected and known Hamas militants from Israel, far-right Minister Bezalel Smotrich stated that the Israeli government should "place the bodies in a cart and drag them through the city center like they would do in the Bible so that they would see and be seen."

While speaking on Israeli Channel 12 news in June 2024, former far-right Israeli MK Moshe Feiglin quoted Adolf Hitler while speaking on the ongoing war. Feiglin stated that Israeli's "can't live in this land if one Islamo-Nazi remains in Gaza" and continued stating that Jews were "not guests in our own land, it is entirely ours" and that he wanted to "turn Gaza Hebrew". Feiglin has had a history of similar comments stating in 2019 that international law should not be applied to the situation as there is no Palestinian nation.

Occupied Territories
Israeli settler violence in the West Bank escalated during the war. Shortly after the 7 October attacks, three Palestinian men in the central West Bank alleged that IDF soldiers and settlers had beaten, stripped, tied up and photographed for multiple hours, with one raising allegations that at least one individual sexually assaulted him. The United Nations have recorded 222 settler attacks in the West Bank against Palestinians since the 7 October Hamas attacks. At least six Palestinian communities have been fully abandoned due to the violence according to the West Bank Protection Consortium, which was founded by the European Union, and eight people have been killed and sixty-four injured. Settlers have also purposefully burned down ancestral olive trees, covered agricultural land with cement, attacked harvesters and built rock barriers to prevent people from returning to villages and fired upon them with live ammunition if they tried.

On 26 October 2023, a memorial in Jenin for Shireen Abu Akleh, a Palestinian-American journalist who was killed by an Israeli soldier in 2022, was bulldozed and destroyed by Israel Defense Forces. On 14 November, two monuments of PLO leader Yasser Arafat were demolished by the IDF in the West Bank's Tulkarem refugee camp.

In early November 2023, widely circulated video footage showed Palestinian detainees in reportedly the occupied West Bank being abused by IDF soldiers. Many of the detainees filmed are shown naked or shirtless with their hands tied behind their backs. At least one detainee is filmed being kicked in the stomach by troops and then spit on, while another is shown having his head stomped on by an IDF troop while laid on his back. In another case, a reported IDF member is recorded telling an detainee in Hebrew and Arabic "Good morning, whore. Good morning, whore. Spit on you, sheep fucker" before he spits on the detainee. The IDF later acknowledged some of the footage and that it was aware of some of the cases, with on going review by commanders.

Widely-circulated video and images at around 7 December 2023, showed dozens of Palestinian men in Northern Gaza blindfolded, stripped partially naked, and kneeling on the ground, guarded by Israeli soldiers. Without a stated source, Israeli media reported that the images and footage showed a mass surrender of fighters. However, CNN reported that at least some of the men are civilians with no known affiliation with any armed group, with IDF spokesperson, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, appearing to confirm this by stating: "We arrest everyone" for interrogation. By 8 December Al Jazeera reported that some of the men shown had been released.

In mid-December 2023, multiple videos circulated online of IDF soldiers utilizing microphones and sound systems in mosques in Jenin in the occupied West Bank and in Gaza to sing traditional Jewish songs; some associated with Hanukkah that was ongoing at the time, mocking the call to prayer and reciting Jewish prayers. The IDF condemned the recorded actions, stating it was against the codes of conduct for the IDF and that any identified soldier seen were reportedly immediately removed from duty. Other videos have shown IDF troops since the start of the conflict, purposefully destroying businesses while laughing, setting goods on fire while still in a vehicle, and going through private Gazan citizens' belongings. These videos and actions were condemned by IDF officials as well.

On 15 January 2024, a group of 25 Palestinian students staged a sit-in protest against rising tuition fees at An-Najah University, leading to Israeli police to arrest them and call them "student terrorist squads".

Canada
A Montreal author Lauren Wise was recorded during a road rage incident on 10 October, screaming at another driver who had a Palestinian flag displayed on her car window. Wise reportedly rammed her vehicle into the other car, which was being driven by a Tunisian woman and screamed at her that she "should be raped and dragged in the street in front of her kids" due to displaying the flag. Wise was reportedly dropped by her publisher after the video, that she had taunted the recorder to publish and tag her in, was posted to social media.

On 3 March 2024, a man was arrested in Vaughan on several charges including possession of weapons dangerous to the public, assault with a weapon and assault. He was identified as 27-year-old, Ilan-Reuben Abramov, and had stopped his car in front of protestors and began to shout at them, while carrying a nail gun that he reportedly discharged at protestors. In a viral video, Abramov is recorded stating "Every fucking Palestinian will die" before knocking the cell phone recording him from the hands of the protestor.

United States
According to advocates in the tri-state area, Palestinian Americans and Muslim Americans in New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut have experienced an increase in verbal and physical attacks since the war began. Council on American–Islamic Relations, a Muslim civil-rights organization, reported an 172 percent increase in anti-Palestinian and anti-Muslim incidents in the United States.

On 12 October 2023, a group of men were accused of waving Israeli flags while attacking three men in Brooklyn. The incident is being investigated as an anti-Palestinian hate crime. The incident happened several hours after a man waving a Palestinian flag was attacked in Williamsburg. Two days later, on 14 October, a six year old Palestinian-American boy named Wadea Al-Fayoume was murdered in Illinois. The boy's mother was also choked and stabbed. The attacker, the family's landlord, allegedly shouted "You Muslims must die" during the attack. The incident is being regarded by Illinois authorities as an anti-Palestinian and Islamophobic hate crime. That same day, a Jewish-American man in Farmington Hills, Michigan was arrested and charged with making a threat of terrorism after he posted on social media that he wanted to "go to Dearborn & hunt Palestinians". Dearborn is a city with large Arab and Muslim populations, and is where significant pro-Palestine protests were held in October 2023.

