LONDON: The Guardian has issued an apology following the publication of a satirical cartoon of outgoing BBC chairman Richard Sharps which was widely condemned as antisemitic.
The newspaper apologized over the weekend and removed Martin Rowson’s drawing from its website saying it “does not meet our editorial standards.”
“We understand the concerns that have been raised,” added a spokesperson for the Guardian in the statement.
“The Guardian apologizes to Mr Sharp, to the Jewish community and to anyone offended.”
The cartoon, which was published the day after Sharp’s resignation, depicted the former chairman, who is Jewish, with exaggerated features and carrying what it appears to be a box stuffed with a squid, gold coins and a puppet of British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.
The cartoon was condemned by Jewish groups as “explicitly racist” for its use of “outsized, grotesque features” that “falls squarely into an antisemitic tradition."
Such caricatures had been used by both the Nazis and the Soviet Union to derogatorily depict Jewish people.
Dave Rich, an author and antisemitism expert, said on Twitter that squid and money are also recurring antisemitic motifs “used to depict a supposed Jewish conspiracy with its tentacles wrapped around whatever parts of society the Jews supposedly control. Especially money.”
Stephen Pollard, editor-at-large of the Jewish Chronicle, said that “it takes a lot to shock me. But I still find it genuinely shocking that not a single person looked at this and said, ‘No, we can’t run this.’”
Richard Sharp resigned as chairman of the BBC on Friday after a report found he had broken conflict of interest rules when he was appointed.
He had been under pressure from the broadcaster’s board for months over his role in facilitating a loan of up to £800,000 for Boris Johnson, the prime minister who appointed him.
Rowson has also apologised, saying that the artwork was a failure “on many levels” and Sharp was not “the main target of the satire”.
He added that even though he went to school with Sharp and knew he was Jewish, he never considered offending or including any discriminatory connotations.
“To work effectively, cartoons almost more than any other part of journalism require eternal vigilance, against unconscious bias as well as things that should be obvious and in this case, unforgivably, I didn't even think about,” Rowson wrote.
“There are sensitivities it is our obligation to respect in order to achieve our satirical purposes.”
The incident comes a week after the Guardian published a letter by former Labour Shadow Minister Diane Abbott suggesting that Jewish, Irish and Traveller people were not subject to racism “all their lives.”
She was suspended as a Labour MP and party leader Keir Starmer described her remarks as antisemitic.
