Fox News host Bill O'Reilly resorted to anti-Semitic imagery in an effort to smear George Soros, describing the Jewish philanthropist and businessman as a “shadow puppet master” who “has his tentacles into political organizations.”
On the March 18 edition of The O'Reilly Factor, O'Reilly warned viewers that the American people have a responsibility to counter so-called “anti-capitalist violence on display” in Europe. He deplored what he claimed is “crazy left-wing economic stuff” on its way to taking root in the United States as a result of the economic agenda championed by President Obama, Senators Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and 84-year old philanthropist George Soros, whom O'Reilly declared “the most frightening of all.” He continued (emphasis added):
O'REILLY: Soros has now taken his ill-gotten gains and is financing the most radical left-wing organizations in America. He is the shadow puppet master behind corrupt far-left groups like Media Matters. Soros has his tentacles into political organizations like the Center for American Progress, which has provided operatives for the Obama administration, some of whom are now going over to Hillary Clinton's campaign. Few Americans even know who Soros is, but the 84-year old uber-leftist is behind much of the political strife in this country.
Depictions of Jewish people as "puppet masters" controlling the government and the media are anti-Semitic stereotypes that go back decades. O'Reilly's claim that Soros' “tentacles” have infiltrated the upper echelons of political society is also a play on overtly anti-Semitic imagery. The white supremacist, neo-Nazi online forum Stormfront.org contains a trove of examples, including a March 19, 2013 post called “The 6 Tentacles of Jewish Supremacy Revealed.” The image of a Jewish octopus engulfing the globe or ensnaring political institutions dates back to at least the 1930s, when it was a common theme in Nazi propaganda.
In 2010, then-Fox News host Glenn Beck was condemned by Jewish groups in part for using similar negative stereotypes and for accusing Soros of being a Nazi collaborator who helped “send the Jews” to “death camps.”