Progressives are trying to stop a merger of Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery. They claim it will cost jobs and create a monopoly, but they're mostly opposed to the owner of Paramount, the son of Oracle founder and Donald Trump donor Larry Ellison, being in control of the new company. Warner Bros. Discovery is the parent company of CNN, and they're afraid it will go the way of Fox News.
Actor and progressive activist Mark Ruffalo wrote a screed against the merger, claiming that Oracle is secretly working on some project with Israel to assist the IDF and was complicit in Palestinian "genocide." Paramount fired back with a statement accusing Ruffalo of relying on "antisemitic tropes." "Words like ‘genocide’ and ‘apartheid,’ applied to a corporate transaction, aren’t just wrong — they’re a bridge too far, and they cheapen the very real suffering those words are meant to describe. This doesn't deserve a response in kind — and to be clear, we don’t tolerate prejudice of any kind, against anyone," the statement began.
"The accusation that I am antisemitic is appalling and fundamentally dishonest," Ruffalo replied on X, noting that "everything I know about acting, activism, and humanism has been profoundly shaped by the Jewish friends, colleagues, and loved ones who have been integral and family throughout every point of my life." In other words, he has Jewish friends.
Variety reports that more than 170 Jewish entertainment industry figures have come to his defense.
Mark Ruffalo is being defended by more than 170 Jewish entertainment figures in a new open letter rejecting Paramount's claim that Ruffalo fueled “antisemitic tropes”:“The time is over for spurious charges of antisemitism to be trotted out, this time in the defense of war,… pic.twitter.com/tlBeYK7UJA
… oligarchy, and AI domination. That tired playbook has run its course. We stand proudly with Mark Ruffalo, and with all decent people who are bravely rising and speaking truth to power.”
Supporters include Hannah Einbinder, Joel Coen, Todd Haynes, Ilana Glazer, Tony Kushner, Emma Seligman, Jane Schoenbrun and Wallace Shawn.
The letter follows a heated week in which Ruffalo has been at the center of a growing confrontation over the Paramount-Warner Bros. merger. In a social media post on Aug. 21, the Marvel star attacked the deal over its potential consequences for Hollywood and accused the Ellison family of being complicit in the “genocide” against Palestinians, which he said “was built on an apartheid system of oppression powered by Oracle.” In the post, he highlighted Oracle’s ties to the Israeli military.
“Pointing out the crucial connections between what is happening in Gaza and what is happening in Hollywood is the exact opposite of antisemitism. It is, for us, the very essence of Jewish ethical duty," reads the open letter defending Ruffalo. "According to a recent Washington Post poll, 61% of American Jews now agree that Israel is committing war crimes in Gaza; and four in ten even agree that these crimes amount to genocide. Do those attacking Mark Ruffalo as an antisemite seriously believe that all these American Jews are antisemites too? Or that we don’t see the connection between, on the one hand, the criminal impunities that have led the US and Israel into unending disaster and, on the other, the oligarchic powerplays of the Musks, Ellisons, Thiels and others who are working to dismantle our democracy?”
170 figures but no writers, I take it https://t.co/UjmAwn5hFK pic.twitter.com/EBjEdHFh2a
Mark Goldfeder is the director of the National Jewish Advocacy Center and responded with a thread.
Dear @Variety,The letter claims to defend @MarkRuffalo from the charge that his campaign against Paramount is really about Israel.Its defense, remarkably, is to explain at length that the campaign is really about Israel.Five failures. Any one should be fatal. Let me explain: https://t.co/rGn7tZGKqU
First, the letter concedes the central factual predicate.It lists ordinary antitrust concerns—jobs, consolidation, competition—and then pivots:“BUT it will do all this and more as part of a larger project…”That “but” is doing heroic amounts of work.
The antitrust case is expressly subordinated to a "larger project" involving Gaza, Israel, Tony Blair, TikTok and Palestine.Ruffalo’s defenders were trying to prove the campaign wasn’t about Israel.Instead, they supplied 800 words explaining why it was.Thanks for the honesty!
Second, the letter never answers the actual accusation.The accusation is not: “Criticizing Israel is antisemitic.”It is that the campaign against the merger targeted particular Jewish businessmen because of their support for Israel, and may have enlisted state power to help.
