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The exhausting, never-ending job of debunking antisemitic conspiracy theories
(JTA) — A few days after the comedian Dave Chappelle appeared to justify the never-ending appeal of Jewish conspiracy theories, this sentence appeared in the New York Times: “Bankman-Fried is already drawing comparisons to Bernie Madoff.”
I’ll explain: Sam Bankman-Fried is the 30-year-old founder of FTX, the crypto-currency exchange that vaporized overnight, leaving more than 1 million creditors on the hook. Bernie Madoff, is, of course, Bernie Madoff, the financier who defrauded thousands of investors through a multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme and died in prison.
It’s a fair comparison, as a former regulator tells CNN: “Bankman-Fried, like Madoff, proved adept at using his pedigree and connections to seduce sophisticated investors and regulators into missing ‘red flags,’ hiding in plain sight.”
Nevertheless, seeing these Jewish figures lumped together, I braced myself for the inevitable: Nasty tweets about Jews and money. Slander from white supremacists. Plausibly deniable chin-scratching from more “mainstream” commentators.
What comes next is a familiar script: Jewish defense groups issue statements saying conspiracy theories traffic in centuries-old antisemitic tropes and pose a danger to the Jews. Jewish news outlets like ours post “explainers” describing how these myths take hold.
It’s exhausting, having to deny the obvious: that a group of people who don’t even agree on what kind of starch to eat on Passover regularly scheme to bilk innocents, manipulate markets or control the world. And it often seems the very attempt to explain these lies and their popularity ends up feeding the beast.
Chappelle’s now notorious monologue on “Saturday Night Live” is a case in point. At first pass, it is a characteristically mischievous attempt to both mock the rapper Kanye West for his antisemitism, and to push boundaries to explain why a troubled Black entertainer might feel aggrieved in an industry with a historic over-representation of Jews. Jon Stewart certainly heard it that way, telling Stephen Colbert, “Look at it from a Black perspective. It’s a culture that feels that its wealth has been extracted by different groups. That’s the feeling in that community, and if you don’t understand where it’s coming from, then you can’t deal with it.”
That is a useful message, but consider the messenger. Chappelle appears to disapprove of West’s conspiracy-mongering, but never once discusses the harm it might cause to the actual targets of the conspiracies. Instead, he focuses on the threat such ideas pose to the careers and reputations of entertainers like him and West. The “delusion that Jews run show business,” said Chappelle, is “not a crazy thing to think,” but “it’s a crazy thing to say out loud.” He ends the routine by ominously invoking the “they” who might end his career.
That’s what critics meant when they said Chappelle “normalized” antisemitism: He described where it’s coming from, explained why his peers might feel that way, and only criticized it to the degree that it could lead the purveyors to be cancelled. It’s like saying, “You don’t have to vaccinate your kids. Just don’t tell anybody.”
This week I worked with a colleague on an article about how the “Jews control Hollywood” myth took hold, and at each step of the way I wondered if we were stoking the fire we were trying to put out. No, Jews don’t control Hollywood, we reported, but “nearly every major movie studio was founded in the early 20th century” by a Jew. Those moguls rarely used the movies as a platform to defend Jewish interests, but per Steven Spielberg, “Being Jewish in Hollywood is like wanting to be in the popular circle.”
A documentary shown Thursday night at the DOC NYC festival here in New York teeters on the edge of the same trap. “The Conspiracy,” directed by the Russian-American filmmaker Maxim Pozdorovkin and narrated by Mayim Bialik, uses 3-D animation to explain how conspiracists ranging from a 19th-century French priest to American industrialist Henry Ford placed three Jews — German financier Max Warburg, Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky and falsely accused French soldier Alfred Dreyfus — at the center of a vast, contradictory and preposterous scheme to take over the world. It connects age-old Christian animosity to the Jews to centuries of antisemitic paranoia and fear-mongering that led to unspeakable violence at Kishinev, Auschwitz and Pittsburgh. “This myth has plagued the world for centuries,” Pozdorovkin explains.
Or at least that’s the message you and I might have gotten. But I can also see someone stumbling on this film and being seduced by the rage and cynicism of the conspiracy-mongers — who, I should note, are quoted at length. Part of the problem is the film’s aesthetic: a consistently dark palette and a “camera” that lingers on ugly examples of antisemitic propaganda. Even though these images are seen on a creepy “conspiracy wall” and connected with that red thread familiar from cop shows and horror films, I can well imagine an uninformed viewer asking why members of this tiny minority seem to be at the center of so many major events of the 19th and 20th centuries.
I was reminded of a joke by the Jewish comedian Modi, ridiculing the ritual of inviting celebrities accused of antisemitism to visit a Holocaust museum. “Which is the stupidest idea, ever,” he says. “You’re taking someone who hates Jews into a Holocaust museum. They come out of there [saying] ‘Wow! Oh my God, that was amazing! I want a T-shirt!’”
The poet and essayist Clint Smith, whose cover story in next month’s Atlantic explores the meanings of Holocaust museums in Germany, makes a similar point. After visiting the museum in Wannsee documenting the infamous meeting in which the Nazis plotted the Final Solution, he wonders: “Might someone come to a museum like this and be inspired by what they saw?”
