Something Is Rotten in the State of Belgium, Where Conspiracy Theories and Tales of “Jewish Plots” Flourish

Conspiracy thinking in Belgium is often dismissed as a marginal phenomenon, the preserve of a few eccentrics on social media. But a new survey by the Institut Jonathas invites a reassessment of that narrative. In the Brussels-Capital Region, 50 per cent of respondents believe that the pharmaceutical industry and governments are lying about the harmful effects of vaccines. 26 per cent percent think Americans never landed on the Moon, and the same proportion believe the 9/11 attacks were a plot orchestrated by the CIA and the Mossad. Another key finding of the report is the extraordinary prevalence of antisemitism: four in ten respondents believe Jews control finance, a quarter hold them responsible for economic crises, and more than one in five consider them not to be Belgians like any other.

These prejudices are more pronounced among younger people and at both ends of the political spectrum, notably among supporters of the extreme Marxist Workers’ Party of Belgium (PTB), which remains closely linked to conspiracy influencer Michel Collon. Here, conspiracy thinking draws on a long-standing reservoir of anti-Jewish representations that Belgium has never fully shed, and which have been reactivated by violent Islamism.

Since the October 7, 2023 terrorist massacre, the situation has worsened further. It was in the context of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza that the Herman Brusselmans affair erupted. The Flemish writer had written in a newspaper that he wanted to “drive a sharpened knife into the throat of every Jew” he encountered. Prosecuted over the remarks, he was acquitted. The scandal was compounded by the position taken by the Council for Journalism, the independent self-regulatory body of the Flemish press in Belgium, which ruled that the writer’s words did not constitute incitement to hatred or antisemitic stigmatization.

As early as 2019, Belgian courts had already dropped a complaint filed years earlier against the manager of a café in Liège who had displayed a sign in Turkish reading, “Dogs allowed, but Jews never!” As for Laurent Louis, a former MP once close to the French antisemitic comedian conspiracy monger Dieudonné, he continues his career as a crusader against the “Jewish lobby,” reappearing in recent days on the conspiracy networks where he was long a fixture, despite his conviction for Holocaust denial.

The situation is such that journalist Jean Quatremer, Brussels correspondent for the French daily newspaper Libération, has spoken of “systemic antisemitism” in Belgium. There is, undeniably, something rotten in the State of Belgium. In this context, the rise of mass conspiracy thinking is a warning sign that must be taken seriously—before hatred begins to kill again.