Hollywood Elite, Nobel Peace Prize Laureates Slam Israel over Conflict with Gaza

PARIS, FRANCE - FEBRUARY 26: (EDITORIAL USE ONLY) (L to R) Gigi Hadid and Bella Hadid atte
Pascal Le Segretain/Getty

Actors, popstars and Nobel Prize laureates have taken to social media to accuse Israel of “apartheid” and “crimes against humanity” for defending itself against the rocket barrage it faces from the Hamas terror group in Gaza.

Supermodel Gigi Hadid, whose father is Palestinian, wrote on Instagram to her 66 million followers: “One cannot advocate for racial equality, LGBT & women’s rights, condemn corrupt & abusive regimes and other injustices yet choose to ignore the Palestinian oppression.”

Her sister, Bella, posted to her 41 million followers a cartoon of two women talking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. One of the women asks, “So aren’t Israelis and Palestinians just fighting over religion?” to which the other woman responds: “They are not ‘fighting,’ Israelis are the oppressors and Palestinians are the oppressed and the situation is about anything but religion.”

The Nobel Peace Prize-winning Malala expressed her “solidarity” with the Palestinians and called Israel’s actions a crime against humanity.

“After decades of oppression against Palestinians, we cannot deny the asymmetry of power and the brutality from Israeli airstrikes on women and children in Gaza,” she said.

Lena Headey, the British actor best known for her role as Cersei Lannister on “Game of Thrones,” retweeted multiple posts from an anti-Zionist writer including one with a picture of a boy holding a Palestinian flag and the accompanying text, “Zionist Israeli Apartheid”.

Another read: “This is not a Jewish state but an apartheid Zionist regime … this is a colonisation of ethnic cleansing upon an oppressed and imprisoned group of people.”

Actor Mark Ruffalo tweeted: “1500 Palestinians face expulsion in #Jerusalem. 200 protesters have been injured. 9 children have been killed. Sanctions on South Africa helped free its black people – it’s time for sanctions on Israel to free Palestinians. Join the call.”

Popstars including BDS overlord Roger Waters and Dua Lipa — who is dating the Hadids’ younger brother, Anwar — also posted anti-Israel posts. Halsey tweeted: “It is not ‘too complicated to understand’ that brown children are being murdered + people are being displaced under the occupation of one of the most powerful armies in the world. It is willful ignorance to conflate these simple horrors with religion + geopolitics.”

Malik, an actress and comedian who has starred in over a dozen Pakistani and Bollywood films, posted a series of tweets Tuesday celebrating the terror directed against Israel — including one that quoted Hitler as saying: “I would have killed all the Jews of the world … but I kept some to show the world why I killed them.”

According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Malik also tweeted “#IronDome is doomed” with a laughing emoji, in an apparent reference to the fact Israel’s missile defense system has been overwhelmed by rockets fired from Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The tweets had been taken down as of Wednesday, the report said.

Trevor Noah, who was only slightly more nuanced, devoted nearly ten minutes on the “The Daily Show” to talking about it. “If you start from ‘Israel fired rockets into Gaza,’ well then Israel is the bad guy … but then you take a step back in time and you go, ‘Well Hamas fired rockets at Israel,’ then Hamas is the bad guy.” Noah went on in this fashion until he reached the 1948 war.

One of the sole voices to express support for Israel, while not outrightly condemning Hamas was Israeli-born actress Gal Gadot, most famous for her role as Wonder Woman. Still, Gadot did not issue an outright condemnation of Hamas but is nevertheless facing an outcry for her relatively neutral post.

“My heart breaks,” she wrote in a post shared on Twitter and Instagram. “My country is at war. I worry for my family, my friends. I worry for my people. This is a vicious cycle that has been going on for far too long. Israel deserves to live as a free and safe nation, our neighbors deserve the same. I pray for the victims and their families, I pray for this unimaginable hostility to end, I pray for our leaders to find the solution so we can live side by side in peace. I pray for better days.”

Despite blocking comments on both social media platforms, the post garnered close to 130,000 quote tweets which in turn sparked a firestorm.

“Gal Gadot is wrong. Israel is not at ‘war’ with Palestine. Israel is butchering Palestine. Again,” tweeted musician James Kennedy. “Israeli soldier turned Hollywood’s Wonder Woman multimillionaire Gal Gadot sends meaningless thoughts and prayers as the Israeli apartheid regime she supports ethnically cleanses Palestinians and bombs Gazans in an open-air prison camp.”

“Reminder Gal Gadot served in the IDF for two years where she not only witnessed the ethnic cleansing of Palestine firsthand but also actively supported it,” wrote another user. “How can you advocate to stop the vicious cycle of terror when you are standing on the frontlines enabling it #FreePalestine.”

Gadot’s army service, as that of all Israelis, was mandatory.

The tweets come as rockets from the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip continue to rain down on Israel, prompting retaliatory strikes by the Israeli military. Thursday afternoon saw a fresh barrage of more than 100 rockets launched at Tel Aviv and other cities in the center of the country.

The Iron Dome missile defense system intercepted about 90 percent of the Gaza-launched rockets targeting population centers in Israel.

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