A political ad supporting Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is drawing accusations of antisemitism after it claimed U.S. aid to Israel is responsible for rising grocery prices.
The ad, produced by Rebellion PAC, a group founded by “The Young Turks” co-founder Cenk Uygur, depicts a couple in a grocery store complaining about the cost of eggs and bananas.
“Honey, you’re going to have to put those eggs back,” the woman says in the spot. “They like eggs, but we have to set that $7 aside for killing Palestinians.”
“Don’t we give Israel $4 billion a year anyway?” the man asks.
“Yeah, and now we’re giving them another $26 billion,” she replies. “It’s like $161 per person. Apparently it’s costing us a lot of money to drop bombs on Gaza.”
The ad also ties high gas prices to the war in Iran before criticizing El-Sayed’s opponent, Mike Rogers, for his support of Israel. “Mike Rogers is for they/them,” a narrator says, referencing Israel in a line modeled on a pro-Trump ad from the 2024 campaign. “Abdul El-Sayed is for you.”
Backlash Across the Political Spectrum
The spot has prompted condemnation from figures on both the left and right, led by the Anti-Defamation League.
“You want to know what desperate looks like? Blaming the price of bananas on Israel. Consider this PAC ad just another example of scapegoating the Jewish state. At least we can thank them for a case study in antisemitism,” ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt wrote on X Sunday.
Joel Petlin, superintendent of the Kiryas Joel School District in Orange County, New York, offered a pointed comparison: “The scapegoating of Jews in this campaign ad designed to benefit Abdul El-Sayed was much better in the original 1938 German version.”
Jonah Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Dispatch, called the ad “dumb and bigoted at scale,” adding: “It’s innumerate and morally obtuse and if anything remotely like it was aimed at Muslims [Uygur] and his ilk would (defensibly) be outraged. But this s–t is fine when aimed at the you know who.”
Tech futurist Jamie Metzl said El-Sayed’s response to the ad would reveal where he stands. “Unless Abdul El-Sayed immediately demands that this campaign ad be taken down and unequivocally condemns it and its creators, he will be exposed as a vile, dangerous, and divisive antisemite,” Metzl wrote, also referencing a separate controversial ad involving Vivek Ramaswamy in Ohio: “Any (of my fellow) Democrats who condemn the disgusting Ramaswamy ad in Ohio but do not condemn this deserve our unflinching contempt.”
Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.), who ran against El-Sayed in the Democratic primary, warned the ad could backfire politically. “This type of fearmongering about Israel is wrong,” she said. “It is not a winning strategy for any state. It does nothing to help Michigan Democrats win up and down the ballot in eight days.”
Uygur Defends the Ad
Uygur, a vocal critic of Israeli policy, shared the ad on social media last week and defended it when asked by The Post on Monday. “If you think this ad is antisemitic, you’ve lost your mind and you don’t know it,” he said. “It’s saying we’re giving too much money to a foreign nation — and they’re misusing it. There’s nothing more normal than that. But when someone criticizes the government of Israel, and you hear ‘They hate all Jews,’ get clinical help.”
El-Sayed’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
