“Propaganda for Fun:” How Extremists Use GAI to Camouflage Hate
Article
Disturbing memes and images created using Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) are polluting social media with camouflaged hate and extremist propaganda. Innovations in AI technology, plus a wider range of tools available than ever before, have enabled the use of AI image generators for nefarious purposes—some of which have been coordinated and crowdsourced online. In the last year, one GAI feature has emerged as a favorite among extremists: The ability to embed shapes, symbols and…
Northern New Jersey Jewish Communities Face Wave of Israel-Related Antisemitism
Article
“Go back to Auschwitz, bitch!” This disturbing antisemitic refrain rang out repeatedly at an anti-Israel protest held across the street from a synagogue in Fort Lee, NJ on November 5, 2023. More recently, in March and April 2024, anti-Israel protests outside of synagogues in nearby Teaneck have included protesters explicitly calling for the exclusion of “Zionists” from the community. These incidents are part of a wave of antisemitic and extreme anti-Zionist…
COE Analysis: Iran Attack Sparks Surge in Online Antisemitic Threats
Article
A new analysis by the ADL Center on Extremism (COE) has found that online expressions of antisemitism on Telegram, a prominent messaging platform frequented by purveyors of hate speech, increased dramatically in the days following the Iranian regime's unprecedented assault on Israel on April 13, 2024. The weekend attack consisted of some 300 drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles. The Iranian regime’s Lebanese proxy Hezbollah and other Tehran-backed militias based in Iraq, Syria…
Campus Antisemitism Surges Amid Encampments and Related Protests at Columbia and Other U.S. Colleges
Article
Anti-Zionist student groups on more than 100 U.S. college and university campuses have established “encampments” in recent days to ostensibly protest Israel’s actions in Gaza and their academic institutions’ alleged “complicity” in those actions. College campuses have been the site of many tense anti-Israel protests and antisemitic incidents since the start of the ongoing Israel-Hamas war that began with Hamas’s October 7, 2023, terrorist attack. These…
From Dearborn to NYC, Quds Day Protesters Praise Terrorists, Denounce the U.S. and Call for the Destruction of Israel
Article
Over the weekend of April 5, 2024, anti-Israel activists in the US and around the world marked Al Quds Day (“Jerusalem Day”) with protests and other events against Zionism and the state of Israel. This annual event, originally conceived by the leader of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, serves as a platform for support for terrorism and other violence against Israel and regularly includes virulent antisemitic and anti-Zionist…
COE Investigation Reveals Key Perpetrators of 10/7 Sexual Assault Denial on X
Article
CW: This piece contains reference to rape and sexual assault In the wake of the October 7 terror attack in Israel, horrific details began to emerge of Hamas assailants brutalizing Israeli women and girls, parading their broken bodies through the streets, and concertgoers being raped and murdered in front of their friends. By November, videos and eyewitness testimony were widely available to the public, showing and describing Hamas terrorists using rape as a weapon of war. …
Daniel Haqiqatjou is an antisemite and conspiracy theorist who also spreads anti-LGBTQ+ and misogynistic rhetoric. He is the founder, editor-in-chief and contributor at the Muslim Skeptic, an online magazine that frequently elevates antisemitic tropes and antisemitic conspiracy theories under the guise of legitimate criticism of Israel or Jewish law. Haqiqatjou has praised Hamas and its October 7, 2023, terror attack on Israel across his social media profiles and shared age…
“Israel is ISIS” and other lies about the Crocus City Hall terror attack
Article
Conspiracy theories and antisemitic narratives have flooded social media in the wake of an Islamic State-claimed terror attack at a music venue outside Moscow. On March 22, 2024, four gunmen attacked concertgoers at Crocus City Hall, shooting into the crowd and using explosives to set the building on fire, killing at least 130 people and injuring at least 140 others. Hours after the attack, the Amaq News Agency, a propaganda arm of the Islamic State (IS or ISIS), claimed…
U.S. White Supremacist Propaganda Incidents Reach Historic Levels in 2023
Press Release
New York, NY, March 26, 2024 … White supremacist propaganda distribution reached historic levels across the United States in 2023, with a total of 7,567 incidents, a 12-percent increase from 2022, according to the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) Center on Extremism’s annual assessment. With an average of about 20 incidents per day, 2023 marked the highest level of incidents since ADL began tracking such data in 2017. This was the second consecutive year that ADL has recorded record…
