‘Seinfeld’ actor makes controversial comparison between ‘Free Palestine’ movement and KKK

A prominent actor and comedian isn’t holding back when it comes to his opinion about the “Free Palestine” movement.

Jerry Seinfeld was at Duke University this week to introduce a former Israeli hostage, Omer Shem Tov, during a campus event in Durham.

During his remarks, he discussed the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict in Gaza and made a controversial comparison between groups, according to Duke’s student newspaper, the Duke Chronicle.

“Free Palestine is, to me, just — you’re free to say you don’t like Jews. Just say you don’t like Jews,” Seinfeld, who is Jewish, said.

“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.’ Okay that’s honest.”

The event was sponsored primarily by Chabad at Duke, as well as the Provost’s Initiative on the Middle East, University centers and Jewish student groups.

In a statement to the Chronicle, Duke administrators said they do not preview the remarks of speakers who are invited to campus, and that the “invitation of speakers to campus does not imply any endorsement of their remarks.”

Seinfeld has strong faith and has been a leading critic of antisemitism amid the War in Gaza.

He traveled to the West Bank in 2018 and in 2023 visited the headquarters of Abducted and Missing Families Forum where he met with representatives of the families and with abductees who returned from Hamas captivity and listened to their stories.

Seinfeld, 71, gained stardom playing a semi-fictionalized version of himself in the NBC sitcom Seinfeld (1989–1998), which he co-created and wrote with Larry David.