Rapper Kanye West has posted antisemitic tropes on his social media accounts, threatening violence against Jewish people

West's antisemitic words were posted on Twitter 2022 through 2021

In 2022, Ted Deutch, a lifelong Jewish and pro-Isreal activist and CEO of American Jewish Committee, speaks on Kanye's tweets:

“Although some have tried, there is no rationale, no explaining away Kanye West’s rants on social media for anything else than what they are: vicious antisemitic statements that pose a clear and present danger to every Jewish person”

160 million records sold

24 Grammy Awards

31.4 million Twitter followers

18.2 million Instagram followers (now banned & deactivated)

The Holocaust was the state-sponsored persecution and mass murder of millions of European Jews by the German Nazi regime between 1933 and 1945

Anti-Semitism in Europe did not begin with Adolf Hitler

There is evidence of hostility towards Jews long before the Holocaust

Jews could be found in all walks of life, as farmers, tailors, seamstresses, factory hands, accountants, doctors, teachers, etc.

Some families were wealthy and many more were poor

Some children ended their schooling early to work in a craft or trade

Others looked forward to continuing their education at the university level

Jewish people were sent to concentration camps simply because of their ethnicity

Across almost all camps there was a lack of facilities, like heating, beds and washrooms

If ere available, they usually had to be shared between hundreds of prisoners

Disease was common in concentration camps

Inmates were subject to regular beatings and humiliation

Access to facilities was often withheld as a form of torture

Kanye’s antisemitic rhetoric is impacting Jewish communities today

His words sparked action:

• A group hung banners over a Los Angeles freeway with an antisemitic message reading "Kanye is right about the Jews"

Beth Kean, CEO of the Holocaust Museam L.A. states:

• "There's always been threats, there's always been antisemitism. But it feels like an epidemic right now"

Anti-Semitism: Hostility to or prejudice against Jewish people

Online Hate Speech: In common language, “hate speech” refers to offensive discourse targeting a group or an individual based on inherent characteristics and that may threaten social peace (un.org)

Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service of April 7, 1933: Excluded Jews and the “politically unreliable” from civil service

Nuremberg Race Laws of 1935: Defined Jews not by religious belief but by ancestral lineage and which formalized their segregation from the so-called Aryan population

Ethnicity - the quality or fact of belonging to a population group or subgroup made up of people who share a common cultural background or descent (Oxford Dictionary)

Radical Politics - Radical, in politics, one who desires extreme change of part or all of the social order (Britannica)