The Washington Post & Kanye Invoked the Same Antisemitic Metaphor—and No One Seemed to Notice

Media's Jewish problem extends far beyond Kanye West.

Over the past few years, we’ve witnessed the power—and sheer will—of the media to create change where it wants to see it. The anti-racism, trans, and climate movements have benefited from a press corps that’s working hard to advocate on their behalf. But when it comes to the media and the fight against antisemitism, it may be that Jews are still largely on our own.

This might not surprise us when it comes to celebrities like Kanye West, now known as Ye, who recently went on multiple overlapping antisemitic tirades. But when we see antisemitism cropping up in one of the most burnished brands of the “right-thinking” media itself, we know the problem is real.

In a news article published this week, the Washington Post invoked a classic antisemitic stereotype to describe Benjamin Netanyahu, the world’s most prominent Jewish leader. In the piece, the Post’s Jerusalem bureau chief writes that Netanyahu supporters see him as a “savvy Svengali,” a stereotype that has been characterized as “a grossly antisemitic caricature.”

The term Svengali originates from the 19th century novel by George Du Maurier (grandfather of famed writer Daphne Du Maurier), Trilby. In the book, Du Maurier casts the Jewish Svengali, who entrances and demonically controls the book’s innocent young titular character, a beautiful singer, as he "leered and ogled, and flashed his bold, black, beady Jew's eyes into hers.” A scholar of antisemitism, Edgar Rosenberg, wrote in his 1961 book that “the myths of Judas and of Cartaphilus met in the figure of a Victorian bogey-hypnotist.”

This is not to suggest that the Post journalist intended to reflect antisemitic sentiment. But with cultural gatekeepers devoting so much of their resources to screening for red-flag terms like this, including with sensitivity readers at publishing houses and movie studios, it’s notable that the Svengali epithet could slip through the racism radar so easily.

But what’s really interesting is that it’s precisely the image of the Svengali—the mind-controlling Jewish villain who entrances, and entraps, artists—that Ye invoked during his global antisemitism tour. Over and over, Ye told podcasters like Lex Fridman and Drink Champ, as well as news outlets like Piers Morgan Uncensored and NewsNation, about a cabal of Jews who took control of his mind to manipulate him and cast him as insane.

That this very metaphor found its way into an article on the world’s most prominent Jew, Netanyahu, and in one of the world’s most high profile news brands, the Post, shows hos deeply ingrained these metaphors are. That no one even seemed to notice is even more scary.

But this is not the first time the Post has found itself subject to claims of anti-Jewish bias. Just months ago, the paper was at the center of another perplexing incident involving a high-profile Jewish figure just months ago. In an article on the woman behind the influential LibsofTikTok Twitter account, the Post’s controversy-stirring technology columnist Taylor Lorenz seemingly went out of her way to note that the account owner is an Orthodox Jew.

This seemed like a bizarre addition since the LibsofTikTok account has no overt connection to religious themes or issues. Looking back at Lorenz’s copious reporting on notable social media figures, you will be hard press to find an instance where she identifies, or makes any mention of, a subject’s religious background.

Reese Witherspoon—one of the very few celebrities to speak out about this frightening trend—was right when she recently tweeted that “Anti-semitism in any form is deplorable. In person. Online. Doesn't matter where. It's hate and it's unacceptable.” The problem, however, is that while millions might passionately agree when we substitute in “racism” for antisemitism, Jew-hatred that appears in dinner-party media is often met with a shrug.