Harvey Weinstein Urges Jews To Be ‘Organized as Mafia’ Against Anti-Semitism

Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
In a pugnacious speech to a gala dinner given by the Simon Wiesenthal Center, Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein urged Jews to organize and fight back against anti-Semitism.
The famously combative Weinstein, who was being presented with the organization’s Humanitarian Award at its National Tribute Dinner on Tuesday night, announced to the attendees that Jews “better stand up and kick these guys in the ass,” according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Weinstein, who has produced a litany of hit films such as the Holocaust action movie “Inglorious Basterds” and “Pulp Fiction,” reportedly urged “understanding of our Arab brothers and our Islamic brothers” but also warned: “We can’t allow the bad guys to win. So, as they say in “The Godfather,” ‘back to the mattresses,’ and back to the idea that we will not ever forget what happened to us.
During the evening’s festivities, fellow Hollywood mogul Jeffrey Katzenberg also reportedly announced that the Wiesenthal Center had raised another $50 million towards the construction of its long-delayed and controversial Museum of Tolerance in Jerusalem. The project has been dogged by a litany of problems, including two architects who have resigned as well as long-running protests that museum is being partially built on top of the historic Muslim Mumilla cemetery.
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
