170 Jewish Artists Back Ruffalo in Antisemitism Dispute — SkimNews
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- Paramount Skydance accused Mark Ruffalo of invoking antisemitic tropes after he linked the company's pending $111bn Warner Bros Discovery merger to Oracle's technology deals with the Israel Defense Forces, calling such framing "antisemitic tropes invoked in purported service of a business dispute"
- The open letter "Enough!" dismissed the accusation as an "outrageous smear campaign," signing on more than 170 Jewish artists, writers, creative professionals, faith leaders and Holocaust scholars, including Todd Haynes, Joel Coen, Miranda July, Hannah Einbinder, Wallace Shawn and Naomi Klein
- Ilana Glazer, the former Broad City star, added that "Calling Mark Ruffalo antisemitic because he is questioning a massive corporate merger is not only absurd – it's a dangerous way to shut down legitimate criticism"
- The letter argued the Paramount-WBD merger is part of a "tech-driven domination" project, citing Oracle's role in the Trump-brokered TikTok sale, Larry Ellison's reported $350m personal funding of Tony Blair's Institute amid his Kushner-backed Gaza peace-board bid, and Oracle executives' public backing of Israeli strikes in Gaza
- Larry Ellison — estimated worth $189bn — personally agreed to backstop $40.4bn in equity financing for the Paramount Skydance-WBD deal, which already secured Trump administration approval in June and would unite two of five remaining legacy Hollywood studios
- Ruffalo's original post shared a video of former Oracle CEO Safra Catz describing "really profoundly scary technology" the company supplied to Israel after the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack, warning the technologies "will most likely be merged into one of the largest media conglomerates in the world and one day used on you"
Why it matters: For Paramount Skydance, a defense from 170 credentialed Jewish figures reframes a CEO-level insult into a public test of whether merger critics can be silenced through antisemitism allegations — a charge the signatories call "weaponization." The letter also sharpens the regulatory stakes of the $111bn deal, tying it to Oracle's IDF contracts and a reported $350m Ellison donation to Tony Blair's Institute ahead of a Kushner-backed Gaza peace-board bid the letter calls a "silencing of critics."
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