Antisemitism in the UK

Whenever 'Tell Mama', the controversial project purporting to measure anti-Muslim attacks, issues a report it seems to receive automatic, extensive, uncritical coverage from the BBC. There will be interviews/reports on the BBC current affairs programmes and articles on the BBC News website discussing its findings. 

Alan at Biased BBC notes, however, that a new survey by the Campaign Against Antisemitism into anti-Antisemitism in the UK - which he saw reported by the Daily Telegraph - has not been reported by the BBC News website, despite the involvement of YouGov in some of its research. 

Nor, for that matter, was this survey discussed on this morning's Today programme, despite it being mentioned in its news bulletins. 

The apparently automatic invite which seems to go out from the BBC to 'Tell Mama' boss Fiyaz Mughal doesn't seem to get sent to Gideon Falter or Jonathan Sacredoti of the CAA, does it?

A search of Google News also shows that the findings of the CAA/YouGov survey have, in fact, been reported right across the UK media: in The Daily Telegraph, ITV News, The Daily Mail, Metro, The Huffington Post, Channel 4 News, The Independent, The Times, The Guardian and The Daily Express. So the BBC is something of an exception here.

The question arises, therefore: Why does the BBC comprehensively report the finding of surveys which purport to show 'Islamophobia' in the UK but fail to do the same with surveys which purport to show Antisemitism in the UK?

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As for the survey itself, the main results of the YouGov part of the study come from asking this question:

Here are a number of comments that different people have made about Jews in Britain these days. In each case, how true or untrue do you think these statements are in general? 

2.1. Jews think they are better than other people.
2.2. In business, Jews are not as honest as most people.
2.3. I would be unhappy if a family member married a Jew.
2.4. Jews have too much power in the media.
2.5. Jews chase money more than other British people.
2.6. Jews' loyalty to Israel makes them less loyal to Britain than other British people.
2.7. Jews talk about the Holocaust too much in order to get sympathy.

The overall results break down as follows:

How many people in Britain believe the antisemitic statements to be definitely or probably true? 45% of the British public believe at least one statement to be true (definitely or probably).
1 in 4 people – 26% of the British public – believe at least two statements to be true.
17% of the British public believe at least three statements to be true.
11% of the British public believe at least four statements to be true. Of those polled, men were more likely than women to believe at least one statement to be true, with 51% of men believing at least one statement to be true and 39% of women. 32% of the men polled believe at least two statements to be true.
Of those polled, 30% of Scots believe at least one statement (the lowest regional figure) compared to 49% of residents of the North of England (the highest regional figure).

Taking them individually:

“Jews think they are better than other people” 17% of British adults believe this to be true, however the number was 27% amongst respondents who intend to vote for UKIP.
Amongst these, the numbers were highest for respondents in London (24%) and the North (20%).
25% of respondents who were neither Christian, Catholic nor atheist also thought that the statement was true.

“In business, Jews are not as honest as most people” 11% of British adults believe this to be true.

“I would be unhappy if a family member married a Jew” 10% of British adults believe this to be true.
73% of those who believe this statement to be true also believe at least one other statement to be true.

“Jews have too much power in the media” 17% of British adults believe this to be true.
24% of the Londoners polled believe this to be true.
29% of respondents who were neither Christian, Catholic nor atheist also thought that the statement was true.
Of those polled, 23% of male respondents believe this to be true, versus 11% of women.

“Jews chase money more than other British people” 1 in 4 British adults (25%) believe this to be true, however the number was 39% amongst respondents who intend to vote for UKIP.
Of these, 29% of male respondents believe this to be true, versus 21% of women.
Of those polled, 30% of respondents aged over 60 believe this to be true.

“Jews' loyalty to Israel makes them less loyal to Britain than other British people” 1 in 5 British adults (20%) believe this to be true.
Of these, 25% of male respondents believe this to be true, versus 15% of women.
27% of the Londoners polled believe this to be true.

“Jews talk about the Holocaust too much in order to get sympathy” 13% of British adults believe this to be true, however the number was 21% amongst respondents who intend to vote for UKIP.
Of those polled, 17% of male respondents believe this to be true, versus 10% of women.
20% of the Londoners polled believe this to be true.

I have to say that I'm taken aback and very worried by that 45% figure for members of the British public who "believe at least one statement to be true (definitely or probably)". That is an extraordinarily high figure.

It's also striking how badly Londoners come out of the survey. What is it about that city with its unusually high levels of immigrants that makes it so different? 

It's even more striking that most Antisemitic people of all appear to be those the survey describes as "neither Christian, Catholic nor atheist", which I'm guessing is a euphemistic way of saying 'mostly Muslims'. 

And, as someone who's far from unsympathetic towards UKIP, I'm absolutely staggered at the apparent finding of significantly higher levels of Antisemitism among UKIP supporters than among other parties' supporters (including, presumably, the Lib Dems) - a finding you might have thought the BBC would latch onto and make something of, if they'd bothered to examine the report closely enough.