A British lawmaker, Shockat Adam, is drawing outcry after he referred to the Israeli army’s “blood-soaked tentacles” during an address in Parliament on Wednesday.
The comment by Adam, a Malawi-born businessman and optometrist who is an independent, came as the British Parliament discussed Israel’s strikes on Hamas leadership in the Qatari capital of Doha and as Prime Minister Keir Starmer prepared to host the Israeli president.
Adam said his niece and her young daughter had been at a library blocks from the scene of the Qatar strike.
“After having witnessed the Israeli army massacre over 60,000 people in Gaza, 19,000 of whom are children, the blood-soaked tentacles of the Israeli army are now reaching closer to home, especially in my case,” said Adam, a longtime critic of Israel who decried the British government decision this week not to call Israel’s war in Gaza a “genocide.”
His phrasing drew criticism from those who said he was echoing longstanding antisemitic stereotypes about Jewish power. Octopuses have been a common element in antisemitic imagery, including that of the Nazis.
“If Shockat Adam has no idea of the historical significance of language like ‘blood-soaked tentacles,’ then he’s grotesquely ignorant, and in no position to participate in this debate,” tweeted Tomos Doran, a Welsh commentator. “If he *is* aware, then he really is just a Nazi. It’s pretty much as simple as that.”
Josh Howie, a Jewish right-wing political commentator, tweeted, “Pretty sure this country, including my grandparents, fought a war so that Nazis didn’t end up in Parliament.”
Adam did not draw a rebuke on the floor of Parliament, where the antisemitic symbol has been at the center of a previous controversy. In 2010, British MP Martin Linton faced criticism for warning voters of the “long tentacles of Israel” but later issued an apology after learning of the antisemitic roots of the language.
Adam did immediately address criticism of his rhetoric, which came the same day that Israeli President Isaac Herzog was in London to meet with Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Adam had called on Starmer to reject Herzog’s visa.
“As Israel prepares a full-scale ground invasion of Gaza [City], Starmer welcomes its president to Downing Street with open arms,” he wrote in a post on X. “History will judge this as the UK’s most shameful chapter of complicity.”
Starmer has said Britain would recognize a Palestinian state this month at the United Nations General Assembly if Israel does not agree to a ceasefire with Hamas. In advance of the visit, U.K. officials formally said they had not concluded that genocide is taking place in Gaza, inflaming critics of Israel.
Herzog and Starmer made no public appearance after their meeting. Herzog characterized the meeting as containing “tough” conversation.
“Things were said that were tough and strong, and clearly we can argue, because when allies meet, they can argue,” he said. “We are both democracies.”
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