Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended Elon Musk after the media described a gesture the Tesla CEO made at President Donald Trump’s inauguration rally on Monday as a Nazi salute.
Netanyahu took X on Thursday to announce that Musk had been “falsely disparaged.”
“Elon is a great friend of Israel,” said the prime minister. “He visited Israel after the October 7th massacre in which Hamas terrorists committed the worst crime against the Jewish people since the Holocaust. Since then, he has repeatedly and strongly supported Israel’s right to defend itself against genocidal terrorists and regimes that seek to destroy the one and only Jewish state.”
Netanyahu then thanked Musk for his support.
MEDIA ACCUSES ELON MUSK OF ‘FASCIST SALUTE’ AT TRUMP’S INAUGURAL MEETING
Musk made the gesture in question while speaking to a crowd of MAGA faithful at the Capital One Arena in Washington, DC
Elon Musk arrives on Monday, January 20, 2025, to speak at the closed inauguration parade in Washington. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
“This is what victory feels like! And this was no ordinary victory, this was a fork in the road for human civilization… I just want to say thank you for doing this, thank you. From my heart to yours,” Musk gushed. as he placed his hand over his own heart and extended his hand to the audience.
The PBS News Hour ran a post on X saying the Tesla CEO “gave what appeared to be a fascist salute,” while the Jerusalem Post wrote, “American billionaire Elon Musk appeared to give a Heil Hitler salute at Trump’s Washington parade Monday, after Trump’s inauguration.”
CNN anchor Erin Burnett played a clip of the gesture and called it a “weird greeting.”
ELON MUSK JOINS TRUMP AT DC GATHERING: ‘REJOYING A LOT OF CHANGES’
Musk addressed the controversy Wednesday on X, which he owns, writing, “Radical leftists are really upset that they had to take time out of their busy day praising Hamas to call me a Nazi.”
Musk mocked the reports in another post on X on Thursday.
“Don’t say Hess to Nazi accusations! Some people will downplay Goebbels! Stop Gőring your enemies! His pronouns would be He/Himmler! I bet you did that to the Nazis,” Musk wrote, adding a crying and laughing emoticon.
The Anti-Defamation League also defended Musk in a statement saying that a tech billionaire made “an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm rather than a Nazi salute”.
CLICK TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
“At this point, all sides should give each other some grace, maybe even give each other the benefit of the doubt and breathe a sigh of relief,” the statement said.
Fox News Digital’s David Spector contributed to this report.
