Are These Antifa Posters Calling For Killing Children Real?

Photographs of antifa posters calling for the murder of white children are floating around the internet in right-wing circles. The only problem? They’re fake.

Antifa, short for anti-fascist, is a loose collection of people who oppose neo-Nazi and other far-right views. The movement traces its origins back to Europe and to the rise of fascism in Italy and Germany.

Anti-fascists clashed with the Benito Mussolini and Adolph Hitler’s devotees. The most controversial part of antifa is its association with violence. In the mid-20th century, antifa used violence against the regimes of Hitler and Mussolini. In the U.S. today, some people associated with antifa have perpetrated violence against members of the far- and alt-right.

President Donald Trump condemned Tuesday groups like the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), neo-Nazis and white supremacists who had members at the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, Friday and Saturday. The weekend saw clashes between the far-right and counter-protesters, and Trump blamed ensuing violence on “both sides.” Trump specifically criticized the “alt-left,” which may have included antifa. Violence reached a flashpoint Saturday when a man with connections to white supremacy rammed a car into counter-protesters, killing one woman and injuring at least 19.

The fake antifa posters found their way around the internet after the clashes in Charlottesville. The posters prescribe the erasure of the white race.

“The evil white race must be destroyed!” reads the poster. “The white racist and their heeb masters must be purged from the face of the earth.”

The poster then calls for the killing of children.

“The children of the white racists are the future of the white race. This is where we must begin and end!” the poster reads. “With Trump in power its far to (sic) late for conversion of the racist children … do what must be done.”

The poster is attributed to the “National Antifa Front,” which according to fact-checking website Snopes.com does not exist.

New York City Antifa, a New York-based group of antifa members, said that posters were fabricated to stoke fear.

“The flyers are – obviously – fake,” the group emailed Snopes. “They are designed by the far right to play to their members’ fears and rile them up against us.”

Photographs of the posters first appeared on the internet in April.