Actor Ben Platt says his Jewish identity is ‘not defined’ by Israel, showing a gap between him and his influential family
Platt’s comments are his first on the topic since early in the Israel-Hamas war
Ben Platt attends a discussion of his album “Honeymind” at 92NY on Oct. 9, 2024, in New York City. (Gary Gershoff/Getty Images)
(JTA) — In his first major public comments about Israel since early in the Gaza war, the Jewish actor Ben Platt said his Jewish identity is not defined by Israel.
Platt also voiced support for another Jewish actor, Hannah Einbinder, who has drawn criticism after condemning the Israeli government in a recent awards speech.
“As a queer Jew, whose personal connection to Judaism is cultural, emotional, and interpersonal, and is not defined for me by the state of Israel, I have felt long alienated from this conversation and from a lot of people in my earliest community who feel differently sometimes, to a dogmatic extent,” Platt wrote on Instagram, sharing a video of Einbinder’s speech.
Platt’s comments revealed a gap between his outlook and that of his influential Jewish family. His mother, Julie Beren Platt, is the chair of the Jewish Federations of North America, which has raised hundreds of millions of dollars for Israel since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack.
His father Marc Platt, a Hollywood producer, reportedly appealed to “Snow White” star Rachel Zegler after the actress took to Twitter and posted “Free Palestine.” (Platt’s brother Jonah, who hosts a podcast called “Being Jewish With Jonah Platt,” criticized Zegler’s post in a now-deleted Instagram comment, according to Fortune.) He also hosted a screening in December for the documentary “We Will Dance Again,” which chronicles the Oct. 7 attack at the Nova music festival.
In Einbinder’s speech, delivered when the Jewish “Hacks” actor was honored last month by the Human Rights Campaign for her LGBTQ+ representation, Einbinder described the role of social justice in her Jewish identity and condemned Israel’s actions in Gaza.
“As a queer person, as a Jewish person and as an American, I am horrified by the Israeli government’s massacre of well over 65,000 Palestinians in Gaza. I am ashamed and infuriated that this mass murder is funded by our American tax dollars,” Einbinder said. “It should not be controversial to say that we should all be against murdering civilians.”
The speech elicited criticism from some in the Jewish world, including Rabbi Denise Eger of A Wider Bridge, a pro-Israel LGBTQ advocacy group. “Even though she is a comedian, her comments are no laughing matter,” Eger wrote in a letter to supporters in which she said she had asked to speak with Einbinder and noted that her group was often “a lone voice in our LGBTQ community.”
Platt said Einbinder’s comments made him feel “seen and hopeful.”
Platt also reportedly posted about the detained pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil, whom the Trump administration is seeking to deport.
The posts mark a departure for Platt. After the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas, the actor condemned the terrorist group and people using the desire for “freedom and human rights in Palestine” as a justification for “antisemitism, and the extermination of Jews,” according to The Algemeiner. (He had recently starred in a revival of “Parade,” a musical about Jewish lynching victim Leo Frank, that neo-Nazis protested.) But since, he has been relatively silent, drawing criticism from both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian voices for not using his celebrity to advance their causes.
Noah Galvin, Ben Platt’s husband, has been a vocal critic of Israel. Last year, the Jewish actor was one of the signatories of a letter voicing support for “Zone of Interest” director Jonathan Glazer’s Oscars speech in which Glazer criticized Israel and “dehumanization.”
In an interview in March with son Jonah, Marc Platt said that Jewish industry leaders had a responsibility to speak up against antisemitism.
“I think all of us have a responsibility to stand up for our community like any other community that receives hate has to stand up because one of the things we’ve learned really since October 7th is if we don’t do it, nobody else will,” Marc Platt said.
Correction: This story has been corrected to show that Jonah Platt criticized Rachel Zegler’s comments, not Hannah Einbinder’s.
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