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We Defeated Pro-Hamas Protestors By Proving They Support Rape and Terror
Hamas terrorists kidnapping Israeli women at the Nahal Oz base near the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7, 2023. Photo: Screenshot
I recently witnessed something I haven’t seen in a long time. On Friday, August 16, 2024, a group of pro-Hamas activists packed up their signs and went home in the face of spirited and non-violent opposition from a coalition of pro-American Iranians and American Jews.
The last time I saw anything like that happen was in 2006 or 2007, when I led a crowd of Israel supporters in chants in order to silence a heckler standing on the sidewalk near the town common in Amherst, Massachusetts. The ridicule was enough to prompt he and his fellow anti-Israel activists to walk away, as we cheered their departure. It was glorious.
On August 16, 2024, the pro-Hamas activists conducted their retreat from Lexington in two stages.
First, they walked away from the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Pleasant Street, where they have been protesting on an intermittent basis since October 7. Then, after they retreated a couple of hundred feet down Mass. Ave. (while tenacious, but peaceful, pro-Israel protesters followed them), the Hamas supporters packed up their signs and withdrew altogether, leaving an Iranian-born American citizen to conduct a solitary rear-guard action. Once the pro-Israel protesters took pity on the police officers charged with keeping the peace and got ready to leave, the pro-Hamas supporter also left — clearly a little bit worse for wear.
The pro-Hamas folks did not abandon the site of their weekly standout because they were outnumbered. The two groups were evenly matched. In fact, the pro-Hamasniks may have even enjoyed a slight numerical advantage over the pro-Israel folks who challenged them. Nevertheless, it was the anti-Israel folks who retreated.
The pro-Israel activists, who had coalesced around a core of Iranian human rights activists associated with From Boston to Iran, used a very simple message to break the resolve of the pro-Hamas activists: “You are on the side of rapists and murderers.”
The pro-Hamas protesters tried countering with the lie that Israel is committing a “genocide” in Gaza, but it didn’t work on the pro-Israel folks who just kept repeating their message: If you’re pro-Hamas, you’re siding with rapists and murderers. They offered this message in chants and individual conversations.
The pro-Israel folks didn’t bother reminding their opponents that Hamas attacks civilians while hiding behind civilians, thereby making civilian casualties inevitable. They didn’t waste their breath reminding the pro-Hamas folks that Arab and Muslim leaders have killed millions of Arab and Muslim civilians without much comment from the progressive left in the United States. The pro-Israel folks knew these facts– but didn’t waste their time repeating them on the streets of Lexington. They just kept repeating the central truth of the conflict in Gaza: Hamas is a bunch of rapists and murderers, and many leftists and anti-democratic radicals in the US have taken their side.
Most importantly, our strategy worked.
By repeating the simple truth of what’s happening in the Middle East, a gathering of pro-Israel Jews and Iranians stripped a gathering of pro-Hamas protesters of the moral superiority in which they have wrapped themselves since October 7. By sticking to the “Hamas is a bunch of rapists and murderers” message, pro-Israel activists reminded any self-proclaimed progressives who joined the Hamas supporters, that the October 7 massacre was not performed to “liberate” the Palestinians — but to build a social order in the Middle East in which terror and violence is the dominant culture, as opposed to peace, tolerance, and full rights for all religions, genders, and minorities.
It is no accident that Iranians who oppose the theocratic leadership in Tehran have become a powerful force of anti-Hamas activism in the United States. Having to deal with the rapists and murderers who oppress their friends and relatives, Iranian human rights activists understand that the violence against moderate Muslims, non-Muslims, and women in Iran has a common root with the violence of October 7 massacre. They know that the violence perpetrated against Iranian and Israeli women is justified by radical Islamism, a supremacist ideology that privileges the rights of Muslim men over non-Muslims and women.
Although leftists should know this as well — many don’t, and they need to be reminded repeatedly, and publicly, of the true nature of the radical Islamist movement they help support. One day, they will be the target of the Islamist oppression endured by Iranians and Israelis and when it happens, they won’t be allowed to say no one told them.
Dexter Van Zile, the Middle East Forum’s Violin Family Research Fellow, serves as managing editor of Focus on Western Islamism.