The makers of “The Conspiracy” (oy, that title) obviously intend the very opposite. In an interview with the Forward, Pozdorovkin agrees with the interviewer’s suggestion that those “who most need to see this film might be the least likely to be convinced by it.”
“My hope is that this film has a trickle-down effect,” he explains.
The fault lies not with those who seek to expose antisemitism but with a society that relies on the victims to explain why they shouldn’t be victimized. As many have pointed out, antisemitism isn’t a Jewish problem; it’s a problem for the individuals and societies who pin their unhappiness and neuroses on a convenient scapegoat. Ultra-nationalism and intolerance are the soil in which conspiracies take root.
But as long as scapegoating remains popular and deadly, the victims have to keep explaining and explaining the obvious — that, for instance, the fact that Sam Bankman-Fried and Bernie Madoff are Jewish is no more significant than the fact that Henry Ford and Elon Musk, two people who founded car companies, are gentiles.
The question is, who is listening?
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The post The exhausting, never-ending job of debunking antisemitic conspiracy theories appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Federal Funding for Trump’s Ballroom in Jeopardy After Senate Ruling
Aerial view from the top of the Washington Monument shows construction crews as they continue site preparation for a planned White House ballroom in the area of the former East Wing in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 2, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Ken Cedeno
A US Senate official on Saturday removed security funding that could be used for President Donald Trump’s planned White House ballroom from a massive spending package, Democratic lawmakers said, imperiling Republican efforts to devote taxpayer money to the contentious project.
The decision by the Senate’s parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, deals a blow to Trump and his administration, which has sought the money for security purposes related to the ballroom.
Trump has said the construction of the ballroom would be funded by $400 million in private donations. But Senate Republicans are seeking $1 billion in taxpayer funding to the Secret Service for security upgrades to the ballroom and other structures being built beneath it.
FRIVOLOUS DIVERSION OR NECESSARY MODERNIZATION?
Democrats have criticized the ballroom as an expensive and frivolous diversion by Trump at a time when Americans face rising costs such as higher fuel prices. Trump, a real estate developer-turned-politician, has written on social media that it will be “the finest Building of its kind anywhere in the World.”
MacDonough ruled that the security funding provision falls under chamber rules that require 60 votes to pass most legislation, according to the office of Senator Jeff Merkley, the top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee.
Republicans hold a 53-47 majority in the Senate.
The parliamentarian interprets Senate rules, including whether legislative provisions are permitted. Republican senators still could revise the legislation to try to gain the parliamentarian’s approval.
Ryan Wrasse, spokesman for Senate Majority Leader John Thune, said in a social media post that Republicans would keep trying. “Redraft. Refine. Resubmit,” Wrasse wrote on X.
If Republicans do not succeed, they may be unable to include the ballroom-related funding in a $72 billion spending package they plan to bring to a vote on the Senate floor, with passage expected on a party-line vote with Democrats opposed. The bulk of the legislation is devoted to immigration enforcement.
Republicans have been invoking complex budget rules to try to secure passage without any Democratic support.
“While we expect Republicans to change this bill to appease Trump, Democrats are prepared to challenge any change to this bill,” Merkley said in a statement.
Democrats have opposed funding for Trump’s signature immigration crackdown absent reforms they have sought since federal immigration agents killed US citizens in separate incidents in Minnesota in January.
Republicans have said federal funding for ballroom security is needed to ensure presidential safety, citing an April incident in which an alleged gunman is accused of storming a black-tie media gala in Washington that Trump attended.
The administration has said the ballroom will modernize infrastructure, bolster security and ease strain on the White House, which often relies on temporary outdoor structures to host large events. Trump has said the ballroom will be completed around September 2028, near the end of his second term in office.
Democrats, hoping to win control of Congress in November’s midterm elections, are seizing on Republican support of the ballroom to portray Trump’s party as out of touch with the cost-of-living concerns of Americans at a time of rising energy costs driven by the Iran war he and Israel launched in February.
Trump last year ordered the demolition of the White House’s East Wing – constructed in 1902 during Theodore Roosevelt’s presidency and expanded four decades later during Franklin Roosevelt’s presidency – to make way for his ballroom.
The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a nonprofit organization, filed a lawsuit challenging the project, arguing that neither the president nor the National Park Service, which manages the White House grounds, possessed the authority to tear down the historic structure or erect a major new facility without explicit congressional approval.
A US appeals court in April allowed construction to continue after the judge handling the National Trust lawsuit issued an order halting the project.
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Bulgaria Wins Eurovision Song Contest, Israel Comes Second Again
Noam Bettan, representing Israel, performs “Michelle” during the Grand Final of the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna, Austria, May 16, 2026. REUTERS/Lisa Leutner
Bulgaria won the Eurovision Song Contest for the first time on Saturday in a final overshadowed by five countries’ boycott over Gaza, claiming a dramatic victory despite another big public vote for Israel that again secured it second place.