Identity-Based Bullying: Listening to Young People
Tools and Strategies
Table Talk: Family Conversations about Current EventsAll young people should be able to feel safe, included and respected in their classrooms and schools. Unfortunately, many do not. A recent study of high school students found that nearly four in ten students experienced identity-based bullying or bullying related to an aspect of their identity such as race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity or physical appearance. How can we listen and learn from young people about…
Men Going Their Own Way (MGTOW): What You Need to Know
Article
Part of the ADL Center on Extremism’s coverage of the misogynist manosphere and its subcultures, each of which impacts women’s experiences of safety and equity – online and offline. Men Going Their Own Way (MGTOW) is a distinct faction of the “manosphere,” the broad set of male supremacist, anti-feminist, misogynist and sometimes violent extremist movements that exist largely online. The MGTOW movement began online in the early 2000s when…
TikTok Ban Feared, Antisemitic Conspiracy Theories Follow
Article
On March 13, 2024, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that could potentially lead to a nationwide ban of the popular social media platform TikTok. According to the bill, the issue stems from TikTok being owned by a “foreign adversary,” which poses a national security threat. TikTok’s China-owned parent company ByteDance would be required to find another buyer within six months to avoid the app being pulled from app stores in the US. While the bill has not yet…
Hizb Ut Tahrir U.S. Conference Features Antisemitism, Calls for Violent Destruction of Israel
Article
The U.S. wing of Hizb Ut Tahrir, an international Islamist organization that seeks to establish an Islamic theocracy, held their annual conference on March 2, 2024, in Villa Park, Illinois. The group, which is banned in the United Kingdom, Germany and several other countries, featured speakers who called for an army to invade and destroy Israel, justified the October 7 Hamas terror attack, suggested men should travel to Gaza to fight Israel, implored followers to “resist…
White Supremacist, Tracked by COE, Arrested on Vandalism Charges in Missouri
Article
On March 9, 2024, authorities arrested Frankie Rizzello Jr., a 20-year-old resident of Chesterfield, Missouri, on two felony charges related to property damage motivated by discrimination, one grounded in religion and the other in race. According to charging documents from the University City Police Department, Rizzello faces these charges for allegedly spray-painting a church and an Asian restaurant with graffiti in 2023. In October 2023, after an extensive examination of user…
Table Talk: Family Conversations about Current EventsYou may have heard about “swatting” because it's been in the news recently. What exactly is swatting? Why do people do it? Because young people are exposed to swatting online, on both mainstream websites and the “dark web” (i.e., hidden websites) and because some swatting incidents begin in online gaming or other digital platforms, it is an important topic to discuss with young people. Swatting is &ldquo…
Untangling False Claims About Ashkenazi Jews, Khazars and Israel
Article
Research from ADL has documented in detail the rise in antisemitism and anti-Zionism in the weeks and months following Hamas’s brutal assault on Israel on October 7, 2023. One of the most insidious claims used to discredit both Jews and Israel is that Ashkenazi Jews (i.e., Jews who trace their ancestry to Northern and Eastern Europe) have no historical or genetic relationship to Jewish antiquity in the land of Israel—making Jews “colonizers” with no legitimate claim to…
Brandeis Center/ADL File Federal Complaint Against Berkeley K-12 Schools For "Severe and Persistent" Antisemitic Bullying
Press Release
Washington, D.C., Feb. 28, 2024: The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and ADL (the Anti-Defamation League) today filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights against the Berkeley Unified School District (BUSD) for failing to take action to end nonstop bullying and harassment of Jewish students by peers and teachers since Oct. 7. According to the complaint, Berkeley administrators have ignored parent reports and…
Anti-Israel activists, Terrorist Organizations Hail Aaron Bushnell as a “Martyr” After Self-Immolation Outside Israeli Embassy
Article
On February 25, 2024, Aaron Bushnell, an active-duty member of the U.S. Air Force, approached the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., and set himself on fire to protest the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, saying he would “no longer be complicit in genocide.” His act of protest has garnered praise from anti-Israel groups and foreign terrorist organizations (FTOs). Bushnell is the second person to self-immolate in front of a U.S.-based Israeli government building in protest of the…