Elon Musk draws attention with a hand gesture at Trump’s inauguration

Billionaire Elon Musk’s hand gesture during US President Donald Trump’s inauguration speech sparked online comparisons to a Nazi salute, but a leading anti-Semitism watcher said it instead represented a moment of enthusiasm.

Musk described the criticism of the hand gesture as a “tired” attack.

Musk took the stage at Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C., raised his arms and shouted “Yes.”

“This was no ordinary victory. It was a fork in the road for human civilization,” he said. “This was really important. Thank you for making this happen! Thank you.”

Biting her lower lip, she clapped her right hand over her heart, fingers spread wide, then held her right arm open, at an upward angle, palm down and fingers together. Then he turned and made the same hand gesture to the crowd behind him.

As he finished the gesture, he said, “My heart burns for you. It is because of you that the future of civilization is secured.”

Gestures were quickly verified online.

“Is Elon Musk Sieg Heil at Trump’s Inauguration?” The Jerusalem Post asked.

The Anti-Defamation League, which monitors anti-Semitism, disagreed.

“Looks like @elonmusk made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute, but we still appreciate people being out,” he tweeted on Monday.

‘Very annoying’

Charlotte Knobloch, president of the Jewish community of Munich and Upper Bavaria in Germany, called the gesture “very irritating.”

“More worrying are Elon Musk’s political positions, his offensive interference in the German parliamentary election campaign and his support of a party that has no illusions about its anti-democratic goals,” he said.

Musk has backed the Alternative for Germany (AfD), an anti-immigration, anti-Islam party labeled as right-wing extremists by German security services, in the upcoming national election. He hosted a show with the party leader on the social media platform earlier this month.

“Frankly, they need better dirty tricks. The ‘everyone is Hitler’ attack is so tired,” Musk said on social media platform X late Monday.

Shortly after his speech, Fox posted a video clip of parts of his speech at X, where Musk walked away from the podium as he made his first gesture to the cameras. “The future is very exciting,” he wrote on it.

A spokesman for Trump did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Some X users came to Musk’s defense, claiming that Musk used the phrase “my heart beats for you” and criticized posts that suggested otherwise.