Rapper Ice Cube blasted on social media for posting anti-Semitic image: ‘You should be ashamed’

Ice Cube’s hostile attitude towards the Jewish community has an extensive history.

By Shiryn Ghermezian, Algemeiner

Rapper Ice Cube came under fire on Saturday for posting an image on Twitter that’s been widely panned as anti-Semitic and refusing to remove it, despite repeated requests by Jewish activists.

Ice Cube, whose real name is O’Shea Jackson, has been tweeting support for the Black Lives Matter movement following the police killing of 46-year-old George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25.

Then, on Saturday morning, he uploaded the image of a group of sinister looking men, some with large hooked noses, sitting around a game board, with one full bearded gentleman counting money. The board rests on the bowed, naked backs of another group of men. Written across the image is “All we have to do is stand up and their little game is over.”

Ice Cube, 50, captioned the image “F*** THE NEW NORMAL UNTIL THEY FIX THE OLD NORMAL!”

The caricature first appeared as a mural in London’s East End and sparked a controversy in 2018 after Britain’s Labour Party leader at the time Jeremy Corbyn voiced support for the artist Mear One (Kalen Ockerman). Corbyn later apologized and the image was subsequently scrubbed.

According to journalist Michael Segalov, the iconography mirrors “anti-Semitic propaganda used by Hitler and the Nazis to whip up hatred that led to the massacre of millions of Jews. This extends to the table these figures are sat at, resting on human bodies, as the Nazis also depicted.”

Twitter users were quick to call out Ice Cube for sharing the offensive image and insisted that he remove the photo. Anti-Semitism researcher and blogger David Collier wrote, “You know Ice, if the only thing you have to use is something that is racist and oppressive towards another minority group, it really is time to rethink your whole argument.”

Another Twitter user wrote: “This not cool. Not at all. It is anti-Semitic and makes an enemy out of those who continue to fight with us. Our Jewish allies don’t deserve such vile tropes. You should be ashamed, sir.”

Yet another added, “This is a racist mural. We can’t fight hate by hating on others. We gotta win this united, not divided.”

Ice Cube’s hostile attitude towards the Jewish community has an extensive history. In 1991, the Simon Wiesenthal Center condemned his album “Death Certificate” for including many racist lyrics. One song on the album even called for the murder of a Jewish music industry figure.

In 2015, he allegedly had his entourage physically attack a rabbi who he bumped into in Detroit. Ice Cube, the rabbi said, “unleashed a string of anti-Semitic epithets at him for wearing a yarmulke.”

Last month, the rapper offered warm birthday wishes to infamous anti-Semitic minister Louis Farrakhan.