The Free Speech Union of Australia ran a pinned post on X using an AI-manipulated image of OHPI’s CEO with the caption: “Who is the Royal Commission really listening to?” The goal was to drive submissions before the deadline. The replies the post generated were illustrative.

Many exercised their “free speech” with antisemitic conspiracy theories. This is a strategically confusing approach to take for those who consider that their free speech may be being curtailed unnecessarily. 

OHPI’s CEO volunteers with IEEE—the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, a global body with over 500,000 members. This role was cited to suggest hidden power and influence. 

Another accused OHPI of lying about its staff numbers. Our finances are publicly available through the ACNC, and our staffing was addressed under oath in our Royal Commission submission. Nonetheless, we appreciate the compliment—a testament to our staff’s dedication.

We don’t publish individual staff details because of safety concerns, not because we have anything to hide. These safety provisions are routinely validated.

OHPI’s CEO and two Jewish board members were singled out by name. Non-Jewish board members were left alone.

An image of Jewish faces with Stars of David superimposed over them—standard antisemitic imagery, appeared in a thread about an online safety inquiry.

The phrase in the original post, “who are they really listening to?” is deliberate and hostile. It is a well-worn antisemitic trope about Jewish people pulling strings behind the scenes. This rhetoric is as vulgar as it is common on social media.

It is also worth knowing what the Free Speech Union of Australia actually is. It has no charitable registration. Its website names no executives, no board, no owners. It was set up as a private company less than three years ago and publishes no financial information. A group with that level of opacity has no standing to lecture anyone about transparency or accountability in public life. 

This episode fits a pattern. Groups that campaign against hate speech regulation often generate significant hateful content in the process—and then walk away from it. 

The harm lands on the people targeted. They pull back from public life, their health suffers, and their voices get quieter. Online abuse levelled at some Royal Commission witnesses highlights the ways in which a failure to regulate online hate strangles our real world capacity to speak freely.

This cost falls disproportionately on minority communities, and it is a cost that platforms and regulators are increasingly aware of.

Ongoing Institutional Response

As reported in the Australian Jewish News, Hearing Block 3 will take place in Sydney between 29 June and 10 July. It will consider the circulation of antisemitic material online, particularly through social media platforms, alongside the treatment of antisemitism in traditional news media and broadcasting.

Meta acknowledged that its moderation systems remain imperfect and stated that it had removed most of the comments. When Yahoo reviewed the content again on 12 June, further antisemitic material was still visible.

OHPI CEO Dr Andre Oboler, who is scheduled to give evidence again during the forthcoming hearings, told the Royal Commission last month that social media data indicated an approximately fivefold rise in antisemitic content from November 2023. He said the same trend appeared across every platform included in the analysis.

Join us on social media

OHPI LinkedIn • OHPI Instagram • OHPI Facebook 

The post “Free Speech” Union targets OHPI CEO Andre Oboler first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

https://www.australianjewishnews.com/meta-to-appear-before-royal-commission

Join us on social media

OHPI LinkedIn • OHPI Instagram • OHPI Facebook 

The post Meta to appear before Royal Commission – Australian Jewish News first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

Antisemitic content is also prevalent, and sometimes boosted by Elon Musk. Part of OHPI CEO Andre Oboler’s testimony to the Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion has been shown by Media Watch as evidence of the prevalence of antisemitic content on X.

ANDRE OBOLER: … the platform that had the most antisemitism …

… was Gab, which is a far-right platform … 

… the Nazis couldn’t theme it more Nazi-like than these people are doing it on Gab.

The next highest one was Twitter …

It was already the most prevalent platform for antisemitism to start with.

– Royal Commission on Anti-Semitism and Social Cohesion, 12 May 2026

Watch the full report on “Musk’s Army.”

Join us on social media

OHPI LinkedIn • OHPI Instagram • OHPI Facebook 

The post Musk’s Army – ABC Media Watch first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

Online Hate Prevention Institute CEO Dr Andre Oboler has been featured in recent J-Wire coverage examining intimidation and harassment directed at Jewish witnesses appearing before the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion.

Read: “Commissioner condemns online abuse of Jewish witnesses” 26 May 2026.

The article follows a statement by Commissioner Virginia Bell, who warned of a “dramatic increase in online hate messages” targeting lived-experience witnesses who had given evidence to the inquiry.

Dr Oboler told J-Wire that OHPI had observed troubling online activity directed at witnesses shortly after the first Jewish witnesses appeared before the Commission.

“We have seen content harassing witnesses or talking about them to other people in ways that are highly problematic,” Dr Oboler said.

