Cartoon of outgoing BBC boss pulled by Guardian after antisemitism backlash

A controversial cartoon of outgoing BBC chairman Richard Sharp has been taken down by a nationwide newspaper after being extensively condemned as antisemitic.

In the face of a fierce backlash, The Guardian has apologised and eliminated Martin Rowson’s drawing posted on its web site because it “did not meet our editorial standards”.

Also apologising, Mr Rowson mentioned by way of “carelessness and thoughtlessness I screwed up pretty badly”.

Critics argued the depiction of Mr Sharp, who’s Jewish, wouldn’t have appeared misplaced in Nazi-era propaganda sheets.

The row comes after Mr Sharp resigned from the highest BBC job on Friday after being discovered to have damaged the principles by failing to reveal he performed a job in getting the then prime minister Boris Johnson an £800,000 mortgage assure.

The cartoon confirmed a heavily-featured Mr Sharp departing with a field marked Goldman Sachs, the funding financial institution the place he used to work, containing a squid and what seems to be a puppet of Rishi Sunak.

The Jewish “puppet master”, secretly controlling the financial and political world order, has been a long-standing narrative and antisemitic trope utilized by conspiracy theorists.

Next to Mr Sharp, sitting on a pile of dung is a unadorned Mr Johnson, shouting to him: “Cheer up matey. I put you down for a peerage in my resignation honours list.”

Author Dave Rich, who has written on antisemitism, wrote on Twitter the cartoon “falls squarely into an antisemitic tradition of depicting Jews with outsized, grotesque features, often in conjunction with money and power”.

He identified such caricatures had been utilized by each the Nazis and within the Soviet Union.

Highlighting the symbolism throughout the cartoon, on the squid, Mr Rich mentioned: “Yes, Sharp worked for Goldman Sachs, which was famously described in @RollingStone as ‘a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money'”.

But he added: “The problem is that a squid or octopus is also a common antisemitic motif, used to depict a supposed Jewish conspiracy with its tentacles wrapped around whatever parts of society the Jews supposedly control. Especially money. Are those gold coins in the box with Sharp’s squid?”

He added: “Is it possible that a cartoonist as experienced as @MartinRowson is unaware of these common antisemitic traditions (plus whoever else at the Guardian saw it)?

“Or maybe this simply one other case of assumptions about Jews, cash and energy which can be so acquainted, folks do not discover them.”

He went on: “The bodily traits given to Sharp within the cartoon – the nostril, lips and so on – are racial traits. Antisemitism will be racism. Just in case anybody was nonetheless not sure about that.”

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Former Labour MP Ian Austin, who give up the celebration beneath Jeremy Corbyn’s management over antisemitism and now sits within the Lords, wrote on Twitter: “What an utterly revolting cartoon, full of disgusting antisemitic imagery.

“It appears to be like like one thing from a far-right Nazi publication however is actually in @guardian and they need to be ashamed of themselves.”

Fellow former Labour MP John Mann, who is also now a peer, said: “Haven’t purchased this paper for a few years. This is why.

“My parents who bought it every day would be so saddened and angry with those who own and edit it. A paper that chooses not to sort itself out.”

Stephen Pollard, editor-at-large of the Jewish Chronicle, tweeted: “It takes a lot to shock me. And I am well aware of the Guardian’s and especially Rowson’s form. But I still find it genuinely shocking that not a single person looked at this and said, no, we can’t run this. To me that’s the real issue.”

‘Antisemitism needs to be relentlessly challenged’

Tory former cupboard minister Sajid Javid additionally wrote on Twitter: “Disappointed to see these tropes in today’s Guardian.

“Disturbing theme – or at greatest, classes not discovered?”

He linked to a previous Guardian cartoon by Steve Bell 2020, which drew accusations of racism, after depicting then home secretary Priti Patel, who is of Hindu heritage, as a huge bull with horns and a ring through her nose.

Former Northern Ireland secretary Julian Smith said: “The depiction of Richard Sharp in @guardian is deeply miserable.

“Antisemitism should be relentlessly challenged, day in day out. Lots to write about re the report this week, but why this?”

Historian Simon Sebag Montefiore branded it a “repellent explicitly racist cartoon”.

Responding to criticism, The Guardian mentioned in a press release: “We understand the concerns that have been raised.

“This cartoon doesn’t meet our editorial requirements, and we’ve determined to take away it from our web site.

“The Guardian apologises to Mr Sharp, to the Jewish community and to anyone offended.”

‘Things go horribly fallacious’

Mr Rowson apologised on Twitter. He mentioned: “Through carelessness and thoughtlessness I screwed up pretty badly with a Graun toon today & many people are understandably very upset.

“I genuinely apologise, unconditionally.”

In a longer statement on his website, he added: “Sometimes, like on this case, within the mad rush to cram as a lot in as doable within the 5 or so hours obtainable to me to supply the art work by deadline, issues go horribly fallacious.”

He continued: “I do know Richard Sharp is Jewish; truly, whereas we’re gathering networks of croneyism, I used to be in school with him, although I doubt he remembers me.

“His Jewishness never crossed my mind as I drew him as it’s wholly irrelevant to the story or his actions, and it played no conscious role in how I twisted his features according to the standard cartooning playbook.

“Likewise, the lovable squid and the little Rishi had been not more than that, a cartoon squid and a brief Prime Minister, it by no means occurring to me that some may see them as puppets of Sharp, this being one other infamous antisemitic trope.”