This article originally appeared on Haaretz. Sign up here to get Haaretz’s free Daily Brief newsletter delivered to your inbox.
WASHINGTON — Elon Musk on Thursday sharply defended himself against accusations of antisemitism after spending months amplifying anti-Jewish conspiracy theories and screeds during a Twitter event alongside prominent right-wing Jewish personalities.
The event, broadcast live on X, was co-hosted with the Daily Wire and Ben Shapiro, the right-wing commentator who is largely sympathetic with Musk and has criticized Musk’s primary foil, the Anti-Defamation League, as a partisan organization that has weaponized free speech and fights against antisemitism.
Critics of Musk and Shapiro, however, have warned that the billionaire is using Shapiro and the other Jewish personalities present at the event — including highly politicized figures such as Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, Alan Dershowitz and Rabbi Manis Friedman, among others — as deflection against the hate speech he has allegedly platformed, while Shapiro and his allies have earned criticism of their own for validating Musk’s supposed enablement of antisemitism for their own personal agendas.
Musk has found himself at war with the ADL over the last month, participating in and amplifying an antisemitic social media campaign targeting the Jewish anti-discrimination organization.
Anti-extremism and hate speech monitoring organizations have been warning that since Musk took over Twitter, the company has been platforming hate speech under the guise of free speech.
Among Musk’s platforming of antisemitic conspiracy theories includes accusing the Jewish billionaire of wanting to destroy Western civilization, participating in victim-blaming in his anti-ADL attacks and engaging with centuries-old Jewish blood libels.
This all comes at a time of unprecedented spikes in antisemitism, a significant portion of which arises on social media platforms on the internet. Despite this, Musk rejected claims about the rampant antisemitism on X as well as his own alleged antisemitism, claiming “all evidence points in the other direction.”
“My entire life story is in fact pro-semitic. And Walter Isaacson, who I believe was Jewish, spent two years with me with have complete access to everything,” he said. “He’s a pretty smart guy, he might have picked up on it.”
Musk further pointed to the fact that he went to a Jewish preschool in South Africa, saying “I don’t know if I am sort of genetically Jewish or what,” while jokingly describing himself as “aspirationally Jewish. My name Elon is a very Israeli name. It’s like being called Bob,” further describing a trip to Israel when he was 13.
Shapiro, who has long served as a Jewish fig leaf of sorts for the far-right, lent credence to Musk’s allegations that the ADL is targeting X via pressure on advertisers, all while Musk defended his own tactics on combatting hate speech while attempting to re-define what hate speech constitutes.
Bnai Zion CEO Ari Lamm further attacked ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, saying “he represents no one, but more importantly to me, he doesn’t even pretend to play in the field of great Jewish ideas and texts.”
“If you really want to combat antisemitism, teach Jewish ideas and send people to visit the greatest repository of Jewish teaching,” Lamm added.
Musk additionally used the space, ostensibly about antisemitism, to defend Orthodox Jewish anti-trans influencer Chaya Raichik and her Libs of TikTok account as well as Russell Brand, the comedian and free-speech advocate embroiled in controversy after being accused of sexual assault by multiple women.
Musk rejected multiple efforts from European Jewish Association’s Rabbi Menachem Margolin to get him to commit to visiting the Auschwitz concentration camp, saying he was “very well aware of the Holocaust” and didn’t need to visit to understand what occurred given the pictures he has seen.
He later revisited the topic, saying he would give it a “tentative yes” since he needs to visit one of his factories in Berlin.
Former President Reuven Rivlin claimed Israel is dealing with a similar free-speech issue as X, noting “sometimes there are people in Israel who believe that the Jewish and democratic state means democracy only for the Jews.”
Musk, for his part, linked Israel’s “desire for retribution” against the Palestinians with the desire to seek retribution against those propagating antisemitism on the platform.
“You have this endless cycle of retribution,” Musk said, adding much of his work is motivated by “can we turn an antisemite into someone who is at least neutral, if not pro?”
“If someone does express antisemitic views within reason, I think you do want that out there so you can hear the counterpoints,” he added.
Boteach claimed any potential Israel-Saudi Arabia normalization deal could be attributed to Musk, since Tesla has supposedly kick-started a global economy moving away from the petro-dollar.
Both Musk and Natan Sharansky further attacked critics of Israel on the left, linking antisemitism with anti-Zionism on the right.
“Anti-Zionism on the left reminds me exactly of the Soviet Union’s propaganda against Israel and there’s something to think about how this neo-Marxism is coming back to American universities,” Sharansky said.
“The crazy thing that I’m finding is how strong on the far left is the antisemitism movement, especially as an anti-Israel movement. It’s, it’s actually very strong on the far left, including at the top universities in America,” Musk said.
“On the far-left is an anti-Israel tenet,” he continued, decrying how “they are being taught Israel is an apartheid state that should not exist.”
The event comes weeks after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lent his own efforts to defend Musk, in an effort brokered by several of Musk’s Jewish allies in Silicon Valley, implying he is more powerful than the U.S. president.