A BBC radio phone-in programme by presenter Simon Lederman allowed a caller to stay on air for almost 13 minutes in a rant that castigated Jews and their “rule” over British society, the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism watchdog group reported.

The group called the incident shocking “even for the BBC.”

According to The Jewish News, the man, introduced as “Andy from St Margaret’s”, began to say by saying: “They are trying to control us more and more and more. They want to put a chip up our backsides, a ring through our noses, and a vizor for our horizons… the elite… the Rothschilds”.

Lederman, who is Jewish, started the exchange by saying that it was a “phone-in amnesty” and that “within obvious limits”, the caller could say “whatever is on your mind”.

Immediately the caller began to complain of “Zionist Jews”, insisting, in a well-known antisemitic trope, that Jews did not come from Palestine but from “an empire called Khazaria.” He said: “Most of the Jews of the world come from eastern Europe, from a place called originally, an empire called Khazaria… The Rothschilds, the people who own the Bank of England, the people who own the Federal Reserve, they’re all Zionist Jews. The people who own corporate America, the media, you’ll find if you just do a little bit of research, they’re all Zionist Jews. We are ruled by Zionist Jews.”

The caller’s comments continued with a long and bad-tempered rant in which he complained of an obsession with the Holocaust and repeated: “We are dominated by the Jews’ system, the financial Jewish system.”

“We keep going on about the Jews… mainstream media, they keep banging on about the Jews and the Holocaust… we keep going on about six million Jews.”

A BBC spokesperson said: “The aim of the programme is to discuss and debate issues raised by our listeners. This was a live phone in and the caller was challenged on his views through out the conversation. Following the interview reaction from other listeners was also broadcast. As of yet we’ve had no formal request from the police for the caller’s details.”

The BBC made the plea to hand over to the police details of the anti-Semitic phone caller.

Jonathan Sacerdoti, director of communication at the Campaign Against Antisemitism, said: “Even for the BBC this is shocking. In this broadcast the radio presenter simply allowed an ignorant racist to speak for nearly quarter of an hour while offering no counter-argument, correction or condemnation of his views that Jews control money, banks, commerce and the media. We expect the BBC to now hand the caller’s telephone number to the police.”

(Source: EJP)