The garish and usually good-natured competition involving pop acts from countries across Europe and beyond, now in its 70th year, was plunged into crisis by a dispute over Israel’s military offensive in Gaza, a response to the Hamas-led attack on October 7, 2023.
The public broadcasters of heavyweights Spain, the Netherlands and Ireland, as well as Iceland and Slovenia, chose not to take part in protest at Israel’s participation.
Israel has alleged a global smear campaign against it. Its performance at the final was not, however, marred by any obvious protests, unlike Tuesday’s semi-final.
“This is unbelievable. I don’t even know what’s going on right now,” Bulgaria’s entrant Dara told a press conference after winning with her thumping, crowd-pleasing dance track “Bangaranga” that avoided politics altogether.
The song touches on themes of empowerment and surrendering to the night. It also left many puzzled as to its meaning.
“Bangaranga is a feeling that everybody gets in themselves. It’s the moment that you choose to be in love and not fear,” Dara said when asked to explain the song in the “green room” where artists await the results.
“This is a special energy… Once you feel (at) one with nature and your universe, you feel the harmony that you can be whatever you want to be and that everything is possible,” she said.
BOOS WERE HEARD AT ISRAEL’S RESULT
Israel’s effort, trilingual love song “Michelle,” stirred less controversy than its entry last year, which was sung by a survivor of the October 7 attack.
Some booing from the audience was audible when Israel’s massive points haul from the public vote sent it surging up the table from eighth place, similarly to 2025, when it also finished second but much closer to the winner than this year.
Israeli public broadcaster KAN received a formal warning from organizers a week ago over videos posted online in which Bettan courted votes too aggressively, after a similar controversy involving Israel last year.
KAN said it plays by the rules and the videos were immediately taken down.
Finland’s entry, “Liekinheitin,” or Flamethrower, a love song in Finnish featuring violinist Linda Lampenius and pop singer Pete Parkkonen on a burning set, was the favorite this year, followed by Australia’s “Eclipse,” a celestially themed love ballad sung by national pop star Delta Goodrem.
In the end, Australia came fourth and Finland sixth.
ONLY MINOR PROTESTS IN VIENNA
The boycotts cut the number of contest entries to 35, the fewest since 2003, which will almost certainly have reduced the global television viewership of an event that last year was estimated at 166 million people, more than the Super Bowl’s 128 million.
The mood in the Austrian capital has been subdued, with protests over Israel’s participation drawing only small crowds. Police anticipated “blockades and disruption attempts” on Saturday that did not materialize.
There was a brief disruption during Tuesday’s semi-final, when one protester chanted “Stop, stop the genocide” and “Free, free Palestine” within range of a television microphone and was ejected along with three others for disrupting the show.
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Israel’s Economy Shrinks in First Quarter but Seen Rebounding After Iran War
People sit at an outdoor restaurant where Israeli flags are displayed, amid the ongoing conflict between Hamas and Israel, in Tel Aviv, Israel, July 12, 2024. REUTERS/Eloisa Lopez
Israel’s economy began 2026 with a slowdown, hit by war with Iran, but growth is expected to recover as long as the conflict does not reignite.
Gross domestic product contracted at an annualized rate of 3.3 percent in the first three months of 2026, the Central Bureau of Statistics said on Sunday, less severe than a 4 percent drop forecast in a Reuters poll of economists.
Israel’s economy grew 2.9 percent in 2025 and was expected to bounce back in 2026 to more than 5 percent growth after a ceasefire in October ended major fighting in the two-year Gaza war.
But growth took a hit after the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran on February 28, resulting in weeks of ballistic missile fire from Iran that closed schools and dampened business activity along with consumer spending.
“The Israeli economy began the year with strong momentum, with rapid growth in the first two months,” said Ofer Klein, head of economics and research at Harel Insurance and Finance.
“The lifting of most restrictions in April and the improvement in economic activity since then… indicate a relatively quick return to positive growth in the current quarter,” said Klein, who raised his growth estimate for this year to 3.5 percent from 3.2 percent.
The Bank of Israel sees 3.8 percent growth this year, down from a 5.2 percent estimate before the Iran war, depending on whether a ceasefire with Iran holds.
Jonathan Katz, chief economist at Leader Capital Markets, said he expected 4 percent growth.
“This is a modest GDP contraction compared to the second quarter of 2025 – the last Iran confrontation in June of 2025 – when GDP contracted by over 10 percent,” he said, adding that industrial exports bounced back in April.
The statistics bureau reported on Friday that the annual inflation rate held steady at 1.9 percent in April. Some economists believe interest rate reductions could resume as early as May 25, the Bank of Israel’s next rate decision meeting.
Israeli financial markets do not trade on Sunday. The shekel has appreciated 20 percent in the past year to 2.91 per dollar, a 33-year high. Tel Aviv share indices are close to all-time highs reached earlier in May.
In the first quarter, consumer spending fell 4.7 percent, exports declined 3.7 percent and government spending shed 4.8 percent. Investment in fixed assets rose 12.6 percent.
On a per capita basis, the economy shrank 4.5 percent in the quarter.