U.S. Vice President Joe Biden has been criticised for using the term 'Shylocks' in a speech

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden has been criticised by Jewish groups for using the word 'Shylocks' to describe money lenders during a speech.

The term, which derives from the name of a vicious money lending character in Shakespeare's 'The Merchant of Venice', is considered anti-Semitic.

National leader of the Anti-Defamation League, Abraham Foxton, said Mr Biden 'should have been more careful' after his mishap at a conference marking the 40th anniversary of the Legal Services Corporation.

Mr Biden was speaking about his son's year serving in Iraq, and recounted how people would speak to him about financial and legal difficulties back home.

'That's one of the things that he finds was most in need when he was over there in Iraq for a year, that people would come to him and talk about what was happening to them at home in terms of foreclosures, in terms of bad loans that were being... I mean these Shylocks who took advantage of these women and men while overseas,' he said in the speech, reported by CNN.

'When someone as friendly to the Jewish community and open and tolerant an individual as is Vice President Joe Biden, uses the term "Shylocked" to describe unscrupulous moneylenders dealing with service men and women, we see once again how deeply embedded this stereotype about Jews is in society,' Mr Foxman said.

The Vice President's office has not yet returned requests to comment.

The national leader of the Anti-Defamation League said Biden 'should have been more careful' after his mishap, which occurred at a conference marking the 40th anniversary of the Legal Services Corporation

SHAKESPEARE'S VILLAIN WHO BECAME AN ANTI-SEMITIC STEREOTYPE Shylock was the antagonist in Shakespeare's c.1596 play 'The Merchant of Venice', a romantic comedy centred around the merchant Antonio, but of which Shylock is by far the most famous and memorable character. He was a Jewish money lender, and the villainous nature of his character has raised questions as to whether Shakespeare held anti-Semitic views. Shylock is defeated at the end of the play, and forced to convert to Christianity. The word came to represent a negative stereotype of Jewish people relating to a meanness in relation to money, and to mean a heartless or demanding creditor. Advertisement

Mr Biden had been praising the Legal Services Corporation during the Washington speech - a group which provides lawyers to people who could not otherwise afford them.

Shylock, 'The Merchant of Venice's' chief villain, is one of the most hated characters in all of Shakespeare's plays, and his name came to be associated with negative stereotypes of Jewish people.

In the play, Shylock memorable demands a 'pound of flesh' from the merchant Antonio if he does not repay a loan.

This is not the first time Biden has made a race-related slip-up - in 2007, he described Barack Obama as 'the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy'.