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During an event at Duke University Tuesday night, Jerry Seinfeld touched on the Israel-Gaza war. His latest comments compared the Free Palestine movement to the KKK, even saying the Klan might be a bit better than the community org.
“Free Palestine is, to me, just — you’re free to say you don’t like Jews,” Seinfeld said. “Just say you don’t like Jews. By saying ‘Free Palestine,’ you’re not admitting what you really think. So it’s actually — compared to the Ku Klux Klan, I’m actually thinking the Klan is actually a little better here because they can come right out and say, ‘We don’t like Blacks, we don’t like Jews.’ OK that’s honest.”
According to Duke newspaper The Chronicle, Seinfeld appeared at the event alongside Omer Shem Tov, an Israeli abducted for 505 days from the Nova Music Festival on Oct. 7. The university released a statement following the comedian’s comparison between the Free Palestine movement and the KKK.
“Duke does not preview the remarks of speakers who are invited to campus, and the invitation of speakers to campus does not imply any endorsement of their remarks,” a spokesperson said, according to The Chronicle.
Back in February, an Instagrammer asked for a selfie with Seinfeld but instead shot a video and said “Free Palestine.”
“I don’t care about Palestine,” the comedian responded before he walked away.
Seinfeld made a number of headlines in 2024 while on the promotion trail for his Netflix film “Unfrosted.” There were few stones he left unturned but eventually began walking back some of his comments – like when he said the “extreme left” and “PC crap” were killing comedy.
“I said that the ‘extreme left’ has suppressed the art of comedy. I did say that. That’s not true,” Seinfeld said. “It’s not true. If you’re a champion skier, you can put the gates anywhere you want on the mountain and you’re going to make the gate. That’s comedy. Whatever the culture is, we make the gate. You don’t make the gate, you’re out of the game. The game is where is the gate and how do I make the gate to get down the hill.”
He continued, “Does culture change and are there things that I use to say that [I can’t because] people are always moving [the gate]? Yes, but that’s the biggest and easiest target. You can’t say certain words about groups. So what? The accuracy of your observation has to be 100 times finer than that just to be a comedian … So I don’t think, as I said, the ‘extreme left’ has done anything to inhibit the art of comedy. I’m taking that back now officially.”
