Popular Hasidic singer Mordechai Ben David called US President Barack Obama a “kushi,” a pejorative term for a black person, at a concert in Jerusalem.
Ben David was performing a song about peace at the December 29 concert when he told the audience: “Do you know when there will be peace? In a few weeks, when there will be a new president in the United States and the kushi goes home.”
The audience at the Jerusalem’s Pais Arena burst into applause.
Several municipal and government officials were in the audience, Yeshiva World News reported, including Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat and Interior Minister Aryeh Deri, both of whom addressed the audience.
Some of the comments made in Hebrew by the officials were caught on mobile phone footage.
Barkat declared that he expects the incoming Trump administration in the US to move the country’s embassy to Jerusalem.
“I don’t just expect, I know that he will do it,” Barkat told the crowd to applause. “He will move the embassy to Jerusalem. And in so doing he will show the way for many nations in the world for cooperation with Israel, the Jewish state. ”
Popular Hasidic singer Mordechai Ben David called President Barack Obama a “kushi,” a term meaning black person, at a concert in Jerusalem.
Ben David was performing a song about peace at the Dec. 29 concert when he told the audience: “Do you know when there will be peace? In a few weeks, when there will be a new president in the United States and the kushi goes home.”
The audience burst into applause.
Several municipal and government officials were in the audience, including Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat and Interior Minister Aryeh Deri (Shas).
The word, derived from a biblical word for an Ethiopian, is usually regarded as derogatory in modern Hebrew.
Mordechai Ben David Werdyger, 65, who lives in Brooklyn, has recorded dozens of albums of Jewish music, and regularly appears before Orthodox audiences in North American and Israel.