Research & Analysis

August 10, 2021 July 2021: The statue of Confederate leader Robert E. Lee, a putative impetus for the Unite the Right Rally, was quietly removed from its pedestal in Charlottesville. Image credit: Rev Seth Wispelwey Four years ago, on August 12, 2017, hundreds of far-right extremists descended on Charlottesville to protest the planned removal of the Robert E. Lee statue from the city’s center. “Unite the Right” was the largest and most violent public assembly of white…

June 09, 2021 Un nuevo análisis del Centro sobre Extremismo de la ADL revela que los incidentes antisemitas en Estados Unidos aumentaron a más del doble durante el conflicto militar de mayo de 2021 entre Israel y Hamás y sus consecuencias inmediatas, en comparación con el mismo período de tiempo en 2020.  Después de alcanzar un punto máximo entre el 20 y el 22 de mayo de 2021, el nivel de incidentes ha retornado gradualmente al nivel de…

June 07, 2021 New analysis from ADL’s Center on Extremism reveals that antisemitic incidents in the U.S. more than doubled during the May 2021 military conflict between Israel and Hamas and its immediate aftermath compared to the same time period in 2020.  After peaking between May 20-22, 2021, incident levels have gradually returned to a baseline level. These numbers should still be considered preliminary and are likely to change as additional information becomes available. …

During the two weeks of military conflict between Israel and Hamas in May 2021, antisemitic incidents in the U.S. reported to ADL increased by 75% compared to the two weeks before the fighting began, from 127 to 222, according to preliminary data. (Also see update: Full data for month of May 2021). Many of these incidents appear to have been perpetrated by individuals scapegoating American Jews for the actions of the Israeli government. The incidents have taken place at and around the…

May 07, 2021 THE WEEK’S BIG 3 Four months after his ouster from Facebook and Instagram, the suspension of former president Donald Trump was upheld by the Facebook Oversight Board. A former leader in a violent neo-Nazi group was sentenced Tuesday to 41 months in prison for harassing journalists who reported on his activities and others. Police arrested a 29-year-old man on hate crime charges in connection with the vandalization of several Bronx synagogues, which included the…

April 21, 2021 Screenshot: ABC News Extremists consistently use mainstream news stories as opportunities to share their racist, often violent, views on a range of social media and online platforms. The April 20, 2021 verdict in the Derek Chauvin murder trial was no exception. Chauvin was found guilty on all three charges in the May 2020 murder of George Floyd. Note: Many of the comments documented in this piece include racist, violent and otherwise disturbing language. Prior to the…

April 09, 2021 THE WEEK’S BIG 3 Cameron Shea, a 25-year-old leader of the neo-Nazi extremist group Atomwaffen, pleaded guilty to threatening journalists and activists with Nazi posters and menacing messages. Coronavirus lockdowns last year shifted some antisemitic hatred online, where conspiracy theories blaming Jews for the pandemic’s medical and economic devastation abounded, researchers reported. The Arkansas Senate on Wednesday approved a stripped-down hate crimes bill…

March 25, 2021 UPDATE: According to the TruNews website, the channel was banned from Facebook on April 3, 2021, and the TruNews page has been removed from the platform.  In early 2020, ADL wrote about TruNews and its host and founder, Rick Wiles, detailing the fundamentalist Christian video streaming site’s consistently antisemitic, anti-Zionist, anti-LGBTQ+ and Islamophobic rhetoric. In July 2020, a follow-up piece focused on TruNews’ use of…

March 05, 2021 THE WEEK’S BIG 3 U.S. House leaders canceled Thursday’s legislative session and rescheduled morning votes after police officials warned of a possible plot by a militia group to storm Capitol Hill. A suspect ADL identified as an alleged white supremacist was arrested after the FBI raided the Florida home he was renting after moving from New Jersey. Jewish groups called for an investigation into allegations that a Frontier Airlines flight crew made antisemitic…

February 17, 2021 It’s been more than a month since a horde of extremists forced their way into the U.S. Capitol, protesting the outcome of a national election and intent on disrupting a time-honored democratic process. At least five people died during the violent attack, including one Capitol Police officer. ADL’s Center on Extremism (COE) has identified 212 of the roughly 800 individuals who are believed to have breached the building on January 6. The emerging snapshot…

February 12, 2021 THE WEEK’S BIG 3 Google's YouTube is still recommending extremist and white supremacist videos to viewers already susceptible to racial hatred, a new report from ADL found. Iranian schools are teaching antisemitism, hatred and conspiratorial material in their textbooks, according to a comprehensive analysis by ADL. Police in Spokane, WA are looking for the person who painted swastikas on the Temple Beth Shalom building and a Holocaust memorial. Read on for more…

February 01, 2021 Users across social media platforms evoked antisemitism during and in the wake of the GameStop incident that took place at the end of January 2021. (photo source: Twitter) During the final week of January 2021, beleaguered retailer GameStop’s stock was driven to astronomical new highs when posters on the r/WallStreetBets subreddit launched a buying frenzy -- ostensibly aimed at soaking the Wall Street hedge funds that had shorted the stock for profit. As the…

January 15, 2021 On January 10, 2021, Nation of Islam (NOI) Student Minister Dr. Wesley Muhammad provided the latest example in the group’s long history of virulent antisemitism. Muhammad delivered a two-hour sermon, broadcast live from NOI’s national headquarters in Chicago, in which he explicitly and repeatedly blamed Jews and Israel for the coronavirus pandemic. As of January 14, his sermon, titled “Beyond Tuskegee: Why Black People Must Not Take the Experimental COVID-19…

January 07, 2021   Manifestantes dentro del Capitolio de EE.UU, uno de ellos con una camisa que dice  “Campamento Auschwitz” — Fuente: ITV news A pocas horas de que extremistas pro-Trump irrumpieron en el edificio del Capitolio de los EE.UU., ideólogos, activistas y adeptos a las teorías de conspiración antisemitas intentaron implicar a los judíos y a los sionistas en la violencia. Aunque estos antisemitas tienen una variedad de…

January 07, 2021 Protestors—one wearing a “Camp Auschwitz” sweatshirt—inside the U.S. Capitol building. Photo credit: ITV news In the hours since pro-Trump extremists stormed the U.S. Capitol building, antisemitic ideologues, activists and conspiracy theorists have attempted to implicate Jews and Zionists in the violence. Although these antisemites have a range of opinions about President Trump, many were united in their belief that the events of Wednesday,…

December 24, 2020 In mid-December an image started circulating on social media. The image was taken in Washington, D.C. and featured a man standing alongside a group of Proud Boys and wearing a t-shirt emblazoned with the cryptic text “6MWE.” This code for “6 Million Wasn’t Enough” is a not-so-veiled reference to the Holocaust. The man, who has not yet been identified, also wore a Proud Boys baseball hat and the skull face mask popular among -- but not…

December 13, 2020 On December 12, 2020, multiple pro-Trump demonstrations took place in Washington, DC, including one that was organized by white supremacists and another that included extremist speakers on their dais. Later that evening over 100 members of the right-wing extremist group the Proud Boys roamed the streets of the city while chanting expletive-laced slogans against Black Lives Matter and Antifa.   The Jericho March The largest event of the day was a prayer…

October 27, 2020 Two years ago, white supremacist Robert Bowers killed 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh after posting antisemitic, anti-immigrant rants on Gab. Today, supported by a founder who encourages hate speech, the social media site appears to be gaining traction among right-wing extremists, including white supremacists: Sixty percent of the 47 right-wing extremist groups currently on Gab were created this year. Gab is rife with white supremacist groups. …