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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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Israel to Send Delegation to Qatar for Gaza Ceasefire Talks
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a news conference in Jerusalem, Sept. 2, 2024. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS
Israel has decided to send a delegation to Qatar for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal, an Israeli official said, reviving hopes of a breakthrough in negotiations to end the almost 21-month war.
Palestinian group Hamas said on Friday it had responded to a US-backed Gaza ceasefire proposal in a “positive spirit,” a few days after US President Donald Trump said Israel had agreed “to the necessary conditions to finalize” a 60-day truce.
The Israeli negotiation delegation will fly to Qatar on Sunday, the Israeli official, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter, told Reuters.
But in a sign of the potential challenges still facing the two sides, a Palestinian official from a militant group allied with Hamas said concerns remained over humanitarian aid, passage through the Rafah crossing in southern Israel to Egypt and clarity over a timetable for Israeli troop withdrawals.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is due to meet Trump in Washington on Monday, has yet to comment on Trump’s announcement, and in their public statements Hamas and Israel remain far apart.
Netanyahu has repeatedly said Hamas must be disarmed, a position the terrorist group, which is thought to be holding 20 living hostages, has so far refused to discuss.
Israeli media said on Friday that Israel had received and was reviewing Hamas’ response to the ceasefire proposal.
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Tucker Carlson Says to Air Interview with President of Iran
Tucker Carlson speaks on July 18, 2024 during the final day of the Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Photo: Jasper Colt-USA TODAY via Reuters Connect
US conservative talk show host Tucker Carlson said in an online post on Saturday that he had conducted an interview with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, which would air in the next day or two.
Carlson said the interview was conducted remotely through a translator, and would be published as soon as it was edited, which “should be in a day or two.”
Carlson said he had stuck to simple questions in the interview, such as, “What is your goal? Do you seek war with the United States? Do you seek war with Israel?”
“There are all kinds of questions that I didn’t ask the president of Iran, particularly questions to which I knew I could get an not get an honest answer, such as, ‘was your nuclear program totally disabled by the bombing campaign by the US government a week and a half ago?’” he said.
Carlson also said he had made a third request in the past several months to interview Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who will be visiting Washington next week for talks with US President Donald Trump.
Trump said on Friday he would discuss Iran with Netanyahu at the White House on Monday.
Trump said he believed Tehran’s nuclear program had been set back permanently by recent US strikes that followed Israel’s attacks on the country last month, although Iran could restart it at a different location.
Trump also said Iran had not agreed to inspections of its nuclear program or to give up enriching uranium. He said he would not allow Tehran to resume its nuclear program, adding that Iran did want to meet with him.
Pezeshkian said last month Iran does not intend to develop nuclear weapons but will pursue its right to nuclear energy and research.
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Hostage Families Reject Partial Gaza Seal, Demand Release of All Hostages
Demonstrators hold signs and pictures of hostages, as relatives and supporters of Israeli hostages kidnapped during the Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Hamas protest demanding the release of all hostages in Tel Aviv, Israel, Feb. 13, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Itai Ron
i24 News – As Israeli leaders weigh the contours of a possible partial ceasefire deal with Hamas, the families of the 50 hostages still held in Gaza issued an impassioned public statement this weekend, condemning any agreement that would return only some of the abductees.
In a powerful message released Saturday, the Families Forum for the Return of Hostages denounced what they call the “beating system” and “cruel selection process,” which, they say, has left families trapped in unbearable uncertainty for 638 days—not knowing whether to hope for reunion or prepare for mourning.
The group warned that a phased or selective deal—rumored to be under discussion—would deepen their suffering and perpetuate injustice. Among the 50 hostages, 22 are believed to be alive, and 28 are presumed dead.
“Every family deserves answers and closure,” the Forum said. “Whether it is a return to embrace or a grave to mourn over—each is sacred.”
They accused the Israeli government of allowing political considerations to prevent a full agreement that could have brought all hostages—living and fallen—home long ago. “It is forbidden to conform to the dictates of Schindler-style lists,” the statement read, invoking a painful historical parallel.
“All of the abductees could have returned for rehabilitation or burial months ago, had the government chosen to act with courage.”
The call for a comprehensive deal comes just as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares for high-stakes talks in Washington and as indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas are expected to resume in Doha within the next 24 hours, according to regional media reports.
Hamas, for its part, issued a statement Friday confirming its readiness to begin immediate negotiations on the implementation of a ceasefire and hostage release framework.
The Forum emphasized that every day in captivity poses a mortal risk to the living hostages, and for the deceased, a danger of being lost forever. “The horror of selection does not spare any of us,” the statement said. “Enough with the separation and categories that deepen the pain of the families.”
In a planned public address near Begin Gate in Tel Aviv, families are gathering Saturday evening to demand that the Israeli government accept a full-release deal—what they describe as the only “moral and Zionist” path forward.
“We will return. We will avenge,” the Forum concluded. “This is the time to complete the mission.”
As of now, the Israeli government has not formally responded to Hamas’s latest statement.
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