TikTokers say in recent viral videos that members of an extremist religious group handed out anti-Native American flyers on Native reservations.
The Black Israelites are a fringe religious movement associated with antisemitism and forced segregation. Members of the group allegedly visited Pine Ridge, South Dakota, and Rosebud, Oregon—both reservations that are home to the Lakota people—on April 10.
Native TikTokers say that the group disseminated anti-Native materials in Rosebud. In Pine Ridge, Black Israelites were escorted out of the reservation by tribal police. The Oglala Sioux Tribe Department of Public Safety did not immediately respond to the Daily Dot’s request for comment.
In one TikTok posted on April 10, Native TikToker Emma Blacksmith captured men wearing purple and yellow shirts with the Black Israelite logo standing outside Big Bat’s convenience store on the Pine Ridge reservation. Big Bat’s employees confirmed the incident in a brief phone interview with the Daily Dot.
“Them Israelites came to the reservation and got escorted off by the police,” Blacksmith wrote in the video’s overlay text. “They came with an agenda.. Because they feel they are the First People.. Being ignorant and disrespectful that’s sad.”
Black Israelites believe that Native Americans are part of the “Tribe of Gad” and originate from Israel. Many Native people find this belief offensive, as they are native to North America.
Black Israelites, also called Hebrew Israelites, are designated as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center because of the group’s beliefs that Jewish people are “imposters and thieves,” white people and the LGBTQ community are “devils,” and that queerness is a “plague.”
In the video’s comments, Blacksmith expressed concern about Black Israelites “coming back in numbers.”
On Thursday, Blacksmith’s video had almost 70,000 views on TikTok.
@lilindianoglalasioux ♬ original sound – Emma J. Blacksmith
Asdzáá Tłʼéé honaaʼéí, a Navajo person, posted on Twitter about the Black Israelites’ visit to Pine Ridge. She tweeted that the group attended “a children’s Easter Sunday event” and “were flashing that they were armed.”
“They were also handing out flyers that had anti-Native and racism rhetoric backed by pseudoscience,” Tłʼéé honaaʼéí tweeted. “They are starting to get bold but no one will listen to us Natives.”
The TikTok account @iuicportland, run by a Black Israelite group based in Oregon, posted photos of their visit to Rosebud that show the group interacting with Lakota people and handing out flyers. (IUIC is an abbreviation for Israel United In Christ. The Portland chapter of the organization did not immediately respond to the Daily Dot’s request for comment.)
The TikTok shows the Black Israelites’ materials, including flyers about “The Downfall of the Native Americans,” “The Truth about Native Americans,” claims that Christopher Columbus “used the bible to find America,” and “The True Description of Christ.”
“IUIC Portland reached out to the so called Native Americans in Warm Springs, OR Reservation to bring them to repentance and their TRUE heritage,” reads @iuicportland’s TikTok caption.
Chantal Lugli (@jerzeygirl1981), a Native TikToker who lives on Rosebud, posted @iuicportland’s video with the overlay text, “STAY OFF OUR RESERVATIONS.”
“WE DO NOT WANT YOU HERE,” Lugli wrote. “OR YOUR FALSE NARRATIVES AND GENOCIDE.”
