Azealia Banks Claims Israel Pays Her to Tweet
Seems like the “212” singer was also in the 972.
Azealia Banks, the controversial rapper who once sacrificed chickens, publicly feuded with Elon Musk and claimed she was stuck in his house, almost got in a fistfight with fellow singer Lana Del Rey, and chastised the countries of Ukraine, Ireland, Australia, Sweden and Bosnia & Herzegovina, is in hot water again—this time for alleging she was paid by Israel for posting about the country.
In response to a post discussing a March 4 article in Calcalist, an Israeli economy and tech newspaper, alleging that Israel’s national public diplomacy directorate had recruited social media influencers as private contractors to represent the country positively, Banks posted: “I got paid lol. Its not 7k a post but i def get paid for every Israel mention. Even the troll posts are paid….”
Banks is known to say outlandish things on social media (“trolling”), so who knows if this isn’t another tactic to stir up opinion. But this seems to be in line with previous complaints claiming that Netanyahu’s strategy in shifting public opinion started with influencers. “We have to fight back,” he said at a press conference last September. “How do we fight back? Our influencers.”
Banks, the musical prodigy whose acclaimed and creative album Broke With Expensive Taste (2014) broke barriers in the rap scene, had recently caused a stir among her largely left-leaning fans by performing in Tel Aviv last fall to commemorate the two-year anniversary of October 7. “[It] will be a day of deep remembrance—honoring every life taken, every family touched,” she posted, while shouting out friends in the IDF and sharing plans to visit Yad Vashem and the Nova Festival site. “I’m ready to connect, vibe, love, remember, and CELEBRATE the LIFE & LOVE of the place.”
On October 9, Banks hit the stage draped in the Israeli flag, wearing a Star of David and declaring her undying support for Jews. The concert was well-received, as she rapped hits like “212” to an energetic crowd. “Israel is a vibe,” she tweeted the day of the show. “There’s so much North African and Arab influence in the city culture except everyone is walking around drinking green juice and carry[ing] surfboards like it’s LA 2004.”
“Highly recommend vacation in Tel Aviv,” she posted later. “This is the best vibe tbh. Europe is so canceled.”
Influencers are known to create sponsored content for brands they work with. And Banks, an endlessly polarizing figure whose “disputes and controversies” Wikipedia section is miles long and constantly updated, might be a good choice to stir the pot and get eyes on the country.
She also has a complex relationship with Jews and Israel. On a tour stop in May 2018, she reiterated antisemitic conspiracy theories: “Now here us negroes are in 2018 paying for our sins by Jews having complete control over all African American entertainment industries in the US,” she said in now-deleted tweets. “From hip-hop to basketball and sports…the Jews run and own it all.” She then alleged a rabbi offered to pay her for sex while they were seated next to each other on an airplane. “It was kind of kinky but I politefully declined,” she wrote.
Later, she vowed never to return to Israel, saying Israelis were rude and brash, and alleging that El Al employees and passengers were racially profiling her. “Anytime I walked into a restaurant the people seemed annoyed that I wanted to eat,” she posted. “The people at the grocery store asked me what I was doing there…pretended they didn’t speak English when I asked for help.”
In 2021, she became engaged to the Jewish conceptual artist Ryder Ripps, posting on Instagram, “I’m Jewish now. MAZEL TOV BITCHES!” (They ended things three weeks later after the release of their audio sex tape NFT. Later, she claimed she was “way more Jewish” than him, since he doesn’t have a mezuzah and eats pork).
She also chimed in during a discussion on X about Jewish American cuisine. It’s “delicioooooous,” she said. “A hot turkey Reuben on marbled rye with no cheese and extra sauerkraut and dressing and a black cherry soda??? With some dill potato salad and pickles and mustard??? Honeeeyyyyy stopp.”
After October 7, she started tweeting publicly about the war. “No black person should be supporting Palestine,” she said in 2025 after declaring she was a Zionist. “Whenever I see stupid ass musicians supporting Palestine blindly without raising the question about black peoples safety and the ongoing *industry* of CHATTEL SLAVERY enslavement of black peoples in the Islamic world It makes my blood BOIL.”
For now, the self-minted “Jewcy Diva” is still posting, now with more erratic targets. The day after Banks tweeted that she’d been paid for posting about Israel, she shared that she missed Condoleezza Rice, argued that there should be more “Goyim” in Israeli affairs and retweeted a post from an X user who said, in response to Israel’s attacks on Iran: “For Jews to go from the Holocaust to hunting antisemites with fighter jets in 80 years is awe inspiring.”Azealia Banks Claims Israel Pays Her to Tweet
It’s unclear when she began to get paid by Israel as an unofficial spokeswoman, or if it’s even real at all. Ironically enough, while tirading against the country in 2018, she vowed never to return, “unless it’s for some real money.”