Many say the new Superman movie is a commentary on Israel’s ongoing war in Gaza in which Israel is the villain and the movie’s hero fights for the Palestinians.
Director James Gunn has insisted that his movie is not political.
If so, why are so many people seeing the same foreign policy parallels in the movie?
Let’s examine.
Boravia is a fictional country that first appeared in Superman comics in 1939, almost a decade before Israel was founded in 1948. In this movie, Boravia’s president, Vasil Ghurkos, is approached by Superman’s arch nemesis Lex Luthor who offers to provide weapons and military support in exchange for conquered land to be renamed “Luthoria.”
That land currently belongs to impoverished Jahranpur, a country with no real military whose citizens are seen holding machetes and rocks when threatened by Boravian soldiers. The movie says Jahranpur is part of Eastern Europe. However, oil is part of the equation and the supposed Europeans of Jahranpur are in fact very brown skinned.
Boravia has been an ally of the United States going back many decades, and it’s the position of the U.S. not to oppose Boravia’s invasion.
Feel familiar? We’re just getting started.
Boravian President Ghurkos sounds and looks like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but even more accurately looks like Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion (see for yourself here and here).
President Ghurkos can’t wait to unleash hell on Jahranpur. His arms dealer, Luthor, is more than ready for it too.
Superman wants to help the defenseless people of Jahranpur, who seemingly have nowhere to go, surrounded by heavily militarized borders, and no real way to fight back. Children plant flags in the sand with the Superman logo, crying out for him to come to their aid. Their only hope.
The Man of Steel’s lady, Lois Lane, interrogates his choice to get involved, insisting that it’s not his fight. Lane tells Superman, “You know a tyrannical regime runs Jahranpur.”
Superman doesn’t care. He’s just worried that people are going to die.
Mind you, the hero is not particularly a partisan of either country nor does he have any sort of political ties abroad. He just sees the conflict as part of his mission to serve the people of Earth by preventing innocent people from dying. His concern is this basic and simple.
Unless you’re Ben Shapiro, it’s really hard for someone to come away from Superman and not think Gunn was portraying the Israel-Gaza war through fictional countries in the comic series. One could also compare to Russia and Ukraine, but there are more similarities to the chaos currently unfolding in the Middle East.
It’s a superhero movie. There are good guys and bad guys. Which is which does not necessarily align with current American foreign policy.
Left-leaning Breaking Points host Krystal Ball saw Superman and could not believe it.
Feels like a major cultural moment that Israel is quite clearly the bad guy villain country in a big budget Hollywood movie (Superman) Going in I thought it would be subtle but it was not subtle. My mind is kind of blown.
— Krystal Ball (@krystalball) July 13, 2025
Americans have been accustomed to seeing Russians or Islamic extremists as the villains in action-packed movies for decades, but this, as Ball notes, is different. Surprising and shocking, even.
Is this a one off, in making an American ally, the bad guy? Or perhaps a sign of things to come? We can’t know.
Regardless, militant Zionist organization Betar Worldwide made the same assumptions as Ball, coming from the complete opposite perspective.
I am a man boiling with rage.
Yesterday, I went with my son to watch the new Superman movie. Superman! The ultimate superhero, a character created by two Jewish immigrants, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, in the 1930s. The character is supposed to represent hope, justice, and… pic.twitter.com/Vvi5RXeVJi
— Betar Worldwide (@Betar_USA) July 14, 2025
“This is literally a film of incitement against us,” the post read, adding, “They are turning Israelis into the ‘bad guys,’ the Palestinians into the ‘good guys,’ and missiles and terrorism into the ‘struggle of freedom fighters.”
“So yes, I am offended,” it said. “I am angry. I am disgusted.”
Superman’s creators, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, were both Jewish. Actor David Corenswet, who plays Superman, is also Jewish. Still, both Krystal Ball and Betar Worldwide are not alone in perceiving Superman and its foreign policy messaging in the same way.
One phrase associated with the comic series that is definitely not in this movie, is that Superman stands for “truth, justice and the American way,” with all three principles, historically, being one in the same or at least compatible.
Maybe James Gunn had his reasons for leaving that part out, too.