The post We Defeated Pro-Hamas Protestors By Proving They Support Rape and Terror first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Falsified Polling Data to Indicate Higher Support for Oct. 7 Among Gaza Civilians, IDF Says
Palestinians gather near damage, following what Palestinians say was an Israeli strike at a tent camp in Al-Mawasi area, amid Israel-Hamas conflict, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 13, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Mohammed Salem
Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that runs Gaza, has been secretly fabricating polling results from civilians of the war-torn enclave in order to hide that the Islamist organization enjoys far less support than previously thought, according to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
The IDF revealed on Thursday that it obtained documents in Gaza showing that Hamas falsified polling data from the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR). The IDF said that it found the documents while conducting military operations in Gaza.
“The IDF just exposed Hamas for manipulating public opinion surveys by the Palestinian polling institute (PSR) to fake support for its leaders, especially after the October 7 massacre,” the IDF posted on X/Twitter.
#busted : The IDF just exposed Hamas for manipulating public opinion surveys by the Palestinian polling institute (PSR) to fake support for its leaders, especially after the October 7 massacre.
The documents, found during operations in Gaza, show how Hamas altered PSR’s March… pic.twitter.com/Y2AoAy1bBv
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) August 29, 2024
According to the IDF, the March 2024 polling results were doctored by Hamas “to falsely boost Yahya Sinwar’s popularity,” referring to the terrorist group’s top leader.
A striking 71 percent of Palestinians in Gaza said that Hamas was “correct” in its “decision to attack Israel on October 7th,” according to the allegedly faked polling data. In reality, 31 percent of Gazans expressed support for the Oct. 7 attacks, according to what the IDF characterized as the accurate polling data, representing a difference of roughly 40 percentage points.
On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas slaughtered roughly 1,200 people throughout southern Israel, captured roughly 250 hostages, and engaged in a systematic rape campaign against women.
Only 23 percent of Gazans indicated that Hamas made the “incorrect” decision to execute the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, according to the original data. In contrast, over 64 percent of Gazans responded that Hamas made the wrong decision to attack Israel, according to the allegedly accurate data.
The purportedly fabricated polling results suggested that a plurality of Gazans support the use of violence to achieve “Palestinian goals.” The authentic polling data indicated far higher support for non-violent methods, the IDF said.
According to the allegedly fabricated polling results, 39 percent of Gazans support engaging in “armed activity” against Israel. Comparatively, according to the faked data, only 23 percent and 27 percent of respondents believe Palestinians should pursue their goals through “political negotiations” and “non-violent popular resistance,” respectively.
Almost 50 percent of Palestinians in Gaza support engaging in “political negotiations” with Israel, according to the authentic polling data, and nearly 21 percent of Gazans support “non-violent popular resistance.” Only 28 percent of Gazans back “armed activity” against the Jewish state, the same polling data showed.
Moreover, the allegedly authentic polling data suggested that Palestinians are far less bullish on Hamas’s chances of defeating Israel than previously thought.
The faked data indicated that 56 percent of Gazans believe Hamas would “win” the ongoing war in Gaza. The same data set also showed that 18 percent of Gaza civilians think that Israel will defeat Hamas.
In what the IDF described as the accurate data set, only 30 percent of Gaza civilians believe the terrorist group will trounce the Jewish state, and more than 51% of Gazans think that Israel will defeat Hamas.
The IDF argued that the Hamas terrorist group doctored the polling results to bolster the appearance of its own popularity, noting there’s no evidence to suggest PSR was complicit.
“There’s no evidence PSR was involved — Hamas did this on its own. This just proves how far Hamas is willing to go to keep up the appearance of strength,” IDF posted on X/Twitter.
The data appears to undermine the belief that the vast majority of Palestinians support Hamas and its Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel.
