YouTube Removes Farrakhan's 'Nation of Islam' Due to Ongoing Policy Violations

YouTube has taken down the Nation of Islam (NOI) channel from its platform.

According to YouTube, the NOI channel was removed on Oct. 2 for violating YouTube’s policies against hate speech, specifically the notion that members of a protected group are part of an evil conspiracy theory.

“We have strict policies prohibiting hate speech on YouTube, and terminate any channel that repeatedly or egregiously violates those policies,” a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement to the Journal. “After updating our guidelines last year to better address content that spreads hateful conspiracy theories, we saw a 5x spike in video removals and have terminated over 25,000 channels for violating our hate speech policies.”

NOI did not respond to the Journal’s request for comment.

In his July 4th speech, NOI’s leader, Louis Farrakhan said during a July 4 speech “that Jews are enjoined by their religion to poison prophets and that Jews had ‘broken their covenant relationship with God.’ He referred to Jews collectively as ‘Satan’ and the ‘enemy of God,’ and claimed that white people “are born with lie [sic] and murder in their nature.”

Since August 2019, YouTube also has removed several white nationalist figures from its platform, including David Duke and Richard Spencer in June.

Antisemitic COVID19 Stickers Found in Halifax, Canada

Members of Halifax's Jewish community are speaking out in response to stickers they view as antisemitic that have been appearing around the city in recent weeks.

The stickers, printed in black and white on mailing labels, say: "The Bug That Backfired COVID-19." Also shown are the Jewish Magen David, or Star of David, and a symbol resembling that of the Freemasons.

"At first glance, this sort of appears strange and people might be unsure," said Naomi Rosenfeld, executive director of the Atlantic Jewish Council. "But, unfortunately, we know that this messaging harkens back to old antisemitic tropes."

One of those is the well-known Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Rosenfeld said that is a fabricated antisemitic text that tells the tale of Jews who conspire to rule the world.

"The implication is that the Jewish community was the cause of COVID-19, which obviously is completely false and very antisemitic," she said, adding it also implicates the Freemasons in the same way.

This line of antisemitic thinking is not representative of Halifax and Nova Scotia at large, Rosenfeld said, and the Jewish community has always felt "welcome and at home" in her four years at the helm of the AJC.

But she said the COVID-19 pandemic has everyone "on edge."

"Unfortunately, it's human nature to try and find a scapegoat … and a very small, very radical group has decided that the Jewish community is that scapegoat," she said.

The stickers have been found around the city's downtown core and on some university campuses, Rosenfeld said.

Marnina Goneck, a member of Independent Jewish Voices in Halifax, has seen the stickers in the downtown. She found them "hateful" and "very disturbing."

Goneck and Rosenfeld both encourage anyone who comes across a sticker to take a picture and report it to either of their organizations as well as Halifax Regional Police.

"We can't keep quiet about something like this," Goneck said. "We have to really make sure we draw attention in a way that condemns these kinds of actions. We can't just let it go."

A spokesperson for HRP confirmed in an email they have received at least one report relating to the stickers.