ADL: Spike in anti-Semitic tweets targeting journalists

NEW YORK (FOX 5 NEWS) - Most people use Twitter to find out the latest news, tweet celebrities. But during this contentious election, others are also using twitter to spew venomous hate.

Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said twitter has had a spike in white supremacists and other people attacking Jewish journalists. The ADL looked at 12 months of data and found that more than 2.6 million tweets containing anti-Semitic language and images were sent. Approximately 20,000 of those tweets were directed at Jewish journalists. The tweets are so vulgar we had to blur them on the air.

Greenblatt said the ADL is very concerned and has seen sparks of violence. About 800 journalists were targeted, the ADL report said. The top 10 most targeted are Jewish. The ADL said that rhetoric on the campaign trail has helped fuel the hate.

Greenblatt said that in the majority of the accounts sending hateful tweets, the most common words in the users' bio were "Trump," "white," "nationalist," and sometimes "conservative." The candidates aren't saying these things, Greenblatt said, but these users claim to be Trump supporters.

Trump's campaign said it strongly condemns any commentary that is anti-Semitic.

Twitter has deactivated 21 percent of the accounts responsible for the tweets. In a statement it said it plans to introduce new policies in the coming weeks to ensure users felt safe.

While social media may be the current way to spread hate, the message is nothing new.

Greenblatt said that prejudice is not a matter of politics; it is a matter of responsibility.