Forensic Research Archive of Manipulation and Exploitation
Illustration: a Second World War naval-intelligence collage of a Pacific theatre map, aerial reconnaissance photographs and radar plots.

Then and now

Then and now:blaming Jews for disease (occupied Poland 1941, COVID-19 2020)

Illustration, not an archive object

Content note. This page quotes antisemitic propaganda, including a Nazi poster calling Jews lice and a 2020 broadcast saying God was spreading COVID-19 in synagogues. The words are quoted as evidence of the method. They are not this archive's description of anyone.

In one line: in 1941 a genocidal occupation regime told Poles that Jews spread typhus; in 2020 scattered broadcasters, online networks and one state outlet claimed Jews or Israel were behind COVID-19. Both put an epidemic on one people.

The shared technique: Scapegoating. The archive's definition: "Park blame for a complex harm on a bounded out-group so the in-group stays clean." Both also use contagion and vermin imagery, a form of Name-calling.

Read this first: the scale is not comparable. The 1941 poster was state propaganda from a regime with total control of the press, issued while that regime was confining and killing the people it depicted. The 2020 material came mostly from fringe, non-governmental voices, on platforms that often removed it, in countries whose official health messaging contradicted it. The comparison is about a method that recurs, not about equal harm.

Then Now
The item Poster, "Jews are lice; they cause typhus" Broadcasts, articles and memes blaming Jews or Israel for COVID-19
When March 1941 March 2020 onward
Who issued it German occupation authorities in Poland (the General Government) No single issuer: a US Christian broadcaster, far-right online networks, and Iran's state-run Press TV, among others
Government at the time Nazi Germany, Adolf Hitler; Governor-General Hans Frank in occupied Poland Various; no government in the West endorsed the claims
Power over the target Total: ghettoisation, then mass murder None comparable; the targets were citizens with legal protection in most of the countries concerned
What was going on Typhus epidemics in the ghettos the occupiers had created The first wave of a new pandemic, with lockdowns and widespread fear

Then: "Jews are lice; they cause typhus" (occupied Poland, 1941)

Image gap: this 1941 German wartime poster has an unclear U.S. copyright status, so FRAME does not host it. It can be seen at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and in Experiencing History.

The Polish-language poster, published by the German occupiers in March 1941, shows a louse drawn over the face of a Jewish man made to look like a skull. The caption reads "Jews are lice; they cause typhus." The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum describes it as designed to make Christian Poles fear Jews.

What was going on. After invading Poland in 1939, Germany forced Jews into sealed ghettos. Hunger, overcrowding and the lack of sanitation there caused the typhus epidemics. The occupiers then blamed the disease on the people they had confined, and used the epidemics to justify isolating them further. German doctors and public-health officials lent the claim their authority.

Content note: Photograph of a typhus quarantine notice on a door in the Warsaw Ghetto, with a resident looking out. This object is shown as it was published. Why A printed German and Polish typhus notice on a wooden door in the Warsaw Ghetto, with a person looking out through a round window in the door below it

Typhus quarantine notice on a door in the Warsaw Ghetto, May 1941. The sign reads "Fleckfieber / Dur plamisty: betreten und verlassen ist strengstens verboten" ("Typhus: entering and leaving strictly forbidden"), and a resident looks out through a round window in the door. Photograph: Ludwig Knobloch, a German army propaganda-company photographer, German Federal Archives (Bundesarchiv Bild 101I-134-0782-35), CC BY-SA 3.0 DE. It shows the quarantine the occupiers imposed, not the poster above.

How the technique shows. A harm with a known cause (the conditions the occupier created) is placed on one people. Because the regime's own policy produced the harm it blamed on its victims, the poster also has an Accusation in a mirror element.

The older pattern. During the Black Death of 1348–49, Jews in many European towns were accused of poisoning wells. In Strasbourg, about 2,000 Jews were killed on 14 February 1349, according to the chronicler Jacob Twinger von Königshofen.

Content note: Medieval manuscript illustration of Jews being burned at the stake during the Black Death. This object is shown as it was published. Why Medieval manuscript illustration: townspeople and men in armour on the left, and on the right men carrying bundles of wood beside a pyre in which figures are burning

"Burning of Jews during the Black Death epidemic, 1349": an illustration in the chronicle Antiquitates Flandriae by Gilles li Muisis, Royal Library of Belgium, MS 13076-77, f. 12v (14th century). Public domain. Reproduced from a 1976 book scan on Wikimedia Commons and shown uncropped; the illustration is not identified with Strasbourg.

