Of course Venezuela blames Israel.

In the immediate aftermath of the dramatic US capture of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Caracas’s leadership executed something all too familiar: a reflexive, conspiratorial claim that “the Zionists” were somehow behind it. Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez thundered that the operation had a “Zionist tint,” urging Venezuelans into the streets and improvising an antisemitic narrative to explain away the regime’s collapse. There is no evidence whatsoever that Israel had any role or even prior knowledge of the US operation.

Maduro’s chosen vice president Delcy Rodríguez says “Zionists” are behind the U.S. operation that captured him. Dictators fall. Conspiracies remain undefeated.

pic.twitter.com/rcHzo23HOr

— Emily Schrader – אמילי שריידר امیلی شریدر (@emilykschrader) January 4, 2026

This isn’t merely spin — it is a symptom of a much deeper malaise. Maduro and his circle have long trafficked in anti‑Israel tropes and broader conspiratorial antisemitism as a political tool. They deploy “Zionism” as a cudgel whenever reality threatens their legitimacy.

A regime that hated Israel — without just cause

Maduro never hid his contempt for the Jewish state. His rhetoric crossed from mere hostility into grotesque distortions. For instance his recent Christmas rant, in which Maduro claimed that Jesus was a “Palestinian, the first anti‑imperialist” — a statement that is both theologically absurd and historically baseless.

Maduro says Jesus was a Palestinian, the first anti-imperialist and was crucified by the Spanish Empire and the oligarchy pic.twitter.com/FPHlDHmvWD

— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) December 24, 2025

Maduro has repeatedly spoken of “Zionists” controlling global power — language that echoes classic antisemitic canards, not geopolitical reality.

These statements aren’t isolated gaffes. They are part of a pattern in which Maduro weaponizes religious sentiment and political grievance into a perverse caricature of Jews and Israel — a strategy that plays well with his allies in Tehran, Doha, and Beirut, but has no grounding in fact.

Why blame Israel? Because the real story is worse

What Venezuela’s leadership fears more than anything is accountability.

The US justified the operation to capture Maduro on longstanding indictments tying him to narco‑trafficking and criminal conspiracy. Routers like the Trump administration’s sanctions on Venezuelan and Iranian entities connected to weapons production and narco networks — including drones and UAVs — underscore how Caracas has intertwined with hostile global actors.

Maduro’s Venezuela became a pivot point for transnational crime and terrorism: partnering with Iran, facilitating Hezbollah’s reach in Latin America, and providing space for narco‑terror networks to flourish. Analysts have warned that Hezbollah’s presence in Venezuela is not abstract — its crime‑terror networks have turned the country into a hub of illicit coordination.

Indeed, external observers have called for the Maduro regime itself to be designated a State Sponsor of Terrorism because of its sustained support for Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and Hezbollah allies.

In this light, the US operation was not some Zionist plot — it was a strategic act of law‑enforcement aimed at dismantling networks that threaten both regional stability and Western security.

Antisemitism is not an innocuous disagreement

Make no mistake: the invocation of “Zionists” here is not a rhetorical flourish. It is an antisemitic trope with deep historical roots — the old accusation that “the Jews” secretly control world events whenever a chaotic reality needs a convenient scapegoat.

Rodríguez’s speech was not delivered in a vacuum; it reflects a worldview that culpably blurs antisemitism with anti‑imperialism. It is a classic inversion of power and blame.

The real lessons for Israel and the West

Israel had every strategic reason to dislike Maduro. His Venezuela provided political support to Iran and Hezbollah, welcomed them into the Western Hemisphere, and nurtured narratives hostile to the Jewish state. But that’s also precisely why his blaming of “Zionists” rings hollow: it is a desperate attempt to weaponize an age‑old prejudice to cover corruption, human rights abuses, and strategic miscalculations.

The United States, not Israel, executed the downfall of his regime. The motivations are geopolitical and legal — not conspiratorial.

Israel must watch these narratives not with indignation but with discernment. The reflexive antisemitic spin out of Caracas underscores why Israel’s struggle is not just territorial or diplomatic; it is also intellectual and moral — to confront ideologies that reduce complex geopolitical failures into age‑worn fantasies about “Zionist” puppeteers.

In a world where truth matters, distortion is the enemy of accountability. Maduro’s final legacy may well be that he spent his last hours not confronting the real causes of Venezuela’s collapse, but scapegoating imaginary ones. And that tells you everything needed about the intellectual bankruptcy of his regime.

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