Ruffalo Calls Antisemitism Accusations 'Dishonest' After Criticizing Ellison Family's Oracle-Israel Ties

Mark Ruffalo reshared a video of Oracle executive Safra Catz describing technology the company gave the Israeli military as "really profoundly scary" after October 7, 2023. Within days, Paramount, the Anti-Defamation League, and the Simon Wiesenthal Centre had accused the actor of antisemitism.

The fight is over the Ellison family. David Ellison runs Paramount Skydance, which is pursuing a $111 billion takeover of Warner Bros Discovery, a deal that would combine CBS, CNN, HBO, and two major studios under one owner. His father, Larry Ellison, owns Oracle, whose software is embedded in Israeli military and security systems and whose executives are outspoken supporters of the Israeli government.

Ruffalo tied the two together in an Instagram post opposing the merger. He wrote that the technologies described in the Catz video "will most likely be merged into one of the largest media conglomerates in the world and one day used on you," and asked why the Trump administration had pushed the deal through.

The response from pro-Israel organizations was immediate. A Paramount spokesperson told The Wrap that Ruffalo was "invoking antisemitic tropes," arguing that applying words like "genocide" and "apartheid" to a corporate transaction "cheapen the very real suffering those words are meant to describe." Creative Community for Peace, a group formed to advance Israel's standing in the entertainment industry, called for a boycott of Ruffalo over what it labeled "extremist and antisemitic messaging." ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt called the actor's statement "cynical and sickening." Simon Wiesenthal Centre CEO Jim Berk described it as "a textbook case of obsession and demonisation" of Jewish people.

Ruffalo answered on X.

"Criticising the actions of the Israeli prime minister, a military technology contract, or the executives who supply it is not the same as criticising Jewish people. This critical and necessary dialogue is then dishonestly framed as being anti-Israel."

He called the accusations against him "appalling and fundamentally dishonest."

Ruffalo has been one of Hollywood's more consistent critics of Israel's war in Gaza. According to reporting on the boycott campaign, he was among close to 4,000 actors and film professionals who pledged last year not to work with Israeli institutions they said were "implicated in genocide and apartheid against the Palestinian people," though the figure has not been independently verified here.

On the merger itself, Ruffalo argued that scrutiny of Oracle's data, surveillance, and government contracting business is "fair and necessary," and warned that the deal would hand one family control of major news and entertainment outlets "backed in part by foreign money whose influence on editorial decisions has never been fully explained to the public." A dozen California attorneys have reportedly filed an antitrust suit to block the merger, and Paramount Skydance faces a reported penalty of $7 million a day if the deal does not close by September 30, though neither figure has been confirmed against a public filing.