Suggestions that a coin bearing a swastika and a Star of David is evidence of Nazi collaboration with Zionists have been dismissed by a prominent  historian as “pure propaganda”.

Images of the coin were shared on social media after it appeared on the Spanishhalyon blog in a post called "Zionism is Antisemitism".

The post claimed "Zionism cosied up to fascists well before the war and that even though they were a tiny minority among European Jewry, they were given a lead vocal role in implementing the purge of Jews from their European home using the exact same language as the anti-Judaic parties of the era".

The claim comes amid the row over Ken Livingstone who was suspended by the Labour Party this week for saying Hitler supported Zionism.

But Paul Bogdanor, a historian who specialises in the Holocaust and antisemitism, insisted the coin was neither produced nor endorsed by any Jewish or Zionist group.

Mr Bogdanor said: “The image shows a coin struck by the Nazis in the 1930s to mark a series of articles published in the newspaper Der Angriff about a trip to Palestine by one of their agents.

“It was created by the Nazis to pretend that they wanted an ‘honourable’ solution to the ‘Jewish Question’ via the transfer agreement, which the Nazis later abandoned.

“The coin was of course pure Nazi propaganda, like a rapist pretending to sympathise with his victim.”

Mr Bogdanor also said those who use the image to discredit against Zionism today are “unscrupulously repeating Nazi propaganda”.