The FBI has released files on the murder of rapper Tupac Shakur, revealing that the Jewish Defense League (JDL) was suspected of "extorting money from various rap music stars via death threats, including Tupac and another performer, Eazy-E.
"The scheme involves (name redacted) and other subjects making telephonic death threats to the rap star," the files, declassified this week, explain. "Subjects then intercede by contacting the victim and offering protection for a fee. The victim and their family are taken to a 'safe haven', usually a private estate, and are protected by gun-toting body guards associated with the Jewish Defense League."
This is the first new information to become public about the Tupac Shakur murder in quite some time and came out due to a Freedom of Information Act request of the FBI.
For those unfamiliar with the Jewish Defense League, here is background from the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups in the United States:
The Jewish Defense League (JDL) is a radical organization that preaches a violent form of anti-Arab, Jewish nationalism. Its late founder, Rabbi Meir Kahane, claimed that Jews face fierce anti-Semitism domestically and abroad and must protect themselves by any means necessary. The JDL's position with regard to Israel is denial of any Palestinian claims to land and the calling for the removal of all Arabs from the "Jewish-inherited soil." The group has orchestrated countless terrorist attacks in the U.S. and abroad, and has engaged in intense harassment of foreign diplomats, Muslims, Jewish scholars and community leaders, and officials.
Eazy-E, of the rap group Niggaz Wit Attitudes, was also allegedly a victim of the same sort of extortion by the JDL.
It seems likely that money stolen through these extortions would be funneled back to Israel to continue the JDL's war on Arabs.
There is no evidence that the Jewish Defense League was behind Tupac Shakur's murder, but this new information certainly makes one rethink whether or not Tupac was really killed due to an East Coast/West Coast rap feud.