1,200 of Hollywood’s Biggest Names Sign Blistering Letter Against Israeli Film Boycott

A powerful consortium of over 1,200 prominent Hollywood figures has published a searing open letter denouncing an ongoing boycott campaign targeting Israeli film institutions. The counter-attack, spearheaded by organizations Creative Community for Peace and The Brigade, rejects the boycott as a dangerous act of censorship and the “erasure of art.”

The signatories, a who’s who of the entertainment world including actors Liev Schreiber, Debra Messing, Mayim Bialik, producers like Greg Berlanti, and musicians such as Gene Simmons, signed the letter on Thursday. They directly challenged a prior pledge by over 1,300 artists, including Oscar winners Olivia Colman, Mark Ruffalo, Susan Sarandon, and Javier Bardem, who committed to refusing work with Israeli festivals, cinemas, broadcasters, and production companies they allege are “implicated in genocide and apartheid against the Palestinian people.”

The pro-Israel group argued that silencing artists based solely on their origin is a profound betrayal of storytelling. In their open letter, they asserted: “Censorship has been used to silence filmmakers before: Nazi Germany’s propaganda machine, Soviet censorship and even Hollywood’s own blacklists. Every time it was dressed up as virtue. And every time it was oppression.”

This ideological rift reflects a dramatically fractured post-October 7 landscape in Hollywood, where Jewish entertainers have been experiencing professional harm for supporting Israel, while anti-Israel narratives frequently receive prestigious platforms.

The letter explicitly called the prior pledge, circulated under "Film Workers for Palestine," a “document of misinformation that promotes arbitrary censorship and the erasure of art.” They warned against the insidious nature of the blacklisting: “Who will decide which Israeli filmmakers and film institutions are ‘complicit’? A McCarthyist committee with blacklists? Or is ‘complicity’ just a pretext to boycott all Israelis and Zionists, 95% of the world’s Jewish population?”

Other prominent signatories include Jerry O’Connell, Howie Mandel, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Lisa Edelstein, and media mogul Haim Saban. They emphasized that turning the power of narrative into a weapon against Israel only amplifies propaganda. “We know the power of film. We know the power of story. That is why we cannot stay silent when a story is turned into a weapon, when lies are dressed up as justice and when artists are misled into amplifying antisemitic propaganda,” the counter-letter declared.

Actress Debra Messing stressed the historical precedent of anti-Jewish boycotts: “History shows that boycotts against Jews have often been used as a tool by authoritarian regimes. Joining such a move, knowingly or unknowingly, means partnership with a dark legacy of antisemitism.”

Similarly, Mayim Bialik noted that boycotting filmmakers and institutions “merely because they are Israeli, deepens divisions and contributes to a disturbing culture of exclusion.” She concluded that the boycott would not end the war in Gaza, bring hostages home, or curb the global rise in antisemitism.

The unified rebuke follows a similar public statement from media giant Paramount Studios, which also rejected the boycott attempts, stating that “Silencing individual creators on the basis of nationality does not advance greater understanding or promote peace.”