A three-year investigation has exposed a vast online influence operation linked to Israeli entities that disseminated racist, anti-Muslim and anti-migrant narratives across more than 30 countries, generating an estimated 800 million advertising exposures.

A new report, Manufacturing the Great Replacement, describes the operation as “one of the largest documented influence campaigns” and estimates that it involved $8.21 million, in advertising spending between October 2023 and October 2026.

The campaign, launched following the Israeli genocidal war on Gaza, targeted audiences across Europe, the Americas, Asia and West Asia with messaging hostile to Muslims, migrants, Iran and Qatar, according to researchers Marc Owen Jones and Sohan Dsouza.

The investigation found that the operation promoted the far-right “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory, which falsely claims that white Europeans are being deliberately displaced by non-white populations, particularly through immigration from Muslim-majority countries.

Dsouza said that the evidence indicated that the entities involved were based in Israeli-occupied territories and had links to Israeli regime influence operations.

“We can’t really assert that it definitely is Israel,” Dsouza told The National. “But the evidence shows that the entities involved in this operation are based in Israel and have connections to influence operations run by the Israeli government.”

The campaign reportedly employed AI-generated imagery, songs, video game parodies and repurposed footage of migration and protests to amplify its messaging.

Slogans included “this is an invasion” and Muslim nations were “Islamizing Europe,” alongside repeated calls to “save Europe"

One parody of the video game Grand Theft Auto, portrayed Muslims purchasing European buildings and converting them into mosques.

Other advertisements juxtaposed protest placards with images of collective Muslim prayer, presenting both as evidence of an alleged hostile takeover of Europe.

According to Dsouza, some Muslim countries were portrayed as the orchestrator of the supposed “Great Replacement” and the "Islamisation of Western societies through immigration."

The operation also repurposed footage circulating within far-right nationalist networks on X, attributing incidents involving people of colour to Qatar without substantiated evidence.

The report estimates that the 37-month operation involved 1,473 Facebook advertisements, 189 YouTube videos, 359 TikTok advertisements and 105 TikTok account videos.

Researchers found that the campaign reached more than 30 countries, generating an estimated 800 million advertising exposures.

The researchers also examined audience responses to the campaign. Out of 406 comments coded on UK-targeted Facebook advertisements in 2024, 61 per cent expressed support for Islamophobic views.

Dsouza said the researchers observed apparently genuine users sharing the content and posting hostile comments about Muslims and migrants.

The investigation builds on research first published in July 2024, when the authors linked a campaign promoting racist content to Israeli entities through Vietnamese proxies.

Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, acknowledged the influence operation in 2024 and reported that approximately $1.21 million had been spent on advertisements on its platforms.

Israel’s official Arabic account incites elimination of mosques in Europe

Israel’s official Arabic-language X account has sparked outrage across social media after describing the rise in the numbers of mosques in Europe as “the true face of colonization”, calling for the removal of “this fifth column”.

Despite enforcement action in May 2024, the campaign reportedly resurfaced in November that year and returned at scale in October 2025.

The researchers said the operation subsequently shifted much of its proxy infrastructure to Brazil, using assets associated with registered Brazilian corporate entities.

Dsouza said that governments should introduce legislation requiring social media platforms to implement more rigorous identification and verification procedures for advertisers. He also called for faster mechanisms to detect and dismantle coordinated influence campaigns.

The findings highlight concerns over the use of digital advertising infrastructure to facilitate cross-border political influence campaigns that exploit anti-Muslim and anti-migrant sentiment to shape public discourse.