Voight: ‘She’s ignorant of what the real stakes are and what the real story is because she’s in the loop of the United Nations.’
By Shiryn Ghermezian, The Algemeiner
Actor Jon Voight accused his daughter, actress and filmmaker Angelina Jolie, of being uniformed about Israel and swayed by antisemites while commenting on their differing political views about the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in a new interview with Variety magazine.
In November, a mere three weeks after the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre and the start of the Israel-Hamas war, Jolie criticized Israel’s military actions targeting terrorists in the Gaza Strip. “This is the deliberate bombing of a trapped population who have nowhere to flee,” she wrote in an Instagram post. “Gaza has been an open-air prison for nearly two decades and is fast becoming a mass grave. 40? of those killed are innocent children. … Whole families are being murdered.”
Her Instagram post was the second time that Jolie publicly commented on the Israel-Hamas war. Both times, she did not mention Hamas by name or the rockets fired by the terror group from Gaza on Israeli civilians during the ongoing war.
The Oscar winner spent over 20 years working with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, first as a goodwill ambassador from 2001–2012 and then as a special envoy from 2012-2022.
A day after Jolie’s Instagram post in November, Voight, who is an avid supporter of Israel, criticized the anti-Israel views of his once-estranged daughter who he reconciled with over the years. The 85-year-old bashed Jolie’s anti-Israel stance several times again during his interview with Variety, which was published on Tuesday.
“She has been exposed to propaganda,” the former “Ray Donovan” star said about his daughter. “She’s been influenced by antisemitic people. Angie has a connection to the UN, and she’s enjoyed speaking out for refugees. But these people are not refugees.”
Voight — who has said he feels an obligation to combat antisemitism – then accused the “Mr. & Mrs. Smith” star of being trapped in a Hollywood “bubble” and not having access to real information about the Israel-Hamas war. Voight told Variety: “Angie, I think she hasn’t been available to this information because in Hollywood people don’t share this kind of stuff. They’re way off. They have no idea what’s going on. It’s a bubble.”
“It comes from ignorance, like everything else,” Voight explained. “It’s like, why are these kids in the universities siding with Hamas, right? It’s because of ignorance. They don’t know the story.”
He further told the magazine that while he loves his daughter and does not want to fight with her, he believes she has “been influenced by the UN.” He said the United Nations claims to care about human rights, but when it comes to the actions of Israel, “it’s just anti-Israel bashing.”
“She’s ignorant of what the real stakes are and what the real story is because she’s in the loop of the United Nations,” he further claimed about Jolie.