A surge of anti-Jewish vitriol spread by rapper Ye, NBA star Kyrie Irving and other prominent people including Nick Fuentes, a Holocaust denier who went to high school in the west suburbs, is stoking fears that public figures are normalizing hate and ramping up the risk of violence in a country already experiencing a sharp increase in antisemitism.
Leaders of the broad U.S. Jewish community and extremism experts say they have been alarmed to see celebrities with massive followings spew antisemitic tropes in a manner that, for decades, has been taboo. Some say it harkens to a time in America when powerful people routinely spread anti-Jewish conspiracy theories with impunity.
