Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of Twitter, was mentioned as having a phone conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday. Netanyahu described the businessman as “someone whose intelligence and contribution to humanity I greatly appreciate.”
The software tycoon, the wealthiest person in the world despite suffering significant losses at Twitter, has generated controversy for his tweets on Israeli data on COVID-19 and Holocaust survivor and liberal megadonor George Soros.
Deborah Lipstadt, the U.S. antisemitism ambassador, condemned Soros’ tweets for using antisemitic tropes, and Israel’s health ministry criticized him for spreading “fake news” about the nation’s COVID record.
In his depiction of their “long conversation,” Netanyahu did not refer to those recent pronouncements; instead, he noted that the two had discussed artificial intelligence, a topic Musk is interested in.
According to Netanyahu, “He expressed his view that Israel could become a significant global player in the field,” he also indicated he intended to form a team to integrate more AI into Israeli society. “Just as we made Israel a global cyber power, we will do so in artificial intelligence,” he continued.
Musk has not commented on his conversation with Netanyahu over the phone. Musk has also suggested that the vaccines, which Netanyahu eagerly made Israel the first country to offer widely, are not necessary, joining a Twitter conversation last week questioning Israeli data about the number of healthy Israelis who received the COVID-19 vaccine.
On Monday, he planned to host a live event with Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has compared COVID-19 vaccines to “Hitler’s Germany.”
The second Israeli ministry to denounce Musk’s recent remarks, even as other government members have welcomed him, was the Health Ministry of Israel, which responded to him by declaring that “Fake news is dangerous.”
Jewish organizations, including the Anti-Defamation League, criticized Musk when he said that Soros “hates humanity” and “reminds me of Magneto,” the “X-Men” villain who is also a Holocaust survivor.
He was allegedly encouraging antisemitism on the social media platform, according to Israel’s foreign ministry.
However, Eli Cohen, the nation’s foreign minister, rejected his cabinet’s criticism. Amichai Chikli, Israel’s minister of Diaspora affairs in charge of battling anti-Semitism, also jumped to Musk’s rescue.
Chikli, a supporter of Netanyahu’s Likud party, lauded Musk on Twitter and stated that “the vast majority of Israeli citizens see Elon Musk as an amazing entrepreneur and a role model,” adding that criticizing Soros was “quite the opposite” of antisemitism.
Later, when asked whether he thought Musk’s tweets criticizing Soros were antisemitic, he told The Atlantic that he had not replied to those specific tweets.
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