An image of Elon Musk making the gesture during his speech at U.S. President Donald Trump's inauguration was projected onto Tesla's Gigafactory in Berlin-Brandenburg.

Michel Friedman, a former deputy chair of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, whose family perished in Poland during the Holocaust, told the Guardian that the salute was a “disgrace” and said Musk was taking America to a “dangerous point for the entire free world.”