Saturday, November 01, 2025

Battling Gazalighting

"We have to understand who our enemies are. And our enemy now is Canada."
"[Canada has failed because of its] recognition of a nonexistent entity [and] not doing enough to combat antisemitism." 
"I will come up to Canada. I will defend [Israeli President Benjamin] Netanyahu, and I will go after everybody who has tried to arrest him."
"Every element within the Palestinian movement has encouraged terrorism. Not a single one has essentially renounced it."
"Palestinianism is not about building a country. It's about destroying Israel. There isn't a single pro-Palestine demonstration that I have seen that calls for a two-state solution. Not a single one."  
American lawyer Alan Dershowitz, professor emeritus Harvard Law
 
"The first and most important thing that we need to do collectively is to listen [to] what they [Islamists] themselves say."
"[Islamists] want to dominate and take control of Western countries and they're not shy in achieving it."
"They are politically organized and disciplined. They are funded. They have powerful mouthpieces some of them very eloquent and fluent in King's English."
"[Elected officials] need to understand that Israel is the Off-Broadway show. The real show, the real Broadway, from a Muslim Islamist perspective, is the West."
Jonathan Conricus, former international spokesperson, Israel Defense Forces 
Demonstrators calling upon the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to take action for the release of hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 and currently held in the Gaza Strip, outside the ICRC offices in Tel Aviv on November 9, 2023. (Ahmad Gharabli/AFP)
Demonstrators calling upon the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to take action for the release of hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 and currently held in the Gaza Strip, outside the ICRC offices in Tel Aviv on November 9, 2023. (Ahmad Gharabli/AFP)
 
At a recent conference produced by the Israel Law Center, Israel-supporters gathered to take impressions from one another and offer support in a demoralizing atmosphere of the West, the very former allies of the State of Israel having turned against the legitimacy of the sovereign state, castigating it for its actions in Gaza against the Palestinian terrorist groups that, led by Hamas, had barraged into southern Israel two years ago October 7 to slaughter Israeli civilians, foreign farm workers, rape and mutilate Israeli girls and women, and take children, entire families, the elderly, young people enjoying a music festival and others back to Gaza as hostages to be used as prisoner-exchange barter.
 
The Israel Defense Forces was challenged by the very fact that Hamas terrorists operate on the theory that the greater number of Palestinian civilians are wounded, and even better killed by the IDF as collateral damage in its attempts to reach and destroy the terrorist operatives, their weapons caches, operations and communications centres, deliberately installed within densely populated areas, with tunnels channeled deep underground as weapons depots and operative havens, leading from and into and beneath mosques, hospitals, schools and private homes. Making every effort to avoid harming civilians under these devised circumstances regardless, the Hamas public relations machinery used those numbers as fodder to convince the world of a genocide unfolding in Gaza.
 
 
 
The Israel Law Center was established for the very purpose of holding to account all those that tarnished their moral compass by circulating slander to harm the reputation of the Jewish state, and by extension all Jews. The founder and president of the Center is Israeli lawyer Nitsana Darshan-Leitner who spoke of the lawfare, legal action that takes place worldwide to support Israel, and highlight the lies and false stories of Israel purportedly intent on genocide to solve the dilemma of Palestinian 'statehood'. "The New York Times is aiding and abetting Hamas", she explained as she intended to make it her next target of litigation, to take them to court for "blood libel and defamation".
 
Targets of the Center include Al Jazeera, related to its Hamas ties. Another is a lawsuit lodged against the Palestinian Authority and PLO in the United States; initially resulting in a US$655 million award for victims of terrorism (which was overturned). Facebook is seeing legal action with respect to incitement and hate speech. Thematically the conference revolved around combating lies, to communicate the reality of Israel's existence, and overall to be constantly on alert over what the country's enemies are plotting.
 
Jonathan Conricus, senior fellow at the think tank based in Washington, Foundation for Defense of Democracies, spoke of prevention of radicalization, through what he calls "the battle of narratives" and his regret that "Israel isn't yet really fighting this battle well". What Israel is fighting is a many-pronged front, from Gaza, Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Iran. Add to that countering the contentions of its heretofore allies leaning heavily on the only democracy in the Middle East, to ease up on its battle with Hamas, which some among them consider 'defenders' of 'Palestinian rights'.
 
"People have fallen for the Palestinian argument", pointed out Professor Dershowitz. "Instead of just defending Israel, we have to expose the lies of Palestiniansm and stop pandering to pro-Palestinian people. Pro-Palestinian is pro-hate", he adds. And to that adds former Israeli spokesman Eylon Levy, that the "anti-Zionist grip on institutional power hoodwinked the world into believing their libel, and they use that power to commit an industrial act of gaslighting", or as he really put it: "Gazalighting".
 
All of which has been made palatable to all too many, from government authorities to the ordinary person on the street, since much of it boils down to that ancient curse of Jew-hate, where those who innately subscribe to antisemitism as a knee-jerk reaction, find it entirely plausible that accusations of human rights violations slathering Israel by a well-organized campaign to delegitimize the Jewish state are well founded, and the founding of Israel itself a curse to humanity.  
  