During a discussion in early November about a proposed cease-fire resolution in the Florida state house, Democratic state representative Angie Nixon asked, "We are at 10,000 dead Palestinians. How many will be enough?" In response, Republican Michelle Salzman responded "All of them". Salzman's comments were condemned by the Council on American Islamic Relations in Florida (CAIR-Florida) who stated that they were a "chilling call for genocide" and had come about through "decades of dehumanization of the Palestinian people by advocates of Israeli apartheid." On 7 November at Edmonds Playground on DeKalb Avenue, a woman identified as 48-year-old Hadasa Bozakkaravani allegedly hurled hot coffee and anti-Islamic statements, calling him a terrorist, at 40-year-old Ashish Prashar who took his 18-month-old son to play. She has been charged with nine separate counts, four of them hate crimes. Bozakkaravani faces assault, reckless endangerment, aggravated harassment and assault on a person under the age of 11, all as hate crimes, according to police.

On 10 November, the parents of a 13-year-old Palestinian student at the Corona del Mar High School in California reported that their son had been suspended due to "threatening remarks to another student", after telling the student who had reportedly been bullying him "Free Palestine", with a district spokesperson calling the remark hate speech. The CAIR-LA condemned the reported incident as a continued perpetuation of Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian sentiment. On 12 November, Kenneth Ballenegger, co-founder of San Francisco-based investment company Oyster Ventures, said on X (formerly Twitter) that Israel must treat Gaza "like China handles Xinjiang", and advocated for a "Full surveillance state. Re education camps. Sterilizations." Ballenegger was later suspended after public backlash to these remarks, with Yashar Ali describing them as "disgusting genocidal rhetoric". Two videos depicting Stuart Seldowitz emerged showing him harassing a halal cart vendor in the Upper East Side, asking a series of racist and Islamophobic questions, including "Did you rape your daughter like Muhammad did?", "What do you think of that – people who use the Quran as a toilet?" and "If we killed 4,000 Palestinian kids, you know what? It was enough. It wasn’t enough!" Seldowitz worked in the U.S. State Department’s Office of Israel and Palestinian Affairs and then served as Acting Director of the National Security Council South Asia Directorate during the Obama administration. He was also the Foreign Affairs Chair at Gotham Government Relations, which ended all affiliation with him after the video emerged. The NYPD said it was aware of the videos and monitoring the situation. Seldowitz was taken into custody on 22 November, he faces one count of aggravated harassment of race or religion and four counts of stalking as a hate crime.

After actress Melissa Barrera shared multiple Instagram posts in support of Palestinians on 21 November, it was announced shortly after that she had been dropped from the upcoming Scream 7 film due to the posts. A spokesperson for Spyglass Media Group, the production company for the franchise, issued a statement that their stance was "zero tolerance for antisemitism or the incitement of hate in any form, including false references to genocide, ethnic cleansing, Holocaust distortion or anything that flagrantly crosses the line into hate speech." Barrera had shared posts about the number of deceased Palestinian children as well as a Philadelphia protest calling for a cease fire, she has also shared links to donate to Doctors Without Borders and Save the Children, and had signed the Artists 4 Ceasefire open letter. About the same day United Talent Agency dropped actress Susan Sarandon as a client after she spoke out at a pro-Palestine rally, where she encouraged others to speak out in support of Palestine and reflected that due to the rising antisemitism many Jewish people "are getting a taste of being Muslim in the United States".

On 25 November, three Palestinian male students of Brown University, Haverford College, and Trinity College, wearing keffiyehs and speaking a mixture of English and Arabic were harassed and then shot while on their way to a family dinner in Burlington, Vermont. The next day, a 48-year-old male suspect was arrested in connection to the shooting near the scene of the attack.

On 14 December, a 51-year-old teacher in Warner Robins, Georgia was charged with Felony Terroristic Threats and Acts and Misdemeanor Cruelty to Children. The man threatened to behead a seventh grade student who said she found the Israeli flag offensive "due to Israelis killing Palestinians."

On 4 February 2024, a 36 year-old man, named as Bert James Baker, was arrested after stabbing a 23 year-old Palestinian-American who was leaving a pro-Palestine protest he had attended with three friends at the Texas State Capitol in Austin. He was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and vehicle, and the attack was determined as "bias-motivated" by authorities.

In June 23rd, 2024, a Jewish woman in Euless, Texas attempted to drown a 3 year old Muslin Palestinian child after making racist statements to the child's mother. She is currently out on a $25,000 bond for attempted capital murder and $15,000 for injury of the child. The representative for Euless, Salman Bhojani - who is Muslim himself - condemned the incident, saying "Hate has no place in Euless, District 92, or anywhere in our great state".

On June 28th, 2024, in the first 2024 United States presidential debate, former President Donald Trump described Joe Biden as "a very bad Palestinian".

Australia
In late November 2023, a Christian Palestinian Australian student at a Western Sydney primary school was called a "terrorist" due to his Palestinian ethnicity. The incident sparked a letter to Christian schools, urging prayers for all people harmed in the 2023 Israel-Hamas war whether Israelis or Palestinians. In early December, ABC News reported incidents of Arab and Muslim Australians being doxed, receiving death threats, and dismissed from their jobs for expressing pro-Palestinian viewpoints or attending pro-Palestine rallies.