Kareem Dennis, commonly known as “Lowkey”, is a patron and a long-time supporter of Palestine Solidarity Campaign (“PSC”) and Stop the War Coalition (“StWC”). Lowkey describes himself as a “hip-hop artist and political campaigner, and student of history” (this is a bold claim, as you will see later in this blog, he is completely clueless). Presently, he hosts a podcast for the disinformation site MintPress called “The Watchdog.” Lowkey has approx. 480K followers across main social media platforms and streaming channels.
There are several songs in his catalogue that contain Holocaust trivialization and antisemitic tropes; Voices of The Voiceless, for instance, uses text to compare Auschwitz – the largest Nazi concentration camp and extermination center– with alleged racist persecution in Hebron. Another song of his, Long Live Palestine, includes the lines “nothing is more anti-Semitic than Zionism” and “Israel is a terror state ”they’re terrorists that terrorise”. The song also contains reference to the “Zionist lobby.”
During our research into the activities of a UK Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) group, we came across an old recording of a pro Palestine event in Coventry in which Lowkey ranted against Zionism and made absurd antisemitic and ahistorical statements.
According to Lowkey, “it’s the Zionists that are the antisemite because it’s the Palestinians that are Semitic people.” As a “student of history,” he seems strangely uneducated. The term antisemitism was coined by German antisemite Wilhem Marr and popularised by the Nazis, who used it to make hatred of Jews sound scientific. Rather than referring to a people, Semitic refers to a language group. The majority of Arabic people are Hamites.
Lowkey states that Zionism is “as much about Judaizing the land as it is about de-Arabizing the land and cleansing it of Palestinians.” Jews have had a constant presence in their indigenous homeland for over 3000 years. To state that we are “Judaizing” is offensive. Judaism is not a proselytising religion and his statement attempts to frame Jews as a malevolent force trying to take over a land that we have lived in for thousands of years. Additionally, over 2 million Arabic people live in Israel with full rights and citizenship.
Moreover, Lowkey denies that Israel has a right to exist, which is regarded as a contemporary form of antisemitism. Does he deny the right to a country to any other ethnic group? Possibly Pakistan or India, who were both created at the same time as Israel, and have strained ties and are at war in Kashmir.
His description of Israel as a dictatorship is laughable, to put it mildly. So much for his historical knowledge, Israel has held elections regularly. Not exactly a dictatorship!
Even more hysterical is Lowkey’s claims that you have “real democracy” in Egypt, in Jordan and in Lebanon, and that “these are all countries that have been invaded” and “occupied” by Israel. Where to start with this ridiculous statement.
Jordan, Egypt, and Lebanon have never been occupied by Israel, and any wars fought against these countries have been in self-defence. Detailed information about Israel’s conflicts can be found here. In terms of being democracies, these countries don’t exactly have a stellar record.
In the past, Lowkey also ranted against “zombies and Zionists” on a BBC Radio show and called Israel a “racist endeavour.” He is still pushing the same false anti-Jewish narrative today, referring to Israel as a colonial supremacist state and to Zionism as a racist colonial ideology.
In case our readers are unaware, depriving the Jewish people of their right to self determination is one of the most disgusting forms of antisemitism. Lowkey, is also applying double standards by requiring Israel to behave in a way that is not expected or required of any other democratic nation.
Additionally, we found posts on his Twitter timeline that are antisemitic as per the IHRA definition of antisemitism.
Lowkey clearly does not have any grasp on the Israel Palestine conflict, and it is evident that he has a bigoted view of Israel that manifests itself in antisemitism on a frequent basis.
Clearly, we do not believe that anyone should be promoting him in any way.
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