Anti-Semitism of some Trump fans fueling online attacks

    (bigstock.com)

    (bigstock.com)

    An old argument has been rebooted for a new political age: Jews are destroying the country.

    Anti-Semitism has found currency among some supporters of Donald Trump, and that has led to an increasing number of online attacks against two groups: Jewish anti-Trump conservatives and Jewish journalists.

    Bethany Mandel is a politically conservative writer and an Orthodox Jew who has written in prominent Jewish and conservative publications about her opposition to Trump. She has encountered thousands of anti-Semitic messages online, mostly from self-identified white nationalists who are Trump supporters.

    Mandel has blocked thousands of users on Twitter who have gone after her. Twitter has been criticized for doing little to rid its site of such hate.

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    But ultimately, Mandel said she blames Trump.

    “He’s been playing to the absolute bottom rung of our society,” she said. “It feels like this is Germany in the ’30s. Like we’re watching the rise of someone really, really dangerous.”

    So a couple of months ago, she went to the gun shop. Then she wrote a piece for the Jewish Forward, “My Trump Tweets Earned Me So Many Anti-Semitic Haters That I Bought a Gun.” It went viral.

    Click on the audio link above to hear Matt Katz’s story, including his own experience of being flagged by white nationalists, after he began writing about Trump.

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