On Friday, West, who changed his legal name to Ye, began posting screenshots of text messages between him and rapper Diddy, whose real name is Sean Combs. He shared a screenshot of a text allegedly from him to Diddy, in which he says, “I didn’t like our convo…I’m selling these tees…nobody gets in between me and my money.”
The tees in question are Ye’s controversial “White Lives Matter” shirts, which he showcased at his brand Yeezy’s fashion show in Paris earlier this week. The shirts sparked a whirlwind of backlash for the phrase, which instigated some of Ye’s Instagram tirades in recent days.
According to the texts on Ye’s Instagram, Diddy allegedly asked to meet with him face to face, and said, “Let’s stop playing these internet games. And don’t feel threatened. You’ll be fine. Just love.”
Ye’s response text read, “This ain’t a game… Ima use you as an example to show the Jewish people that told you to call me that no one can threaten or influence me… I told you this was war…Now gone get you some business.”
He captioned the post, “Jesus is Jew.”
On Thursday, Ye also spoke with Fox News’s Tucker Carlson, in which he said he believes that Jared Kushner’s efforts in the Middle East and his facilitation of the Abraham Accords during the Trump administration were intended to make him money.
“I just think that’s what they’re about, is making money,” Ye said. “I don’t think that they have the ability to make anything on their own. I think they were born into money.”
The comments regarding Jewish people’s alleged privilege and influence were disconcerting to many in the Jewish community, including the Executive Director of the watchdog group StopAntisemitism, Liora Rez, who said that his statements in the interview with Carlson were “horrifying.”
“This is horrifying, just to…tap into these century-old antisemitic myths of Jewish money,” Rez told Newsweek.
Rez also said of the Instagram post, “I think we can all agree he [Ye] has always been a provocateur, and he is struggling with mental health issues [and] family issues, but once we saw his post we actually commented right away, ‘We strongly urge you to delete this.’”
Ye has been open publicly about his mental health struggles and revealed several years ago that he has bipolar disorder.
All that aside, Rez said, “this gives him zero excuses to spew baseless and confusing messages about Jews, specifically when antisemitism has been set ablaze across America. Furthermore, his language about influence taps into an age-old antisemitic myth and stereotype about Jewish control.”
“I don’t think he understands when his wording is problematic, but we hope he deletes the Instagram posts,” Rez said. “Jews have enough issues as it is right now without him furthering any type of negativity towards us and hatred.”
