Addison Smith
Israel Editor
Throughout history, there has always been antisemitism, whether a lot or a little, depending on the time. Still, throughout the 2010s, antisemitism has been on the rise worldwide. Dealing with this has always been a challenge; especially now with social media, people can spread and share their hateful comments without leaving their houses while using their screens as a shield. Along with the rise of social media, there has been a rise in celebrities showing their antisemitism online, most notably in 2022 with Ye (Kanye West) posting numerous tweets about “going death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE'' and more recently with Jamie Foxx accusing Jews of ‘killing’ Jesus.
It is no surprise that some celebrities are antisemitic, but just recently, there has been a new debate if Jamie Foxx is antisemitic as well. Jamie Foxx is a 55-year-old American Actor and Musician who, on Friday, August 4th, made a post on Instagram saying, “They killed this dude named Jesus… What do you think they’ll do to you???!” along with the hashtags #fakefriends #fakelove. Foxx’s post was later deleted, but not before actress Jennifer Aniston had the chance to give it a like. He reportedly only took down the post after being accused of antisemitism. Although there is no excuse for this behavior, some people argue that a reason for a lot of antisemitism is a direct result of the belief that Jews are responsible for the death of Jesus. After Aniston had received some attention for liking Foxx’s post, she put up an Instagram story saying, “This really makes me sick. I did not ‘like’ this post on purpose or by accident. And more importantly, I want to be clear to my friends and anyone hurt by this showing up in their feeds - I do NOT support any form of antisemitism. And I truly don’t tolerate HATE of any kind. PERIOD.” Following this, she reposted a post that A Wider Frame (a Jewish News & media website) had posted on her story. The post had Foxx’s post, where Aniston’s like and commentary from A Wider Frame can be seen. A day after Foxx had made the post and had taken it down, he posted an apology statement. In the statement, he said, “I want to apologize to the Jewish community and everyone who was offended by my post, I now know my choice of words has caused offense and I’m sorry. That was never my intent.” Foxx added that his usage of the word “they” in his original post was that he was talking about a “fake friend” who had betrayed Foxx, and he ended with “I only have love in my heart for everyone. I love and support the Jewish community. My deepest apologies to anyone who was offended.” Foxx’s post received many comments, to which people compared him to Ye (Kanye West), who has in the past made several antisemitic posts. The example of Ye’s actions in the past shows the true harm in these celebrities actions, after Ye’s first tweets about antisemitism he started traveling with known antisemites and said on a podcast that people should “stop dissing the Nazis”. Ye’s actions lead to a rise in antisemitic riots popping up all over the country.
With cancel culture and all of the constant changes in the world, people, especially people with lots of influence, have become more and more comfortable with posting/saying things without thinking of the outcome and of what they are saying in the first place. Whether or not you believe that Jamie Foxx and Jennifer Aniston are truly antisemitic, along with many other celebrities, is up to you. But it is without a doubt that these actions alone are one of the reasons why there is so much antisemitism seen today; all types of people-young, old, rich, and poor- look up to these giant stars. Many of them are young, impressionable people in their teens to thirties, and for them to see their role models not only hating but criminalizing and accusing a whole religion just because they can, convinces people to do the same.
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