Media mogul Rupert Murdoch has married for the fifth time to a Jewish molecular biologist named Elena Zhukova.
Murdoch, 93, who is not Jewish, married Zhukova, 67, the former mother-in-law of Russian-Israeli oligarch Roman Abramovich.
The couple married on Saturday in a ceremony at Murdoch’s wine estate in Bel Air, California.
His media company News Corp confirmed the union.
His new wife Zhukova was born in Moscow to Jewish parents and emigrated to the US in 1991.
Murdoch, who has six children, was last married to model and actor Jerry Hall, but the couple divorced in 2022.
He was previously married to Australian flight attendant Patricia Booker, Scottish-born journalist Anna Mann and television executive Wendi Deng.
Before marrying Zhukova, he was also briefly engaged to Ann Lesley Smith, a former radio host from the US, but canceled the engagement in March 2023.
Deng was the only one of his former wives to attend his last wedding. It is understood that she introduced him and Zhukova at a party she threw last year.
Rupert Murdoch and his new bride Elena Zhukova on their wedding day (Photo: NewsCorp)
Murdoch was married to Deng between 1999 and 2013 and they have two daughters.
Zhukova was previously married to Alexander Zhukov, a billionaire energy investor and Russian politician.
The couple has a daughter together named Dasha, who attended a Jewish day school in California.
Dasha subsequently married Russian billionaire Abramovich, but they divorced in 2018.
Roman Abramovich with his then girlfriend Daria Zhukova in 2010 (Photo by Alexander Fyodorov/Epsilon/Getty Images)
Elena Zhukova, who moved to Los Angeles in 1994 to work at the University of California, specialized in the study of diabetes before retiring.
The happy couple at their wedding (Photo NewsCorp)
According to the Daily Mail, a UCLA colleague said: “Elena already came from a wealthy background. Then her daughter married a billionaire. Now that the marriage is over, the happy couple plans to spend most of their time at the Bel Air estate, where Rupert continues to work to develop an internationally renowned winery.
Despite not being Jewish, Murdoch is often misidentified as such in the context of anti-Semitic conspiracies about Jews and the media.
The Australian-born media mogul is chairman emeritus of News Corporation, which owns Fox News Wall Street Journalthe Sun and the Time.
Murdoch stepped down last year as leader of both Fox News’ parent company and its media company News Corp, leaving his son Lachlan in charge.
In 2012, Murdoch was criticized for a tweet attacking the “Jewish press” for being “so consistently anti-Israel in every crisis.”
He tweeted in the context of ongoing violence in the Middle East, with Israel stepping up attacks in Gaza following a long series of rocket attacks by Hamas.
He later apologized for the tweet, saying it was “inappropriate.”
In a letter to the Anti Defamation League, Murdoch wrote: “I have a very strong sense of the justice of Israel’s cause, especially when its citizens are attacked with rockets.
“So I get very angry when I see reporting that I believe is unfair and biased against Israel. But I should have stuck to the essence of the issue and not raised irrelevant and incorrect ethnic issues.”
At the time, Abraham Foxman, national director of the ADL, said: “After speaking with Mr. Murdoch, it is clear that he deeply regretted posting his comment on Twitter and understands how his reference to ‘Jewish media’ could play a role in the age-old anti-Semitic issue. conspiracy theory about ‘Jewish control’ of the news media.
“We appreciate his effort to apologize and clarify that his comments were an attempt to defend Israel, made at a time when the Jewish state is under direct attack, and were not intended to hurt or offend.”