Julianna Margulies Apologizes After Saying Black Palestine Supporters Have Been ‘Brainwashed to Hate Jews’
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Julianna Margulies issued an apology a day after she garnered significant controversy for comments she made on a recent episode of podcast The Back Room with Andy Ostroy. During the interview, The Morning Show actress accused the Black and LGBTQ communities of not supporting Israel and suggested that people taking the side of Palestine have been “brainwashed.”
Marguilies didn’t specifically apologize for the claims themselves, but apologized for offending the Black and LGBTQ communities with her previous words.
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“I am horrified by the fact that statements I made on a recent podcast offended the Black and LGBTQIA+ communities, communities I truly love and respect,” Margulies said in a statement to Deadline on Friday. “I want to be 100% clear: Racism, homophobia, sexism, or any prejudice against anyone’s personal beliefs or identity are abhorrent to me, full stop. Throughout my career I have worked tirelessly to combat hate of all kind, end antisemitism, speak out against terrorist groups like Hamas, and forge a united front against discrimination. I did not intend for my words to sow further division, for which I am sincerely apologetic.”
Prior to the apology, Margulies told Ostroy she believed the current rise of antisemitism in the U.S. was boosted by former President Donald Trump when he legitimized the neo-Nazi protestors in Charlottesville in 2017. She added that she was saddened that Black and LGBTQ people were not supporting Israel when it retaliated following Hamas’ brutal attack on Oct. 7.
“I’m the first person to march [for] Black Lives Matter. When that happened to George Floyd, I put a black screen on my Instagram, like I ran to support my Black brothers and sisters,” Margulies said. “When LGBTQ people are being attacked, I run. I made a commercial for same-sex marriages with my husband in 2012. Like I am the first person to jump up when something is wrong, as I think most Jews are, because we have been persecuted from the beginning of time, not just World War II, but literally from the beginning of time when we first lived in Israel way before anybody else.”
Discussing the Civil Rights Movement, Margulies noted that “the Jews were the ones that walked side by side with the Blacks to fight for their rights. And now the Black community isn’t embracing us and saying ‘We stand with you the way you stood with us’? Jews died for their cause. Where’s the history lesson in that? Who’s teaching these kids? Because the fact that the entire Black community isn’t standing with us, to me, says they don’t know, or they’ve been brainwashed to hate Jews.”
Speaking about the current antisemitism in the U.S., Margulies suggested that it’s young people on college campuses who are driving the divide.
“It’s those kids who are spewing this antisemitic hate, that have no idea if they stepped foot in an Islamic country — these people who want us to call them they/them, or whatever they want us to call them, which I have respectfully made a point of doing — it’s those people that will be the first people beheaded and their heads played with like a soccer ball,” she said. “And that’s who they’re supporting? Terrorists who don’t want women to have their rights? LGBTQ people get executed.”
She then claimed that a “Black lesbian club” at Columbia University screened a film and “put signs up that said, ‘No Jews allowed.'”
“As someone who plays a lesbian journalist on The Morning Show, I am more offended by it as a lesbian than I am as a Jew,” she said. “Because I wanna say to them, ‘You fucking idiots. You don’t exist. You’re even lower than the Jews. A. You’re Black, and B. You’re gay and you’re turning your back against the people who support you?’ Because Jews, they rally around everybody.”
She later added, “Here’s what kills me. These kids are calling Jews colonialists. If you’re gonna go with that argument, kids, then get the fuck out of America. Because you were not here first. Native Americans were here first and you owe them a big fucking apology.”
Elsewhere in the interview the actress said she was “stunned by my industry” in terms of the lack of support for Jewish people.
“Can you imagine the WGA not putting out a statement after George Floyd?” she said. “And yet when it was the Jews. By the way, all of our great material on television is pretty much from the Jews. Like the fact they stayed silent until they feel were pressured.”
The podcast episode was initially posted on Nov. 21, but didn’t gain traction until yesterday when listeners began posting furious clips and reactions on social media. Margulies previously wrote an op-ed for USA Today titled “My non-Jewish friends, your silence on antisemitism is loud.”
This article was updated on Dec. 1, 2023 at 6:32 p.m. ET to include Julianna Margulies’ statement to Deadline.
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