Antisemitism

[Dill]

(07-16-2020, 11:39 AM)BmorePat87 Wrote: The last few years saw a number of stories about antisemitism from the right, but with the growth of BLM in the last two months, we have seen a new form of antisemitism occur within those groups.

From celebrities like DeSean Jackson, Stephen Jackson, and Nick Cannon, people have been pushing antisemitic rhetoric, including globalist conspiracy theories, fake quotes from Hitler, and quotes from the Nation of Islam to promote anti-semitism as a fight against racism and black identity. The typical message seems to be pushing the narrative of Black Hebrews being the true chosen people and White Jewish people fighting to keep them done and joining with racist Christians to keep that fact hidden. Sometimes it also includes imagery of powerful and rich Jewish people controlling global events, which includes racial inequality. I've also seen cases where Henry Ford's antisemitic The International Jew literature is pushed.

Here you are alluding to a grouping of religious sects called Hebrew Israelites or Black Hebrew Israelites, or Nation of Yahweh Their base belief began in Kansas and spread to Chicago, New York, Liberia and Israel, where they claim a right to natural citizenship as the real Jews. Their beliefs are (to me at least) reminiscent of the Cargo Cults of New Guinea and Borneo, some of whose inhabitants believe that they were God's chosen but white missionaries tricked them by ripping the relevant pages out of the Bible. In both cases, powerful magical thinking constructs a narrative which explains current oppression/low status in terms of a stolen rightful identity, and a focus on reinterpreting and redefining the false reality peddled by those who dominate them.

Anyway, their central belief is that Black people were "the Jews" of the Old and New Testament, and their international enslavement during the Modern period is punishment for their disobedience of God. Jews, along with whites, conspire to obscure this truth. A few decades ago there was a big dust up in Israel about this as they were likening Israelis to Nazis and Hitler.

According to a 2008 SPLC report, Black Hebrews are not generally racist, but noted there was a growing percentage who openly hate whites and Jews, etc. Easy to understand as a reaction to white racism. Jews they attack as "fake" Jews, whom they hate for misrepresenting themselves as real Jews. The most extreme want to kill all Jews and gays. https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2008/racist-black-hebrew-israelites-becoming-more-militant

I first encountered them in 1994 when I went on a trip to Manhattan with my family. There was a group of four men with bushy afros and large beards dressed in black tactical outfits and black combat boots; they had a big sign about "Israelites" and were handing out literature to select passersby.  I attempted to speak with one; he told me blacks were the real Hebrews, but didn't want to engage further.

There numbers are not great, but it is interesting that some of these ideas are now being absorbed and spread by celebrities. In the post truth era of Trump and Alex Jones, we oughtn't be surprised if some minority communities mirror the conspiracy mongering and magical thinking we see among some sectors of the white population.

Here is a pic of Israeli Black Hebrews standing in front of the Knesset, and an article about them:

https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/b42ad8800bc449aaa415e05a8087bbe6