Hen Mazzig
@HenMazzig · Pro-Israel advocacy & explainers
Hen Mazzig is a senior fellow at the Tel Aviv Institute and one of the most effective pro-Israel explainer accounts in English, drawing on his Mizrahi family story and IDF service.
Turkey 🇹🇷 has cancelled upcoming concerts for French singer Emma Shapplin because of her support for Israel 🇮🇱. The truly awful crimes she is accused of are performing in Israel and expressing horror and sympathy after the October 7th massacres. Now the people of Turkey can sleep soundly at night, knowing they are safe from anyone with empathy being given a platform. And if it wasn't obvious, I'm being sarcastic.
I mean, that's not what you said, but fine. Let's engage with your argument. You are saying that it is America's actions that caused 9/11. It isn't that Osama Bin Laden was a jihadist terrorist, it was that he was reacting to America's actions in a way so natural that you can't even blame him for it. Had America acted differently, it wouldn't have happened at all. So, to put it simply, you think America deserved 9/11. Your inability to attribute malice or blame to the men who sought to kill civilians is why people think you think America deserved 9/11.
Israel's Oscar submission is in! 🇮🇱🏆📽️ "Tell Me Everything" has won Israel's Ophir Award for Best Picture, officially making it the country's submission for Best International Feature at the Oscars. The film takes place in the 1980s during the HIV epidemic. Directed by Moshe Rosenthal, "Tell Me Everything" premiered at Sundance in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition.
Who controls Hollywood? A play in four acts Act I September 1: Hebrew media reports that Malkovich will come to perform in Israel. Act II September 3: Malkovich gets a 14-minute ovation in Venice. Critics say he might be getting an Oscar for it. Act III September 5: The Jerusalem Post published its first article in English quoting an Israeli promoter's PR firm announcing his Tel Aviv show, citing his "solidarity" with Israelis. Sep 6-7: I can only imagine the conversations with his management about the Oscars, which is traditionally given to anti-Israel celebrities, filmmakers, and anti-Israel movies. ACT IV Sept 8: Malkovich cancels his show in Israel. He says the quote was fabricated. Then he goes further: he doesn't stand in solidarity with anyone; he's against violence and terrorism, and he supports everyone. Malkovich has performed in Israel three times and opposes boycotts. I doubt that he discovered the quote on Sept 8. What we know for sure is that he discovered he was an Oscar contender on Sept 3. The PR firm invented an out for him. He took it.
Amberly Thay, a student at Exeter University, is the target of antisemitic abuse, despite not being Jewish. She became a regional ambassador for the Holocaust Educational Trust charity after a high school trip to Auschwitz. Following a Holocaust Remembrance Day event at the Israeli ambassador’s residence in London, she began receiving online messages of abuse, calling her a “mossad agent” and a “mouthpiece for Israel”. Amberly chose to be an ally despite her background. The hate she receives just proves why remembering the Holocaust is so crucial.
This person is trying to portray Sarah Michelle Gellar as a terrible person. Their evidence consisted of a post by Sarah, expressing solidarity with Israel after the October 7 attacks. I don't think recognizing the humanity of a situation makes someone "terrible". https://t.co/H5fLKXpbNo
Ha'aretz reported that Hamas immediately went to Qatar and said they'd release all the hostages for nothing. Now, if you have any sense in your head, you might realize that this is idiotic. Why go through all the trouble of kidnapping people from hostile territory if you aren't planning to use them as pawns in negotiation? And it wouldn't have been a sign of goodwill to start the negotiations. A sign of goodwill would be not slaughtering, raping, and kidnapping innocent civilians in the first place. And for those who didn't immediately realize how stupid this claim is, Antony Blinken, US Secretary of State at the time of Oct 7th, who partook in a lot of negotiations and who has criticized Netanyahu’s government before, has pointed out that it is a complete fabrication. Because of course it is. ➡️🧠
Another day, another target for the Free Palestine movement. Today, Ralph Lauren is under fire for featuring Israeli 🇮🇱 actress Gal Gadot in their Modern Luxury cover shoot. Their comments section on Instagram are flooded with threats to block and boycott now. They can stay mad.
The Free Palestine movement spends its time looking up which celebs do or don't follow P!nk. Does this help Palestinians? No. Does it make them feel like they are somehow making a change in the world? Yes. Their "activism" has become nothing more than a censorship campaign. https://t.co/XsUf8WA96M
The same people who say Palestinians shouldn't all be judged for Hamas's crimes on October 7th argue that Jews around the world are fair game if they don't publicly disavow Israel. You're not against collective punishment if you support it when the victims are Jews.
Do I wish the British government had chosen a way to oppose extreme settler violence that wasn't so obviously motivated by domestic political concerns? Of course. Again and again, the British government chooses posturing to voters over actually governing. This will only radicalize their voters even more, just as antisemitism reaches unprecedented levels, a crisis this government ignores. It is already proving to be an ineffective step that diminishes any influence the UK might have had on Israel. Not that the UK is so relevant these days, anyway. All of this is true, and should be said. But as an Israeli, the out-of-control uptick in settler violence in the lead-up to the elections, the extremist ministers who are enabling it, combined with the news that Netanyahu ignored not one but two warnings before the October 7th massacre, is really what has me furious today. Yes the world is crazy and possessed with hatred toward the Jewish nation. And yes, Israel needs a new leadership, too.
