June 21, 2019 Recent incidents of white supremacist terrorist activity have prompted the public, researchers, and cyber hate and harassment experts to focus on smaller online message boards and forums like Gab and 8chan. These platforms rose to prominence by permitting any content to be posted, no matter how extreme, without consequence. In fact, they boast about being unhindered by content moderation niceties. A particularly worrying trend is the increasing reach and influence of these…

April 26, 2019 USA Today By George Selim | ADL Senior Vice President of Programs; Former Director of the Office for Community Partnerships and Interagency Countering Violent Extremism Task Force at the Department of Homeland Security Six months after a gunman shouting “all Jews must die” killed 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, another gunman in another synagogue killed one worshiper and wounded three — this time in Poway, California. …

by: Jonathan Greenblatt | March 19, 2019 As we count the dead massacred while worshipping in mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, it’s time to recognize a painful and obvious fact – white supremacy is a transnational terrorist threat that could engulf us all. To some, this might sound like an exaggeration. For the past two decades, law enforcement officials worldwide primarily have been focused on the Islamist extremist threat. They have pursued terror organizations like Al…

by: Jonathan Greenblatt | November 02, 2018 New York Daily News In Pittsburgh this week, the Jewish community has been burying its dead, the innocent men and women massacred by an anti-Semite while they were praying at the Tree of Life synagogue. For many of us, social media platforms — such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram — have been vital ways to connect with people near and far to share our grief, anger and determination as well as ways to take action, from…

by: Jonathan Greenblatt | August 28, 2018 USA Today Last summer, as most teachers were still preparing their classrooms for students, the largest and most violent gathering of white supremacists in decades took place. Teachers were left wondering how they should discuss this horrific event with students and how students would react. For those teaching early grade students, many questioned whether they should have the conversation at all, and, if so, what kind of information was&nbsp…

by: Jonathan Greenblatt | August 12, 2018 USA Today One year ago, hundreds of torch-wielding white supremacists gathered on the campus of the University of Virginia, chanting “Jews will not replace us!" The following day, the streets of Charlottesville exploded in violence, as neo-Nazis, Klansmen and alt-right agitators clashed with counter-protestors. As the National Guard was being called in, a young counter-protester, Heather Heyer, was killed in a tragedy…

April 26, 2018 David Andrew Weinberg, Ph.D. Washington Representative for International Affairs Anti-Defamation League Hearing Before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and Trade Subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa Washington, D.C. April 26, 2018 2:00 pm Chairmen Poe and Ros-Lehtinen, Ranking Members Keating and Deutch, and distinguished Members of the Subcommittees: thank you on behalf of the Anti-Defamation…

by: Jonathan Greenblatt | March 01, 2018 Medium In recent times, there has been one constant in anti-Semitism in America: Louis Farrakhan. His lacerating speeches over more than three decades and more from his pulpit and perch at the Nation of Islam have repeatedly placed Jews at the center of conspiracy theories blaming them for everything from controlling the banks and media to engineering the slave trade. The longtime leader of the Nation of Islam, Farrakhan’s name has become…

by: Jonathan Greenblatt | February 05, 2018 USA Today The cold-blooded murder of Blaze Bernstein has horrified the Jewish community and indeed all Americans. It is hard to come to terms with the shocking brutality that ended the life of such a bright and promising young man. At just 19, Blaze already had shown an aptitude for writing and the arts, even while excelling in a rigorous molecular sciences program at the University of Pennsylvania. Blaze will always be remembered for the…

by: Jonathan Greenblatt | January 18, 2018 The Forward A new report, commissioned by the Trump Administration as part of its efforts to enact new restrictions on immigration, bends over backwards to selectively pick and choose cases in which immigrants who entered the country through the diversity visa lottery or other immigration programs were directly linked to terror plots. The unsubtle agenda of the report is to link terrorism and extremist violence with immigrants. What’s…

March 29, 2018 1. RICHARD SPENCER IS AN ALT RIGHT LEADER. Spencer has become the most recognizable public face of the alt right, a loose network of people who promote white identity and reject mainstream conservatism in favor of politics that embrace implicit or explicit racism, anti-Semitism and white supremacy. Spencer coined the term “alternative right” (from which “alt right” is derived) in 2008 in an article in Taki’s Magazine, a far-right publication…

April 25, 2018 1. Andrew Anglin runs the neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer. Anglin launched The Daily Stormer on July 4, 2013.  He says the site, which remains popular with white supremacists despite ongoing hosting issues, was his attempt to reach “all disenfranchised and angry White males under the age of thirty.” Anglin created The Daily Stormer after founding another neo-Nazi site, Total Fascism, in 2012. Previously, Anglin was a 9/11 “truther”…

by: Oren Segal | August 15, 2017 The Hill The would-be rally in Charlottesville and its aftermath appears to have sparked a new refrain: “White civil rights movement.” The chaos surrounding the “Unite the Right” event in Virginia was significant for a number of reasons, even beyond the violence and hatred on display. The largest public gathering of white supremacists in at least a decade, the group showcased remarkable cohesion among a broad cross-section of the…

March 01, 2019 The Topeka, Kansas-based Westboro Baptist Church (WBC) has a well-earned reputation as one of America's most reviled hate groups. The small, virulently homophobic group stages vitriolic, highly visible protests nationwide against groups and individuals they’ve identified as supporters of “homosexuality,” or who otherwise subvert what they refer to as “God’s law.” Through outrageous statements and postings on their various websites, the…

by: Rabbi David Sandmel | June 16, 2017 Religion News Service The news out of the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting in Phoenix earlier this week took some by surprise: The conference ended with a near-unanimous vote condemning the so-called “alt-right,” the political movement that gained notoriety last year for injecting racism and anti-Semitism into the presidential campaign. Despite the outcome, some in the media sensationalized the vote. Much was made of the…