Does Sacha Baron Cohen Support Israel?

Short answer: As of 2026, yes, in the sense that matters most: Sacha Baron Cohen has been a steady, repeat voice against antisemitism and in solidarity with Jews since Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack, showing up in hostage letters, platform-accountability fights, and public mourning for victims from Manchester to Sydney. He has stayed almost entirely silent on Israeli government policy and the conduct of the Gaza war itself, so calling him a policy advocate for Israel would overstate the record. What is documented, repeatedly and as recently as December 2025, is a comedian who treats Jewish safety as personal.

What Sacha Baron Cohen has actually said and done

The public record on Cohen since October 7, 2023 is unusually consistent. Here is what is actually documented, dated:

• October 16, 2023: Cohen was among a group of Writers Guild of America members, including Josh Gad, Eli Roth, and Jerry Seinfeld, who published an open letter criticizing the WGA for staying silent on Hamas's October 7 attack, calling it "a monstrous act of barbarity" and noting they signed "as individuals... united in our shared humanity." IBTimes UK
• October 23, 2023: He signed the "#NoHostageLeftBehind" open letter to President Biden, alongside Gal Gadot, Chris Rock, Bradley Cooper, and dozens of other entertainment figures, thanking Biden for backing Israel and demanding the release of all hostages still held by Hamas. Deadline
• November 2023: Cohen joined more than 30 Jewish celebrities, including Amy Schumer and Debra Messing, on a call with TikTok executives, telling them the app was "creating the biggest antisemitic movement since the Nazis" and demanding they "flip a switch" on hateful content reaching young users. The Times of Israel
• July 2024: After a Hezbollah rocket killed twelve children on a soccer field in Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights, Cohen shared criticism of a BBC headline that referred only to an "Israeli-occupied Golan" strike without naming Hezbollah, calling out the framing for obscuring who fired the rocket and who was killed. The Jerusalem Post
• October 2025: Following the terror attack at a Manchester synagogue on Yom Kippur that killed worshippers, Cohen posted that the murder of Jews "is not a one-off. It's part of the biggest surge in hatred of Jews since the Nazis. No one should have to risk their lives to pray." StandWithUs
• December 2025: After a gunman killed fifteen people at a Hanukkah celebration on Sydney's Bondi Beach, Cohen posted a tribute to the victims, writing that "no one should die because of their faith," joining Gal Gadot in public mourning for those killed. The Jewish Chronicle

His Jewish identity and long personal history with Israel

Cohen's public statements sit on top of a much older personal history. He was born in Hammersmith, London, on October 13, 1971, to a Jewish family; his mother was born in Israel, and he grew up fluent in Hebrew. As a teenager he was an active member of Habonim Dror, the Zionist youth movement, remembered by a fellow participant as "very Zionist, very involved in Habo." The Times of Israel

In 1989, he spent a year in Israel through the movement's leadership program, volunteering at Kibbutz Rosh HaNikra and Kibbutz Beit HaEmek in the Western Galilee. HaBonim Dror Olami That thread runs straight through his career choices: in 2019 he set aside the broad comedy he is known for to play Eli Cohen, Israel's most celebrated Mossad agent, in the six-part Netflix miniseries "The Spy," a dramatic turn that earned him a Golden Globe nomination for best actor. Netflix It is the kind of quiet, decades-long attachment that a lot of people today express simply by wearing an IDF T-Shirt rather than issuing a press statement, and in Cohen's case it clearly predates October 7, 2023 by more than three decades.

The bottom line

Sacha Baron Cohen has not become a commentator on Israeli government policy or the war in Gaza, and nothing in the record has him weighing in on ceasefire terms or settlements. What he has done, repeatedly and as recently as December 2025, is treat attacks on Jews anywhere, in Manchester, in Sydney, or on TikTok, as his fight, and that consistency, layered on a personal history running back to a kibbutz in the Galilee, is the honest answer to whether he supports Israel.

Related

See where other well-known entertainers stand: Does Larry David Support Israel?, Does Mel Brooks Support Israel?, and Does Justin Bieber Support Israel?

Last updated 2026. We update these profiles as the record changes.

Photo: Raph_PH, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons