- Bill Ackman defends Elon Musk.
- Musk is facing a wave of backlash for sharing an anti-Semitic remark on Twitter on Wednesday.
- Ackman says Musk has made the world a “much better place.”
Hedge fund manager Bill Ackman expressed his support for fellow billionaire Elon Musk on Saturday as owner X faced backlash for retweeting an anti-Semitic remark.
Ackman, who has waged a personal social media campaign against people he sees as anti-Semites, wrote on X that Musk is “not an anti-Semite.”
“It’s remarkable how quickly the world is ready to attack Musk for his session based on a comment,” Ackman wrote.
He then praised the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX. “Musk isn’t perfect, but the world is a much better place because of him,” Ackman added.
On Wednesday, Musk retweeted a post on X that said “Jewish communities” spread “white hatred.” The post also accused Jews of supporting “hordes of minorities” arriving in Western countries.
“You told the whole truth,” Musk wrote in his retweet, sparking a quick wave of reactions online. The tweet appears to draw on the “Great Replacement” theory, a white supremacist idea that states that white people are being replaced by minorities and immigrants.
Critics from the White House to the Facebook co-founder and Tesla investors have slammed Musk, with several major advertisers cutting contracts with X since his controversial post.
Despite the backlash, Musk continued to comment on his retweet: criticizing the Anti-Defamation Leaguea Jewish non-governmental organization fighting anti-Semitism, claiming it “unfairly attacks most of the West.”
When another user X told him not to “generalize the Jewish community,” Musk wrote: “You are right that this does not apply to all Jewish communities, but it is not limited to the ADL either.”
In his defense of Musk, Ackman re-posted a video from conservative political pundit Ben Shapiro, who claimed that Musk was unfairly called “some kind of crypto-Nazi.”
“Very often, anti-Semitism becomes a political football,” said Shapiro, who said many of Musk’s critics have failed to condemn anti-Semitism among anti-Israel protesters.
Ackman wrote that he agreed with Shapiro’s analysis. In recent weeks, Ackman has spoken out harshly against pro-Palestinian supporters who he believes have crossed the line into anti-Semitism.
The hedge fund manager also criticized diversity, equity and inclusion programs at Harvard University, his alma mater, accusing them for not representing Asians, Jews and conservative students.
It’s worth noting that Shapiro also condemned DEI programs in his video. “Nobody hates DEI more than me. There are certain liberal Jewish groups that support this kind of thing,” Shapiro said.
All this is happening in the context of a brutal war between Israel and Hamas in the wake of the Hamas terrorist attacks on October 7, which Israel says killed 1,200 people.
Gaza health authorities say more than 13,000 people – a majority who are women and children — died as a result of Israel’s military response, which included airstrikes and a total siege of the area.
The death toll and continuing accusations of war crimes and human rights abuses by both sides have sparked tensions around the world, with Islamophobia, anti-Semitism and extremist rhetoric coming to the forefront of public discourse.
