Hollywood’s Betrayal: Profiting Off Jewish Pain While Turning Its Back on Us

Hollywood has made billions of dollars using our stories. Films about the Holocaust, pogroms, and the genocide of the Jewish people have lined the pockets of studios, won Oscars, and fueled careers. The industry has built an entire genre around Jewish suffering—stories of survival, resistance, and unimaginable horror—marketed for mass consumption. And yet, today, when Jews are under attack, Hollywood has nothing to say.

As we approach Hollywood’s biggest night—the Oscars—we are again reminded of this industry’s hypocrisy. The red carpets will roll out, and the acceptance speeches will be filled with calls for justice and human rights, and yet, when it comes to the Jewish people suffering in real-time, the silence remains deafening. Will any of these so-called champions of humanity mention the Bibas family? 10-month-old Kfir, his 4-year-old brother Ariel, and their parents, Shiri and Yarden—who were brutally kidnapped by Hamas and the world finds out that Shiri, Kfir and Airel are confirmed dead, murdered in captivity, Will they acknowledge the hostages who were returned looking like they had walked out of Auschwitz? Will they recognize the Jewish families torn apart by terror? Or will they continue to turn a blind eye while celebrating films that profit off Jewish history?

We saw it again just days ago. The images of three released Israeli hostages, emaciated and haunted, should have sent shockwaves through every media industry. The confirmation that the members of the Bibas family—whose plight gripped the world—were murdered in cold blood should have led to universal outrage. But what did we get from Hollywood? Silence. The same industry that so eagerly profits from Jewish trauma suddenly has nothing to say when Jews are the victims in real-time.

Instead, Hamas gives us a Hollywood-style production designed to manipulate the world into thinking we are the villains. It is a staged propaganda effort meant to demonize us while those who built their legacies off Jewish suffering sit comfortably in their mansions, saying nothing. And as they ignore this latest crime against our people, we are left to witness elite executives, influencers, and actors gathering in rooms, casually discussing how to rewrite the narrative—how to hurt us again, how to delegitimize us, how to make sure that the world turns against us.

It’s not just Hollywood as an institution—it’s the Jewish celebrities who have benefited from the industry yet remain silent. Where are the voices of the actors, directors, and producers who owe their success to the Jewish community? When antisemitism is surging, when our people are being brutalized, they say nothing.

Instead, the silence from these so-called leaders sends a message that Jewish pain is only worthy of acknowledgment when it fits a profitable narrative. They champion every cause except their own people’s survival. We saw it in the wake of October 7th, when some in the entertainment industry were quick to condemn Israel. Still, when faced with the undeniable atrocities committed against Jews, they had nothing to say. Silence isn’t neutrality—it’s complicity.

Hollywood has betrayed the Jewish people. We will not stand by while they rewrite history in real time, pretending that our suffering matters only when it serves their creative and financial interests. If they want our stories, they better stand with us when it counts. Otherwise, they are nothing more than opportunists feeding off our pain.

For generations, Jews helped build Hollywood. We wrote the scripts, directed the films, acted in the roles, and told the stories. We wrote the music that underscored these powerful narratives—music that shaped the very identity of American cinema. Legendary Jewish composers and songwriters like Irving Berlin, George and Ira Gershwin, Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim, Elmer Bernstein, Marvin Hamlisch, and Jerry Goldsmith helped define Hollywood’s golden age and beyond. From White Christmas to West Side Story, from the haunting scores of Schindler’s List and Exodus to the Broadway hits that became Hollywood classics, Jewish musicians and composers provided the soundtracks that moved audiences to tears.

But Hollywood itself was built by Jews who migrated from New York due to antisemitism, seeking a place where they could create without persecution. And now, when we need them to use their voices—to call out the atrocities happening to our people, to demand justice, to fight against the sickening rise of antisemitism—they are nowhere to be found. Their silence speaks volumes.

To Hollywood: You profited off of Schindler’s List. You profited off of The Pianist. You profited from Fiddler on the Roof, Exodus, and countless others. You made fortunes off the musical genius of Jewish composers. Where is your voice now? If you only care about Jewish suffering when it’s a profitable screenplay or a stirring film score, then you were never allies to begin with.

We don’t need Hollywood’s tears or their empty, performative sympathy. We need action. We need voices against this injustice, not ones that disappear when the credits roll.

So this Oscar season, while Hollywood pats itself on the back for its artistic achievements, we will be watching—not for their films, but for their silence.