A search for the term “Jews must die” brings up stories about the Pittsburgh shooter, who allegedly shouted that before the shooting.
But Googling “I hate Jews” takes you to a variety of pages ranging from a Wikipedia entry about self-hating Jews to an article about a Vice co-founder, who left the company more than a decade ago, launching into a rant about Jews in a post titled “10 things I Hate About Jews.” Among the articles also are comments from President Donald Trump telling Republican donors that Democrats “hate Jewish people.”
As you dive deeper into the search results of Google, the articles become less mainstream and more offensive. More rants and anti-Semitic vitriol from white supremacist sites come up.
Google searches for “kill Jews” were also atypically high, reaching levels not seen since the Pittsburgh aftermath, in the wake of the Passover shooting that killed one woman and injured the rabbi and others, our research shows.
As a Jewish woman living in Washington, DC, who takes her two-year-old daughter to synagogue and writes for the Jewish news and culture Tablet magazine, the increasing violence is alarming and is impacting real life.
“It is a serious life or death threat for American Jews,” Pildis says. “I feel a sense of loss, for what it used to be like for Jews here.” It is personal, for her, like other Jews who feel under threat.
She says each assault on a Jew or vandalism of property with a swastika impacts her. And the massacres, well, they feel like a death in the family.