Neo-Nazi site sued for defamation, struggles to stay online
(AP) — A Muslim-American radio host is accusing the publisher of a notorious neo-Nazi website of defaming him by falsely labeling him the "mastermind" of a deadly concert bombing in England, according to a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday.
Obeidallah's suit says the site embedded fabricated messages in a June 1 story to make them seem like they had been sent from Obeidallah's Twitter account, tricking readers into believing he took responsibility for the May 22 terrorist attack at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester.
Obeidallah, a comedian and Daily Beast columnist, told The Associated Press that he received death threats after the article's publication.
The suit claims that the article's defamatory statements were intended to incite violence against Obeidallah, citing other alleged examples of Daily Stormer readers who did just that, including Dylann Roof, who read the site before killing black churchgoers in South Carolina.
Access to the site has been sporadic since Monday, when Google canceled its domain name registration, making its IP address nearly impossible for internet users to locate.
On Wednesday, the site reappeared for a time with a Russian domain name and registration, with a top story making the unsupported claim that President Donald Trump called Russian President Vladimir Putin to get the site restored.
Tanya Gersh's suit claims anonymous internet trolls bombarded Gersh's family with hateful and threatening messages after Anglin published their personal information in a post accusing her and other Jewish residents of Whitefish, Montana, of engaging in an "extortion racket" against the mother of white nationalist Richard Spencer.