A promoter fabricated a quote, so Malkovich had a real reason to pull out. But the quote was that he felt solidarity with human beings under attack, and the online abuse he got over those words was real. His team saw it and made a call. I don't know what it's like to be John Malkovich. I do know what it's like to be the audience in Tel Aviv that just lost another show to the mob.
“Stop conflating Jews and Israel” isn’t what you say when you want Jews to be safe. It’s what you say when you want us to delete a major part of our identity—our homeland. That’s not happening.
“While safety and security of our community are of the utmost importance, they are also not our only considerations.” Columbia University's new president, Jennifer Mnookin, has moved to reopen the Manhattan campus after the 2024 Free Palestine protests. The campus brought turmoil and hate towards Jewish students and staff, yet the Free Palestine movement celebrates it to this day. If Columbia wants to reopen it, that's fine, but there must be more responsible steps for any future issues.
The French owner of a Thai zoo who banned Israeli visitors is being deported from Thailand 🇹🇭. Kevin Dimino is accused of aggressive behavior, threats, harassment, public-order violations, and causing serious religious and racial division and strife, including among foreign visitors to the resort island. An Israeli was also deported around the same time as Dimino, for sending threatening messages to the zoo owner following the viral video of Dimino turning and Israeli family away because they were Israeli. Both deportations stem from new laws in Thailand that streamline the process of expelling foreign nationals who "undermine[s] public order, good morals, or public welfare."
It is not the "conflation" of Jewish people and Israel that is driving antisemitism. Jews come from Israel. Our traditions, our beliefs, our celebrations; literally everything about Jewish identity is built around our connection to Israel. It's why anti-Israel seders are so awkward. What drives antisemitism is the belief that antisemitism can be excused or is deserved. A person who goes "I have problems with Israel therefore I am justified in calling my neighbor a slur" is the problem. The person who draws swastikas on a synagogue is the problem. Jews are not the driving force behind antisemitism. Stop blaming us for the hate against us.
If you have a history of engaging in antisemitism, maybe you’re not the person to chime in on the Israeli Palestinian conflict. 🤷♂️ https://t.co/0TSL8rRObW
“I am thrilled to return to Israel and look forward to meeting the warm Israeli audience once again." Acclaimed actor and Oscar nominee John Malkovich is returning to Israel 🇮🇱 to perform in "The Music Critic". Malkovich will perform at Tel Aviv’s Charles Bronfman Auditorium starting April 13, 2027. I applaud John for choosing humanity and ignoring the hate that has influenced so many others.
Meet the man Adidas felt the need to apologize for partnering with. Shalev Biton was stationed in Israel near the Gaza border in 2021 when anti-tank fire, likely launched by Hamas men, killed his friend and wounded him. His leg had to be amputated due to his injuries. Since then, he's rebuilt his life and learned to walk and run again with the help of prosthetic legs. He's traveled the world and proposed to his girlfriend. But he's also gone beyond recovery to advocacy. Along with his friend, Shalev brought Israel's first youth participant to the European Amputee Football Federation Junior Camp in Romania in 2025. Adidas's historical legacy includes being founded by Nazi Party members and being among the last brands to drop Kanye West amid his antisemitism scandal. Their program offering the chance to buy one shoe, instead of the pair, was a long-overdue correction, especially given the company's past. The Adidas apology says everything. They never deserved to work with someone like Shalev.
"I'm not antisemitic, I'm just anti-Israel!" https://t.co/OsI2U2vQct
IMDb has reportedly changed “Israel” to “Palestinian Territories” on some of its paywalled listings of where movies are distributed. Israel is a sovereign country of 10 million people, who are Jewish, Arab, Druze and more. Why are we being erased off the map? https://t.co/5eijJM3qOD
Musician Jane Remover quit the M3F Festival rather than share the state with the Israeli group Temper City. Now Jane Remover will get way more attention, without even having to honor their commitment to fans. An easy win. Helping Palestinians was never Free Palestine’s goal. It was using their pain to get famous.
Calling Hakeem Jeffries a “monkey” and “errand boy” for AIPAC is a despicable example of anti-Black racism. That Rula Jebreal said Jeffries was in the thrall of AIPAC also plays directly into tropes about Jews puppeteering Black people to do their bidding. These harmful tropes are more typical of the extreme right wing, who have used them to delegitimize the civil rights movement or push conspiracies like the Great Replacement Theory. The fact that these ideas are now so omnipresent on the left is yet another concerning example of the horseshoe theory. Hate brings the political ends of the spectrum together.
Macklemore, a performer who once appeared in an offensive Jew costume, compelled his entire audience to chant “Free Palestine.” At a concert. Not a rally. With no idea what traumas or connotations the words held for them. People thinking Jews have a connection to Israel is a fact. It doesn’t “harm” the tiny percent of Jews who, like Matt, deny that connection. If Matt doesn’t want to speak out about antisemitism, that’s fine. But the way he vilifies people who do as the “real antisemites” is actually very harmful.
BREAKING: The German far-right party AfD just won 44% in Saxony-Anhalt. First time since 1945 a far-right party is this close to running a German state. This is the party that wants to gut Holocaust education, cut funding for memorial sites, and put an arms embargo on Israel. Anyone cheering this as a "win" against antisemitism hasn't read what they actually stand for. But here's what should worry everyone: Jews in Magdeburg told Israeli media the AfD isn't their biggest threat anymore. The far-left activists and Islamist terrorism is. That's how bad things have gotten. When the mainstream fails Jews so completely that they stop seeing neo-Nazis as the main danger, extremists on both ends win. Germany's vaccine against fascism lasted 80 years. We're watching it wear off. And not just in Germany.