Hasidic Singer's Racial Slur Against Obama: Video Shows Mordechai Ben David Slamming Outgoing US President During Jerusalem Concert

A prominent Hasidic singer from Brooklyn used a racial slur against President Barack Obama at a concert in Jerusalem, a video posted online showed. Mordechai Werdyger, who goes by the name Mordechai Ben David, was performing a song about peace on Dec. 29 when he slammed the outgoing U.S. president, calling him a “kushi”— a derogatory Hebrew term for a black person.

“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,” he said in Hebrew, according to a translation by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

In ancient Hebrew, “kushi” referred to Ethiopians and also black Africans, particularly those of Ethiopian origin. In modern Hebrew, however, it has been used as a pejorative term for black people and Africans.

His words brought thunderous applause and cheers from the crowd at the event, which was attended by several Israeli officials, including Interior Minister Aryeh Deri and Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat — both of whom previously expressed their belief that President-elect Donald Trump will be a better friend to Israel than Obama.

Barkat had also reportedly said that he was confident that Trump will implement his election campaign promise to move Israel’s U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

“I don’t just expect, I know that he will do it,” Barkat told the crowd at the event. “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.”

Meanwhile, Werdyger's racial slur against Obama comes weeks after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the Obama administration of conducting “a shameful anti-Israel ambush” over the U.N. Security Council anti-settlements resolution, which declared illegal all Israeli settlements constructed since 1967 on occupied Palestinian land. Netanyahu praised Trump as “a true friend” of Israel after the president-elect pledged in a cryptic tweet that "things will be different" once he takes office.