Dr Oboler explained that OHPI raised concerns with Royal Commission staff weeks earlier and suggested a public statement be considered in response to the online harassment.

“Some of the behaviour was likely intimidation of future witnesses and likely to lead to a breach of the Royal Commissions Act,” he said.

OHPI has appeared as an expert witness before the Royal Commission and is preparing reports for the inquiry on online antisemitism and related online harms.

The organisation continues to monitor trends in online hate and disinformation, including efforts that may discourage witnesses from participating in democratic and legal processes.

The full J-Wire article is available here.

Join us on social media

OHPI LinkedIn • OHPI Instagram • OHPI Facebook 

The post OHPI’s Royal Commission Witness Harassment Concerns: J-Wire first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

The Online Hate Prevention Institute has been monitoring online responses to the attack. While there is significant empathy and support for the Muslim community who have been targeted by this attack, there was also glorification of the attack, false flag claims, and general Islamophobia. We also found hate directed against other communities. Some of the responses blamed Jews or Israel for the attack, others claimed the shooters were transgender. 

This report examines the various narratives of hate found online in the immediate wake of the attack and provides examples of this content. The data has been gathered across 12 social media platforms, both mainstream platforms and more fringe platforms focused on minimal moderation. 

As with previous attacks which we have written about, conspiracy theories once again sprung up almost immediately. Some comments also linked the attack to a climate of intolerance towards Muslims, promoted by statements made by a number of politicians and commentators. 

Social media platforms were also criticised for insufficient action on anti-Muslim hate. Some suggested this was a double standard compared to antisemitism. Our work demonstrates this is not the case and antisemitism fairs no better. While  levels of online hate  have continued to rise, some companies have wound back efforts used to address it. This affects everyone, but communities subjected to racism, religious vilification, xenophobia, and bigotry in particular. 

We need to see greater care in the words used by political leaders and other public figures. We need to see greater efforts against hate by social media platforms. Most importantly, we need unity against all forms of hate and a recognition of the harm it does to the fabric of our societies. 

Let’s stand together, united against hate.

The Data

While we collected many kinds of hate and extremism in the comments we gathered, here are the 4 we encountered most frequently. The report discusses others as well.

The report examines false flag claims like the following:

Glorification of violence like the following:

The image above that the poster used is of Baruch Goldstein a Jewish terrorist who attacked a mosque in 1994. He was beaten to death at the scene by the survivors of the attack. The text reflects a comment made in the same forum in response to a post by someone who was about to attack a synagogue, also near San Diego, in 2019.

Islamophobia like the following:

Blaming Jews and feeding anti-Jewish hostility like the following:

Anti-LGBTIQ+ content like the following:

More examples and discussion can be seen in the full report.

Support our work

The Online Hate Prevention Institute is an Australian charity that has played a leading global role in monitoring and combating all forms of online hate since 2012. Our work is supported by public donations. You can donate here to support this vital work.

The post San Diego Mosque Attack 2026 first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

“…The definition was again discussed during a Tuesday appearance by Andre Oboler, CEO of the Online Hate Prevention Institute and a long-serving member of the Australian government’s delegation to the IHRA.”

The post Antisemitism, Zionism and Israel: Royal commission hearings take a political turn – SBS News first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

OHPI’s monitoring of anti-Semitism provides important data on the rise of these campaigns.

“The Online Hate Prevention Institute analysed 13 social media posts made by politicians or mainstream media, finding more than 3,000 anti-Semitic comments.

“Those numbers are high. This is not a discussion initiated by someone anti-Semitic to attract other anti-Semites. This is literally the public square where, you know, everyday Australians are engaging in discussion,” chief executive Andre Oboler said.”

The post Hate inquiry hears how rising anti-Semitism has scarred lives – News.com.au first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

As printed in Sydney Morning Herald and The Age 13 May 2026:

Dr Andre Oboler, chief executive officer of the Online Hate Prevention Institute, told the commission that most of his body’s work is dedicated to tracking antisemitism.

“There are a number of reasons for that. One is because it is such a big part of online hate. Another one is that there is actually more energy and work in responding to online antisemitism than there is in other forms of online hate,” Oboler said.

“There just aren’t the same number of conferences, parliamentary hearings, etc, and I am talking globally. I think there has been one meeting of special envoys on Islamophobia, and we were able to connect Australia’s special envoy to the European envoy.

“But you compare that to antisemitism, where there’s regular stuff going on around the world.”

Oboler outlined some search phrases the institute uses to monitor for online antisemitism content, such as “holohoax”, a Holocaust denial term, as well as a more recent term, “kiss the wall”, which is often used when politicians visit Israel and take part in a Jewish religious practice of kissing the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

“This is used as an antisemitic trope to say ‘oh look, they went to Israel, they kissed the wall, and therefore they are controlled by the Jews’, so ‘kiss the wall’ as a phrase is something we use as an entry point.”

