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| - A video supposedly featuring notable Jewish celebrities such as Scarlett Johansson, Adam Sandler, Jerry Seinfeld, Steven Spielberg and many more circulated on social media (archived) in mid-February 2025.
The video purported to show celebrities in matching white T-shirts featuring a Star of David inside a raised middle finger with the word "Kanye."
The video spread on social media following revelations that rapper Kanye West, also known as Ye, purchased an advertisement for certain local markets during Super Bowl LIX urging viewers to visit the website of his fashion brand, Yeezy.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the Yeezy website "featured multiple products for sale, but on Monday it was updated to feature only one item: a T-shirt with an image of a swastika."
Snopes readers flooded our inbox asking if the video could be authentic. However, the viral video protesting West is fake, constructed using generative artificial intelligence (AI).
None of the actors in it consented to appear. However, actor David Schwimmer, whose likeness is included in the fake video, posted a message to social media (archived) condemning West.
The video originated (archived) on the Instagram account of Ori Bejerano, @oribejerano_ai, who identified himself to Snopes as the video's creator and confirmed its use of generative AI.
The bio for Bejerano includes "Generative AI Expert" and "Leading AI-Driven Advertising" and his account features other examples of AI imagery.
The post featuring the AI-generated video of Jewish celebrities was accompanied by text, which Snopes translated from Hebrew using Google Translate, that read:
In recent days, Kanye West has once again crossed every possible red line. The man who had previously declared "I am a Nazi", glorified Hitler and spread anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, used one of the biggest stages in the world - airing a commercial during the Super Bowl - to spread anti-Semitism and hatred.
💥 How did he do it?
Immediately after his ad aired, which apparently led to his regular e-commerce site, he removed all products from the site, leaving only one t-shirt - a white one with a swastika.
🚨 This is not a mistake, not a gimmick, and not an "artistic provocation".
🚨 This is deliberate incitement against Jews.
🚨 This is the normalization of Nazi symbols in front of tens of millions of people.
🚨 This is a call to violence in the guise of pop culture.
✅ Fortunately, Elon Musk has already blocked Kanye West's page on Twitter.
❌ Unfortunately, Shopify - through which West sells the shirts - have not yet stopped the sale, nor have they confirmed it as such.
⚠️ It's time to stop being silent and respond to anti-Semites like Kanye West in the strongest possible way.
⚠️ We must demand that social networks stop giving a platform to anti-Semitism and hatred.
⚠️ Economic and public pressure should be applied and people like West kicked out of any platform for spreading their poison.
⚠️ We must not continue turning Kanye West into a sensation and a gimmick - he is dangerous, and it is time to treat him as such.
The Yeezy website, hosted by Shopify, was subsequently deactivated.
Further, Bejerano's Instagram page featured a collaborative post (archived) with the Times of Israel Instagram account, which also confirmed the video's use of AI. It read:
A video released on social media on Tuesday shows a wide array of Jewish celebrities, including Steven Spielberg and Woody Allen, wearing a T-shirt with a raised middle finger and the word "Kanye" — a rejection of the rapper Kanye West's antisemitism.
The video resembles any number of PSAs created by Jewish advocates, with one catch: None of the celebrities consented to participating.
That's because the video was made with generative AI, an emerging technology that instantly creates lifelike animation, opening new frontiers for creativity while also raising ethical questions about what can be rendered and how such products should be labeled.
Released on Instagram by Ori Bejerano, an Israeli generative AI entrepreneur, the video spread rapidly on Tuesday, riding a wave of anger at West and frustration over his persistence as a presence in the public sphere despite a years-long record of antisemitism. Over the last week, West posted a string of antisemitic tweets, then paid for a Super Bowl ad directing viewers to a website that sold just one product: a $20 T-shirt with a swastika on it.
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), whose mission is "to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all," posted to X (archived):
As if we needed further proof of Kanye's antisemitism, he chose to put a single item for sale on his website – a t-shirt emblazoned with a swastika. The swastika is the symbol adopted by Hitler as the primary emblem of the Nazis. It galvanized his followers in the 20th century and continues to threaten and instill fear in those targeted by antisemitism and white supremacy.
If that wasn't enough, the t-shirt is labeled on Kanye's website as "HH-01," which is code for "Heil Hitler."
Kanye was tweeting vile antisemitism nonstop since last week. There's no excuse for this kind of behavior. Even worse, Kanye advertised his website during the Super Bowl, amplifying it beyond his already massive social media audience.
As if we needed further proof of Kanye's antisemitism, he chose to put a single item for sale on his website – a t-shirt emblazoned with a swastika. The swastika is the symbol adopted by Hitler as the primary emblem of the Nazis. It galvanized his followers in the 20th century… pic.twitter.com/0TT30Dda9D
— ADL (@ADL) February 10, 2025
The airing of West's commercial during the Super Bowl was followed by a flurry of antisemitic posts West made on X. The rapper subsequently deactivated the account and an archive of the posts is unavailable, but the offensive tweets were widely reported by Forbes, Billboard, CNN, Business Insider, Variety and more.
This incident followed a pattern of behavior from West that had been going on for years. For example, in 2022, West's X account was suspended after he posted and then deleted an image of a swastika inside the Star of David.
Scarlett Johansson, another celebrity featured in the video, made a statement to People magazine regarding the use of AI for the message.
It has been brought to my attention by family members and friends, that an A.I.-generated video featuring my likeness, in response to an antisemitic view, has been circulating online and gaining traction. I am a Jewish woman who has no tolerance for antisemitism or hate speech of any kind. But I also firmly believe that the potential for hate speech multiplied by A.I. is a far greater threat than any one person who takes accountability for it. We must call out the misuse of A.I., no matter its messaging, or we risk losing a hold on reality.
I have unfortunately been a very public victim of A.I., but the truth is that the threat of A.I. affects each and every one of us. There is a 1000-foot wave coming regarding A.I. that several progressive countries, not including the United States, have responded to in a responsible manner. It is terrifying that the U.S. government is paralyzed when it comes to passing legislation that protects all of its citizens against the imminent dangers of A.I.
I urge the U.S. government to make the passing of legislation limiting A.I. use a top priority; it is a bipartisan issue that enormously affects the immediate future of humanity at large.
Snopes has covered a variety of claims related to Kanye West, including an alleged photo of the rapper in an anti-Nazi shirt, that West received at least 60,000 votes to become president in the 2020 U.S. election and that he was seen wearing a patch of the Confederate flag.
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