Now: COVID-19 antisemitic conspiracy theories (2020–21)

Image gap: the broadcasts, articles and memes are copyrighted, and hosting the memes would spread them further. They are described and linked below instead.

In early 2020, claims that Jews or Israel created, spread or profited from the new coronavirus appeared across several unrelated camps:

  • A US Christian broadcaster. Rick Wiles of TruNews said in late March 2020: "God is spreading it in your synagogues! You are under judgment because you oppose his son, Jesus Christ." (JTA, Newsweek)
  • Iranian state media. Press TV published an article on 7 March 2020 under the headline "US, Israel waging biological warfare on massive scale", and ran reports suggesting "Zionist" scientists had engineered a deadlier strain aimed at Iran. (Foreign Policy, Combating Terrorism Center at West Point)
  • Far-right online networks. The ADL documented white-supremacist channels urging followers to spread the virus to Jews. (ADL)

What was going on. A new, fast-spreading disease with no vaccine, lockdowns, job losses and a great deal of uncertainty about where the virus came from. Older antisemitic conspiracy theories were attached to the new event.

How far it spread. A study by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue for the European Commission compared the first two months of 2020 with the first two months of 2021. It found antisemitic content on Twitter, Facebook and Telegram rose seven-fold in French and more than thirteen-fold in German. (European Commission, ISD report)

Bar chart: antisemitic content in French rose 7 times and in German more than 13 times between the first two months of 2020 and the same months of 2021

The two figures above, drawn by FRAME from the European Commission's summary of the ISD study (make_plague_libel_chart.py). It shows the volume of content in two languages, not a count of people or of harm.

Where they are alike

  • Both place an epidemic on one people.
  • Both use contagion or vermin framing.
  • Both attach a new event to a very old accusation.

Where they differ

  • Who spoke. In 1941 the state spoke, with no competing press. In 2020 the claims came mainly from individuals and online networks. Iran's Press TV was the main state outlet among them. Mainstream governments and health agencies contradicted the claims.
  • What followed. In 1941 the poster served a policy of confinement that led to mass murder. In 2020 the claims were followed by online abuse and, according to the ADL, by violent talk and plots in extremist channels, but by no state action against Jews in the countries concerned.
  • Reach and removal. The 1941 poster could not be answered. In 2020 platforms removed much of this content, and it was widely reported and rebutted.

Positions on the record

  • Rick Wiles framed his remarks as religious teaching. The ADL called them "classic antisemitism mixed with religious triumphalism."
  • Press TV presented its articles as reporting on possible biological warfare. They named Israel and "Zionists" as responsible without offering evidence.
  • No public-health body has linked the virus's origin or spread to Jews or Israel.

Same-method test

Blaming any people, faith or nationality for an epidemic, whoever does it and whichever group is blamed, is scored the same way here. The page on Then and now: national and ethnic labels for an enemy or a disease (US 1942, US 2020) applies the same test to anti-Asian labels in 1942 and 2020.

How to spot it
  • Ask what caused the harm by the evidence, and whether the group blamed had any power over it.
  • Watch for vermin, dirt and contagion words applied to people.
  • Notice when a new event is quickly fitted to an old accusation.

Sources

Images

Image Source Licence
Typhus notice, Warsaw Ghetto (May 1941) Wikimedia Commons, German Federal Archives (Bundesarchiv), Ludwig Knobloch CC BY-SA 3.0 DE
Burning of Jews during the Black Death (1349) Wikimedia Commons, Royal Library of Belgium MS 13076-77 Public domain (14th-century work)
Growth in antisemitic online content, 2020 to 2021 (chart) Drawn for FRAME (make_plague_libel_chart.py) from the European Commission's summary of the ISD study CC BY 4.0, FRAME

Image gaps

  • The 1941 typhus poster. German wartime work with unclear U.S. copyright status. Linked to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum instead. A copy on Wikimedia Commons carries a CC BY-SA tag from an uploader who sourced it from a slide deck; that tag does not establish the poster's own status, so it is not used.
  • A photograph of the 2020 claims in public. No openly licensed photograph of a 2020 broadcast, sign or protest making these claims was found, and the "now" side is therefore a chart of reported volumes, not a photograph.
  • Der Stürmer front pages. Julius Streicher's weekly (1923–45) ran similar caricatures, but its artist died in 1975 and the drawings are still in copyright. Not hosted.
  • The 2020 broadcasts, articles and memes. Copyrighted, and the memes would spread hate content. Described and linked instead.