Who Are the Black Israelites at the Center of the Viral Standoff at the Lincoln Memorial?
For The Washington Post, Sam Kestenbaum writes about The House of Israel (HOI), an American religious branch of Black Israelism whose members were recently involved in a now-viral confrontation between Catholic high school boys and a Native American elder in Washington. Kestenbaum writes, “Beliefs vary widely, but groups are bound together by the central tenet that African Americans are the literal descendants of the Israelites of the Bible and have been severed from their true heritage.” He adds, “With an elevated profile, Hebrew Israelite groups such as HOI have received significant pushback from organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League — which brand them as ‘hate groups’ for their inflammatory messages about white, LGBT and Jewish people — as well as from Christian groups that see them as a growing religious threat.”