British Actor Jokes Israel “Ignores the Arab Population” With COVID-19 Vaccines

British actor David Tennant joked during an April 9 BBC comedy segment that Israel has ignored its Arab population when it comes to the COVID-19 vaccine distribution. The Jewish News reported that Tennant said that British residents could only travel to countries with a similar vaccination rate to Britain. He pointed to Israel, which has around 61% of its population vaccinated against the virus, while Britain has 46%.

“As you can see, Israel ha[s] populated 61 percent of their population, which is pretty much everyone there if you ignore the Arab population, which they do,” Tennant said. “So they’re done.”

Jewish groups condemned the remark.

“@nbcsnl lies again on @BBC – Outrage,” the Simon Wiesenthal Center tweeted, referencing the February joke from Saturday Night Live’s Michael Che, who said: “Israel is reporting that they’ve vaccinated half of their population. And I’m going to guess it’s the Jewish half.”

> @nbcsnl lies again on @BBC – Outragehttps://t.co/DC1HMmo37S via @JewishNewsUK

— SimonWiesenthalCntr (@simonwiesenthal) April 15, 2021

Michael Dickson, executive director of StandWithUs Israel, tweeted the joke “is not funny and not true. Israel’s healthcare system is equal to all and an exemplar of coexistence. This is just an antisemitic ‘blood libel’ being played for laughs.”

.@bbc @haveigotnews “joke” saying Israel 'ignores the Arab population' on vaccines is not funny and not true. Israel’s healthcare system is equal to all and an exemplar of coexistence. This is just an antisemitic “blood libel” being played for laughs. https://t.co/hmRxPCTw0d

— Michael Dickson (@michaeldickson) April 15, 2021

British journalist David Collier similarly tweeted that the joke was “racist” and that “Israel has given more vaccines to ‘Arabs’ than Iraq, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon COMBINED + as % of [population] more than ANY NATION in the world. Put that in your antisemitic pipe and smoke it.”

Here is the thing @BBC -with your racist jokes and antisemitic need to attack #Israel

FACTS:
Israel has given more vaccines to 'Arabs' than Iraq, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon COMBINED

+ as % of pop. more than ANY NATION in the world.

Put that in your antisemitic pipe and smoke it.

— David Collier (@mishtal) April 15, 2021

A spokesperson for the Israeli embassy in London told the Jewish News, “Israel offered vaccines to all of its citizens above the age of 16, regardless of their religion, ethnicity or social status. Arab citizens in Israel have been offered vaccines and special campaigns in Arabic have targeted these communities in order to prevent misinformation and address any concerns that they may have in order to increase uptake.”

The BBC has defended the joke as “satirical” in a statement to the Jewish News.