Oboler told the commission that social media giant X, formerly Twitter, was “behaving very much like the far-right platforms”.

Oboler shared his analysis of the “density”, or prevalence, of antisemitism on social media platforms, where X rated second, only behind free speech fringe platform Gab, which has widely been criticised for hosting hateful content.

Longitudinal data also showed current antisemitism rates across all platforms are higher than the fivefold spike observed immediately after the October 7, 2023 attacks by Hamas.

Oboler, an Australian envoy to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, said X had “one of the lowest increases” in antisemitism before and after October 7 because “it was already the most prevalent platform for antisemitism to start with”.

OHPI LinkedIn • OHPI Instagram • OHPI Facebook 

The post OHPI in Sydney Morning Herald first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

The Online Hate Prevention Institute has been retained by the Royal Commission as expert witnesses. Our CEO, Dr Andre Oboler, is testifying before the Commission on May 12th.

The Australian Government established the Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion following the 2025 Bondi terrorist attack, in which the Jewish community were targeted in what was the most deadly terrorist attack on Australian soil.

As Australia’s highest form of public inquiry, the Commission is examining the causes and impact of antisemitism on Australian society. Its goal is to recommend practical measures to improve public safety, strengthen social cohesion, and help ensure Jewish Australians can live free from discrimination and fear.

How we categorise different forms of antisemitism

OHPI’s evidence to the Royal Commission includes analysis from our routine antisemitism monitoring project examining the different forms of antisemitism appearing across social media platforms. The monitoring classifies antisemitic content into detailed categories and sub-categories that allow long-term trends and dominant narratives to be identified across platforms and over time.

The evidence submitted to the Commission demonstrates that traditional antisemitic narratives remain the most common form of online antisemitism. These include blood libel, claims that Jews killed Christ, antisemitic slurs, dehumanising rhetoric, and conspiracy theories alleging Jewish control of governments, institutions, or world events. The monitoring also found that many forms of antisemitism relating to Israel or Zionism draw directly on these same historic antisemitic narratives and imagery.

OHPI’s monitoring is conducted by trained human analysts who assess the context, meaning, symbolism, and narrative structure of the material being collected. This allows the monitoring to identify coded antisemitic language, conspiracy narratives, visual references, and evolving forms of online hate that automated systems frequently fail to interpret accurately.

The submission to the Royal Commission includes the following findings:

“163. Looking across all of OHPI’s routine monitoring periods from November 2022 until March 2026 and at the 27 sub-categories we use for classification, we can see the following aggregate pattern across all platforms:

The most common narrative is ‘3.6’ this category captures all traditional antisemitism that is not otherwise designated to another category and is present in 51.8% of the content. The second most common is ‘4.4 Describing Israel or Israelis using antisemitic words or imagery (e.g., claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel)’ which accounts for 25.0% of the content and which was just discussed. The third is ‘3.2 Promoting the idea of a world Jewish conspiracy’ which is the foundational conspiracy theory behind the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and accounts for 23.7% of all the content.

There is a significant drop to the 4th most prevalent narrative, ‘3.5 Promoting the idea of Jews controlling government or other societal institutions’ present in 13.9% of the content, and a further drop to the 5th most prevalent narrative, ‘3.1 Dehumanising Jews’, present in 8.3% of the content.

That category ‘2.1 Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion’ is present in 5.9% of the content, and ‘2.3 Calling for harm to Jewish people in general’ is present in a further 3.2% of the content, is deeply concerning.”

The submission argues that understanding the structure and prevalence of these narratives is essential for developing effective responses to online antisemitism and for improving moderation, transparency, and public policy responses across social media platforms.



OHPI LinkedIn • OHPI Instagram • OHPI Facebook • Bondi Report • Ambulance Attack Responses Report.

The post Categories of Online Antisemitism – OHPI & The Royal Commission first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.

Dr Oboler described a study analysing reactions to 13 social media posts by Australian politicians that were in some way related to the Jewish community or the Middle East.

The Institute recorded 2,572 antisemitic comments believed to be from Australian users and a further 644 from users of uncertain origin.

The majority of the posts either referred to the antisemitic conspiracy theory that Jews control the government and media or blamed all Jews for the actions of Israel, Dr Oboler said.

“This is literally the public square where everyday Australians are engaging in discussion,” he said.

The post Social media posts expose ugly rise in antisemitic abuse – J-Wire first appeared on Online Hate Prevention Institute.