 
 
"[Israel's enemies] have been able to hijack the language and weaponize the West's post-truth, post-moral culture, to push their agenda that Israel and the Jews are on the  wrong side of just about everything that is good and right and true."
"[The] big lie that we are all up against [is the notion that] peace and justice in the Middle Est [will come with a Palestinian state]."
"There is no such thing as Palestine. There is no such thing as the Palestinian people. The indigenous people of the land of so-called Palestine are the Jews; the Jews are the only people who have any entitlement to any of this land, an entitlement based in law, in history and morality."
British journalist Melanie Phillips, The Times columnist 

Labels: , , , , , , ,

Tuesday, May 07, 2024

Inside From the Outside on U of T Encampment

"First fact is that strict majority of people I talked to are neither students nor affiliated with our university. We have something like 100,000 students and tons of staff, so it's not hard to find them! But yeah, 'student encampment' is just objectively wrong as a description."
"They took down one piece of fencing on the quad where convocation events happen next week, and have a handful of [masked] people controlling entry."
"I walked round the 'sign-in' and no one noticed for ten minutes or so. But it's [not] free entry.
"The 'security' and 'spokesperson' both explicitly said that if you don't support the collective's view on Palestine, you aren't welcome and they will remove you."
"Actually, I was specifically told to leave now or 'it would become more uncomfortable'."
"I don't really get why we'd allow this. All have the right to protest! Free country. But letting a group of masked [non] students control entry to quad, letting them turn it into a campground with tents: you can just take down the tents and entry gate without touching anyone."
Kevin A. Bryan, economist, associate professor, University of Toronto business school
https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/nationalpost/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/University-of-toronto-anti-israel-protests-1.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1128&h=846&type=webp&sig=JJXNxGm_R7xyKg9nTBZ1Tg
He was skeptical about the identities and purpose inherent in the anti-Israel protests taking place at the University of Toronto, where students and clearly others had set up an encampment inside King's College Circle. So he decided that he'd go out and have a look around, himself. It wasn't particularly difficult for him to infiltrate the group, illegally assembled with their posters and banners, tents and expressions of hatred for Zionists and Israel. He just began by walking about nonchalantly. And engaging others in brief conversations.

What the professor found damning and disconcerting was that the protesters took it upon their assumed authority to block anyone from accessing the area other than those whom they scrutinized and questioned to ensure that they were singing from the same vitriolic hymnal. The university environs are private property, and none of the groups assembled across Canada and the United States at various universities have secured permission of the various university administrations to stage their volatile confrontations.
 
https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/U-of-T-protest-1-e1714688556874.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1128&h=846&type=webp&sig=PTAmCT4KvxRqkqK01Ynqng
Professor Bryan walked among the protesters for a good half-hour before he was identified as an outsider, asked to leave on the basis of the revelation he failed to share the outlook  and values of the organizing groups. He did eventually leave under some duress and then shared his observations on social media, expressing his opinion that many of the protesters had no link to the university. "A short note on the encampment that's now set up here in Toronto @UofT. I snuck into it today [I told them I was a fellow comrade who'd stepped out to get a cigarette.] I think it's only fair to talk to the folks and see what's going on before judging."

Well, he did see what was going on, he did speak to protesters to discuss with some that the huge "Honour to the Martyrs" poster, logically interpreted as pro-violence since martyrdom as it is meant in the Gaza conflict has a sinister Islamist ring to it that martyrdom is achieved by killing Israelis and Jews. The person to whom he spoke was insistent that he misunderstood; martyr and intifada are not, she said, violent terms.

As for the group demanding that the university divest its funds from any entities, businesses or individuals having anything to do with Israel in any way, shape or form, he remarked to them that U of T has no such investments. "The university response right now is basically 'let it peter out'. They have campus security in case a fight breaks out But they're still complicit in allowing the 'entry gate'." The Professor videoed what he came across at the protest site, but just to ensure he had documentation of what he was commenting on. 

https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/torontosun/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/U-of-T-protest-3.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1128&type=webp&sig=vpLXCYpJsdJoRivHd4Eb4g
The entrance to a pro-Palestinian encampment in an area fenced off at the University of Toronto campus in downtown Toronto on Thursday, May 2, 2024. Photo by Ernest Doroszuk /Toronto Sun/Postmedia Network
"...I'm not going to post my video. I didn't even take a phone out until a kid made an implicit threat."
"But I do think @UofT needs to understand what's actually happening, and the embarrasing @utfaculty letter implying faculty support, this needs to be retracted."
"And, last last thing: Just want to be really clear that I didn't take a census.All I know directly is, majority I talked to weren't Uof T affiliated."
"We also know that the protest was partly organized by USW [United Steelworkers Union]. Beyond that, you'll have to do some journalism yourself!"
Professor Kevin A. Bryan

 

Labels: , , , , ,

Follow @rheytah Tweet