Kanye West left fans disturbed this week after unveiling his new online store selling just one item – T-shirts with swastikas on them.
Ye, 47, who recently declared that he was a “racist” and a “nazi”, had aired a commercial in some markets during the Super Bowl, pointing fans to his website, Yeezy.com.
The 30-second commercial showed Ye filming a close-up of his face while lying in a dentist’s chair, telling the camera: “I spent, like, all the money for the commercial on these new teeth. So, once again, I had to shoot it on the iPhone.”
According to reports from the New York Times, the rapper then directed people to his online store, which sold just one item – a $20 white T-shirt with a back swastika on the front.
According to Variety, at the time the commercial aired on Sunday night, the store was selling a range of non-branded clothing, but changed it to the controversial T-shirt shortly afterward.
By Tuesday morning, the website appeared to have gone offline, being replaced with a message reading: “This store is unavailable.”
A spokesperson for Shopify, the online platform which processed the website’s orders, told the outlet that Kanye’s online store “did not engage in authentic commerce practices and violated our terms so we removed them from Shopify.”
Shopify President Harley Finkelstein told CNBC that the website’s owners “had an entire day” to prove they were not violating company policies, “which did not happen.”
He said on Tuesday: “The moment we realized this was not actually a real commerce practice, they weren’t actually engaging in authentic commerce, we pulled it down,” labelling the website “disappointing”.
According to reports, the T-shirt was labeled ‘HH-01’, with it being believed to stand for “Heil Hitler”.
Finkelstein told CNBC’s Sara Eisen: “I’m a proud Jewish entrepreneur. I’m a proud Jewish community member. You and I have talked about this in the past, that it’s a big part of my identity. So obviously I’m devastated by that.”
Kanye has expressed antisemitic views on numerous recent occasions, including on social media after his controversial appearance on the red carpet at the Grammys, where his wife, Bianca Censori, appeared wearing a sheer mesh dress underneath which she was completely naked.
The ‘Runaway’ performer took to X on February 7 to share a series of posts including a number of antisemitic tweets about Jewish people, and even about friends of his who are Jewish who he has apparently “never trusted”.
The once-revered rapper then went on to say that he “loves Hitler”, branding himself a Nazi.
Since then, Elon Musk also confirmed that people would no longer be able to see Kanye’s X (formerly Twitter) account.
As a result of his inflammatory posts and offensive slurs, X slapped a “sensitive content warning” on the ‘Gold Digger’ rapper’s account.
According to Sky News, the Campaign Against Antisemitism group condemned West’s posts in a statement, saying: “Once again, Ye has gone on an antisemitic rampage online. It couldn’t be any clearer that he is an unrepentant, proud antisemite.
“At a time of unprecedented antisemitism, there can be no mistaking this incitement for exactly what it is. We call on Elon Musk to remove him from X,” they added.
The 53-year-old X owner finally addressed the controversy after three days, revealing that Kanye’s account had been marked as “NSFW [not safe for work].”
“You should not be seeing that anymore,” the billionaire added.
Kanye had previously been banned from Twitter in 2022 after he posted a photo of a swastika merged with a Star of David.
