Israel’s Netanyahu Says Musk “Unfairly Smeared” for Salute Embraced by Neo-Nazis

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has come to Elon Musk’s defense after the billionaire performed a salute at Donald Trump’s inauguration that is being widely celebrated by neo-Nazis as a Nazi salute.

In a post on social media, Netanyahu said that Musk is being “falsely smeared” and suggested that Musk’s support of Israel is proof that he isn’t antisemitic — even as numerous Jewish and anti-hate groups and observers have said that Musk’s now-infamous salute was clearly a Nazi salute.

“Elon is a great friend of Israel,” Netanyahu wrote. “He visited Israel after the October 7 massacre in which Hamas terrorists committed the worst atrocity against the Jewish people since the Holocaust. He has since repeatedly and forcefully supported Israel’s right to defend itself against genocidal terrorists and regimes who seek to annihilate the one and only Jewish state.”

“I thank him for this,” Netanyahu concluded.

Like Musk’s salute, Netanyahu’s statement immediately drew backlash, with critics saying that the Israeli leader’s embrace of Musk demonstrates that his top priority is not fighting antisemitism, but continuing Israel’s colonization of Palestine.

“Elon Musk saluted a Sieg Heil — evoking fear for millions and broadcasting hate and violence, not only for Jews, but for many others,” said Jewish Voice for Peace in reaction to Netanyahu’s post.

“But for the Israeli government, all that matters is that Musk supports its Jewish supremacist project of apartheid and ongoing genocide against Palestinians,” the group went on. “The Israeli alliance with fascists and Nazis across the globe is the inevitable direction of a violent apartheid state that manipulates the history of Jewish people in order to carry out ethnic cleansing.”

Indeed, many experts have said that Musk’s salute — which he performed twice in a row — was unambiguously a Nazi gesture. Neo-Nazis expressed excitement about the salute, celebrating it as a major win within neo-Nazi and white supremacist networks.

Meanwhile, the fiercely pro-Israel Anti-Defamation League (ADL), which brands itself as an antisemitism watchdog, has defended Musk, saying the salute was merely an “awkward gesture.”

The ADL has defended Musk before, when he has levied attacks against the movement for Palestinian rights. In the early months of the Gaza genocide, ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt praised Musk when he decided to censor pro-Palestinian terms and the word “decolonization” on X. “I appreciate this leadership in fighting hate,” Greenblatt said.

Greenblatt’s statement came just days after Musk had endorsed virulently antisemitic conspiracy theories, including the long-debunked, white supremacist “great replacement” theory.

For years, progressives have denounced Musk for espousing antisemitic and hateful views. Recently, he endorsed the far right, neo-Nazi German political party Alternative for Germany, whose party leaders have minimized or denied the Holocaust, among other antisemitic acts.

Indeed, amid the backlash to his salute, Musk made yet more antisemitic statements on Thursday, this time posting crass jokes making light of the Holocaust.

“Don’t say Hess to Nazi accusations! Some people will Goebbels anything down! Stop Gőring your enemies! His pronouns would’ve been He/Himmler! Bet you did nazi that coming,” Musk wrote in a post on X, adding a laughing emoji.

This time, Greenblatt condemned Musk, saying, “We’ve said it hundreds of times before and we will say it again: the Holocaust was a singularly evil event, and it is inappropriate and offensive to make light of it. @elonmusk, the Holocaust is not a joke.”