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Candace Owens Slams ‘Zionist Media Empire’ After Being Denied Visa to Australia for Comments About Jews, Holocaust
Political activist Candace Owens in the spin room at the Fiserv Forum following the first Republican presidential primary debate in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on Aug. 23, 2023. Photo: Chris Dilts/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Far-right American political commentator and content creator Candace Owens addressed Australia’s decision to deny her a visa and ban her from entering the country in Tuesday’s episode of her podcast “Candace.”
Australia’s Immigration Minister Tony Burke canceled Owens’s visa this past weekend, which prevents her from doing five live speaking events scheduled for November in Australia and New Zealand. Owens, 35, was expected to have her first ever Australia and New Zealand tour, with stops in Sydney, Perth, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, and Auckland. Speaking to a local news outlet, Burke said he made the decision to deny Owens a visa because she has the “capacity to incite discord in almost every direction.”
“From downplaying the impact of the Holocaust with comments about [Nazi doctor and war criminal Josef] Mengele through to claims that Muslims started slavery, Candace Owens has the capacity to incite discord in almost every direction,” Burke said. “Australia’s national interest is best served when Candace Owens is somewhere else.”
Owens and organizers of her speaking tour in Australia will be filing a legal appeal to a federal judge in response to Burke’s decision.
The “Candace” podcast host described Burke’s move as a “petty act of vandalism” on Tuesday and partially attributed his decision to the alleged influence of the global “Zionist media empire.”
“What you are seeing really take shape is that people don’t want me to get in front of an audience,” she added. “We all know what actually happened in Australia, [which is] really the story of me and this year: that I am not comfortable with the amount of death that is taking place in Palestine.”
“And the Zionist media empire is very powerful all around the world and they essentially say, ‘If you do not count out or at least stay mum, so you gotta be out there pretending that you don’t see all the Palestinian children being blown up and killed. You can choose silence or you can choose support,’” Owens continued. “But you cannot be reasonable and say, ‘I’m not OK or comfortable with that amount of death’ – and that’s where I’m at. I’ve made my bed and I’ve chosen to lie in it.”
Owens has made a series of antisemitic and controversial comments about Israel, Jews, and the Holocaust on social media and her podcast, as well as in interviews. She has downplayed the atrocities of the Holocaust and said medical experiments by Mengele performed on Jews during World War II sounded “like bizarre propaganda.” She has also said she believes the Star of David originated from an evil pagan deity and claimed the US “is being held hostage by Israel.”
Owens has also suggested Israel was behind the assassination of former US President John F Kennedy and called Judaism a “pedophile-centric religion that believes in demons … child sacrifice,” according to the Anti-Defamation League. She has promoted antisemitic conspiracy theories about Jews and Zionists and in September falsely claimed that Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the late spiritual leader of the Jewish Chabad-Lubavitch movement who was also known as the Lubavitcher Rebbe, “preached Jewish supremacism.”
Burke made it clear that he would reject Owens’s application for a visa even before she applied for one. He said in August, “tickets to these events are selling for $100. I hope she has a good refund policy. There hasn’t been an application for a visa, but if there is, the brief will come to me personally. My opposition to antisemitism and Islamophobia has always been on the record. I have clear legal powers to knock back a visa to anyone who would incite discord.”
During Tuesday’s episode of her podcast, Owens denied Burke’s claims about her inciting “discord” and said “of course it’s not true.”
“Nothing said is true … All of this is just to make a statement to try to present me as some very scary person akin to Adolf Hitler and we’ve seen this before,” she claimed. She then talked about being penalized for not staying silent about how the ongoing Israel-Hamas war is affecting Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
“The determined punishment for me for not turning a blind eye to this, for not being a coward and pretending that I just don’t see it, has been harassment; has been that I’m going to take away your money, and I’m going to ruin your reputation and I’m going to have journalists who are Zionists try to assassinate your character online,” she said. “I have accepted that because I think that is a way easier punishment to accept than what these [Palestinian] children are accepting on a daily basis.”
The post Candace Owens Slams ‘Zionist Media Empire’ After Being Denied Visa to Australia for Comments About Jews, Holocaust first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.