(JTA) — The British rapper Wiley in a new interview repeated tropes about Jewish power and money that saw him removed from social media platforms.
Wiley doubled down on many of his remarks, including that Jews “run the Earth,” are very rich and “stick together,” in an interview with the “1 Po Show” on the FilthyFellas YouTube channel.
The rapper said that his initial 48-hour social media tirade against Jews late last month was triggered by Nick Cannon, who espoused anti-Semitic conspiracy theories in a June episode of his podcast. Cannon, who was fired from ViacomCBS, has apologized for his remarks and taken steps to learn more about the Jewish community.
Wiley’s Jewish manager cut ties with him after the remarks.
The creators of the FilthyFellas channel said in a statement accompanying the video that Wiley “is not without his faults and 1 PO SHOW and FilthyFellas will acknowledge them. In our opinion (his) recent tirade was wrong and poorly considered and very dangerous. There is more to him than those Tweets though and we wanted to make sure we gave him the opportunity to clear-up as much of the mess has been left behind as possible.”
Wiley was removed late last month from Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and earlier this month from YouTube, following a series of tweets widely regarded as anti-Semitic and other social media posts.
In Friday’s interview, Wiley said that he “never had a problem with anyone in business other than with some of the Jewish community” and that it is not anti-Semitic to say Jews “do, with other societies, run the Earth.”
“They own everything. I’m not anti-Semitic if I say the Jewish community’s very powerful, they own this, they own that – I’m not wrong. I’m not wrong,” Wiley said.
He again referenced comments made in 2018 by Israeli Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef in which he used Talmudic language that compares Black people to monkeys and used the ethnic slur “Kushi.” Yosef was roundly criticized for the remarks by Israeli leaders of all sides.
