Jessica Seinfeld, cookbook author and wife to comedian Jerry Seinfeld, is funding a pro-Israel counterprotest at UCLA—where violence broke out Tuesday night after a mob attacked demonstrators inside a pro-Palestine encampment.
A GoFundMe for the effort, which Seinfeld promoted in an Instagram story this week after contributing at least $5,000, has since made the majority of its donations anonymous. The fundraising page has raised more than $93,000 as of Wednesday and also changed its organizer name and description since launching over the weekend.
The Daily Beast left messages for reps for the Seinfelds.
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“I just gave to this GoFundMe to support more allies like yesterday’s at UCLA,” Seinfeld wrote this week. “More cities are being planned so please give what you can. Donations are annonymous [sic]. We will continue to share our light and love, as proud American Jews.”
It’s unclear whether Seinfeld coordinated with the GoFundMe to make donations anonymous after they’d been public earlier in the week. Nor is it clear whether supporters or organizers of this fundraiser were among the 100 or so counterprotesters, some wearing masks, who ripped down barricades or tossed objects including fireworks into the camp opposing Israel’s war on Gaza.
Still, it hasn’t stopped X users from roasting Seinfeld.
One observer, who shared video of a mob violently attacking the encampment, wrote, “Jessica Seinfeld must be elated seeing her 5k donation come to fruition.”
A University of California president parody account posted that campus cops were “ready to step in and continue the assault once the counterprotesters tuckered out but Jessica Seinfeld’s Zelle payments kept their fighting spirits high into the wee hours!”
Other celebrities—including actors Melissa Barrera and John Cusack—have shared footage on social media of Israel supporters ambushing the UCLA protest camp.
Billionaire hedge-funder Bill Ackman has taken to X to repost UCLA protest footage, including one account claiming a Jewish woman was beaten during a confrontation, and donated $10,000 to a separate GoFundMe financing a similar video-based effort to be held at the George Washington University.
Despite the chaos, police and campus security didn’t intervene as the counterprotesters moved in around 11 p.m., according to eyewitness accounts from journalists on scene.
UCLA’s student-run newspaper, the Daily Bruin, revealed that a counterprotester with a megaphone shouted, “If they can be there, so can we. You guys are going to want to get this. This is history being made.”
“As counter-protesters pushed forward, some began aggressively hitting those inside the encampment with sticks, and others continued to break down the metal fences,” the Bruin reported. “Individuals also threw wooden planks, cones, a Bird scooter and water bottles at the encampment while chanting ‘USA, USA.’”
At one point, the Bruin added, counterprotesters “shouted an anti-Black racial slur.”
The Bear Jews of Truth, an Instagram page associated with the GoFundMe, shared footage from Tuesday night, including a masked and black-clad man with a megaphone shouting, “Never again!” with the caption “UCLA 3am.” It shared other late-night footage of a group chanting “USA” as they trailed a line of cops in riot gear.
In another video from the account, counterprotesters are captured confronting the encampment’s fencing and wooden planks, with one taunting, “Stop being angry teenagers!”
The GoFundMe, launched by a man identified only as Nathan Mo, of Beverly Hills, initially stated: “A group of us are planning something very big for the ucla encampment… we are working to bring a huge screen and big loud speakers right next to them and just play nonstop clips and interviews from Oct 7.”
Mo then called campus protesters “braindead uneducated sheep sleeping in tents.”
“In order to do this right we need lots of equipment, logistics, staff and security,” Mo continued. “If we all pitch in a bit then we can make this a legendary counter move and drown out their chants with the screams and cries of October 7th.
“All extra funds will be donated to charity,” Mo wrote in the GoFundMe, then titled “UCLA Counter protest,” which later became “Bruins for Israel,” before settling on “UCLA rally.”
The organizer soon changed his name to “Bear Jews Of Truth,” which matches Instagram and Twitter accounts promoting the fundraiser.
Before Tuesday night’s clashes, the counterprotest included a large video screen facing the encampment and playing footage from the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on a loop. This pricey production was also used for a daytime rally, where one speaker draped in an Israel flag condemned the demonstrators as “pro-Hamas.”
Mo did not return messages left by The Daily Beast asking what the donations would be used for and what high-profile people are supporting his cause. He appears to be a 33-year-old real estate developer in the Los Angeles area, based on his “Nathan Mo” social media account which follows the Bear Jews Instagram.
Meanwhile, Ackman appears to have donated $10,000 to a GoFundMe (titled “Support Loud Video Displays of Oct 7 Truths on Campus”) that claims to be associated with the Bear Jews group and has collected $26,000 off the “success” of the Oct. 7 footage display at UCLA.
The Shirion Collective, a self-styled “private Jewish surveillance force” on X, is behind the fundraiser and notes: “This marks an exciting step forward as Shirion Collective and The Bear Jews of Truth officially join forces. The same crew that brought you the incredibly successful UCLA broadcasts is now spearheading this new initiative.”
It plans to kick off at George Washington University “with plans to deploy our first loud, unmistakable installation the second week of May” before heading to Columbia University.
This week, Internet sleuths identified another pro-Israel demonstrator targeting the UCLA protesters—who, similar to those at campuses across the country, are calling for the university to divest from companies with businesses in Israel or that are investing in weapons manufacturers tied to the Israeli military.
Israeli boxer David Kaminsky, who owns a gym in Los Angeles, was recorded spitting on a pro-Palestinian activist and calling them the N-word.
A representative for Kaminsky reached at his boxing gym who identified himself as Tolik told The Daily Beast that the video was blown out of proportion, “fake,” and “the media just make shit up against him.”
Tolik claimed no one was in front of Kaminsky when he spit—“he spit to the air probably and to the floor”—and that he lobbed the racial slur toward a white person.
“The kid come and protest and stay strong for his people,” Tolik said.
