Tech billionaire Elon Musk insisted Wednesday that his trip to Israel was not an “apology tour” following backlash he received for appearing to endorse an antisemitic social media post, something he says he regretted doing.
“Well, the trip to Israel is independent of — it wasn’t something like an apology tour,” Musk told New York Times’ Andrew Sorkin at the Dealbook Summit. Musk recently returned from his trip to Israel earlier this week, in which he toured the Kfar Aza kibbutz, where Hamas fighters led a deadly Oct. 7 assault on Israel.
Sorkin pressed Musk on the post he engaged with on X, formerly Twitter, sparking a wave of criticism earlier this month. An X user claimed Jews have been encouraging “dialectical hatred against whites” and referenced the “hordes of minorities that support flooding their country.” Musk then responded to the post, calling it “the actual truth.”
This claim echoes an antisemitic conspiracy theory that accuses Jews of wanting to flood Western countries with nonwhite immigrants. Musk later said that claims he is antisemitic “couldn’t be farther from the truth.”
When discussing the criticism he faces over the post, Musk said he “has no problem being hated.” He did appear to express regret for the response, saying that “in retrospect not have replied to that particular post.”
“And essentially, I handed a loaded gun to those who hate me, and arguably to those who are antisemitic, and for that I am quite sorry,” he said, adding “that was not my intention.”
Days after Musk’s initial post sparked backlash, liberal watchdog Media Matters for America reported that it found ads for companies including Apple, Bravo, Oracle, Xfinity and IBM placed next to posts celebrating Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party on X. This prompted a handful of companies, including Disney and Apple, to pull their ads from the platform.
Musk decided to sue Media Matters in response. When asked about companies pulling their ad spending from the platform on Wednesday, the X owner accused them of attempting to blackmail him in an explicit response.
“Don’t advertise. If someone is going to try and blackmail me with advertising? Blackmail me with money? Go f— yourself,” he said.
He was responding to Disney CEO Bob Iger’s previous comments during the summit, where he explained why the entertainment giant pulled its ad spending from X.
Copyright 2023 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.