The post Hamas Falsified Polling Data to Indicate Higher Support for Oct. 7 Among Gaza Civilians, IDF Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Treasure Trove explores Israel’s treatment at the United Nations
On May 11, 1949, after the Security Council concluded that Israel is a peace-loving nation, the General Assembly of the United Nations decided to admit the Jewish state as the 59th member of the United Nations. The UN now has 193 members. United Nations Resolution 181 dated Nov. 29, 1947 called for the creation of […]
The post Treasure Trove explores Israel’s treatment at the United Nations appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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Israel Blasts UN Chief for Demanding Stop to West Bank Operation Amid Threat of Return to Suicide Bombings
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks at the UN headquarters in New York City, US, before a meeting about the conflict in Gaza, Nov. 6, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs
Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon took a swipe at UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres for demanding an end to the Jewish state’s counterterrorism operations in the West Bank at a time when Palestinian leaders have called for a return to suicide bombings against Israel.
Danon on Thursday morning defended the West Bank operations, saying intervention by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is necessary to thwart potential terrorist attacks.
“Since Oct. 7, Iran has been working vigorously to introduce into Judea and Samaria [the West Bank] sophisticated explosive devices that are intended to explode in the centers of cities in Israel,” Danon posted on X/Twitter, referring to the aftermath of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel. Iran is the chief international sponsor of Hamas, providing the terrorist group with weapons, funding, and training.
“The State of Israel cannot sit idly by and wait for the spectacle of buses and cafes exploding in city centers,” the ambassador continued. “The activity of the IDF forces … is intended for the clear purpose of thwarting terrorist attacks and acts before they are carried out under Iranian direction.”
Danon was responding to Guterres, who hours earlier condemned Israel’s defensive military operations in the West Bank, arguing that they endanger the lives of innocent civilians.
“Latest developments in the occupied West Bank, including Israel’s launch of large-scale military operations, are deeply concerning. I strongly condemn the loss of lives, including of children, and I call for an immediate cessation of these operations,” Guterres posted on X/Twitter.
Overnight on Wednesday, Israeli forces killed several Palestinian terrorists who hid in a mosque during counterterrorism activities in the West Bank city of Tulkarem. One of the men killed was Muhhamad Jabber, also known as Abu Shujaa, the head of the Nur Shams terrorist network, according to a joint statement from the IDF, Israel Security Agency, and Israel Border Police. Jabber, a local commander of the Iran-backed Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist group, was one of the most wanted men in the West Bank involved in planning attacks against Israeli targets, Israeli authorities said.
Guterres’s condemnation came shortly after top Hamas official Khaled Mashal on Wednesday called for a resumption of suicide bombings in the West Bank. According to Arabic media, Mashal said during an address at a conference in Istanbul, Turkey that Palestinians should implement “actual resistance against the Zionist entity [Israel].” He also reportedly said that Hamas wanted to “return to [suicide] operations.”
Mourning the elimination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on July 31, Mashal added, “The enemy has opened the conflict on all fronts, seeking us all, whether we fight or not.”
While Hamas’s core terrorist infrastructure is in Gaza, it has operatives in the West Bank.
Last week, the military wings of both Hamas and Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for a failed suicide bombing near a synagogue in Tel Aviv. In a statement, Hamas’s Al-Qassam Brigades said its “martyrdom operations” (suicide attacks) inside Israel would continue as long as the “occupation’s massacres and assassination policy continue” — a reference to Israel’s military campaign in Gaza and and the killing of Haniyeh in the Iranian capital last month.
Israeli officials have long accused the UN of having a bias against the Jewish state. Last year, the UN General Assembly condemned Israel twice as often as it did all other countries. Meanwhile, of all the country-specific resolutions passed by the UN Human Rights Council, nearly half have condemned Israel, a seemingly disproportionate focus on the lone democracy in the Middle East.
Just weeks following the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas on Israel, the UN adopted a resolution calling for a “ceasefire” between the two sides. The UN failed to pass a measure condemning the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7.
In June, the UN put Israel on its so-called “list of shame” of countries that kill children in armed conflict. Israel is considered to be the only democracy on the list.
Since Oct. 7, top Israeli officials have called on Guterres to resign as secretary-general of the UN, arguing he is unfit to lead and emboldening terrorism.
The post Israel Blasts UN Chief for Demanding Stop to West Bank Operation Amid Threat of Return to Suicide Bombings first appeared on Algemeiner.com.