A War of Words

August 30, 2018

Repeat a lie often enough and it will eventually become truth. That is the propaganda law from which the Nazis reportedly wove an elaborate plot to justify the murder of six million Jews. Their approach was anything but original. Libels, slurs and slanders sold as fact are ancient weapons in the arsenal of those who seek the destruction of the Jews. And today, the enemies of Israel wield the same weapons in the onslaught of the Jewish state’s legitimacy.

An Ancient Lie with a Modern Twist

“The attacks on the Jews were always preceded by the slander of the Jews. What was done to the Jewish people then is being done to the Jewish state now. In those days we could do nothing. Today we can speak our mind, hold our ground. We’re going to do both.”  —PM Benjamin Netanyahu in a meeting with Polish Foreign Minister Grzegorz Schetyna

“BDS constitutes the modern version of the old blood libel. It is targeting Jews and Israel… It ignores any transgressions in the Arab and Muslim worlds and other locations where major atrocities take place, and it is focused on national character assassination that is aimed to set the ground for the annihilation of Israel.”  —Robbie Friedmann and Asaf Romirowsky in “The Modern Blood Libel”

“For the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful have opened against me; they have spoken against me with a lying tongue. They have also surrounded me with words of hatred…”  —King David in Psalm 109:2–3

 A Different Battlefield

 “Military supremacy is no longer enough. The war of words can matter more than bullets.”  —David Patrikarakos in “Israel is Losing the Social Media War”

 “A few years ago Israel’s wars were fought using tanks and guns and helicopters. Now it’s a new war: the war between lies and truth.”  —Yossi Dagan, chairman of the Samaria Regional Council

 “In terms of economic and military prowess, Israel is about 20 years ahead of her enemies. But when it comes to the narrative war, Israel’s haters have created a system of media and campus propaganda which is ahead of Israel’s hasbara [public diplomacy] and has managed to sow delegitimization in the hearts and minds of many. That is their chosen weapon.”  —Yishai Fleisher, broadcaster, columnist and international spokesperson for the Jewish community of Hebron

“@BBCWorld this is a formal complaint by @IsraelMFA. This title is a deliberate misrepresentation of reality (that’s the polite equivalent of ‘this is a LIE,’ if you don’t get it). Israelis were targeted by Hamas and IDF acts to protect them. Change it IMMEDIATELY!”  —Emmanuel Nahshon, Israel’s Foreign Ministry spokesman in response to an inflammatory BBC headline

 “Before I moved to Jerusalem, I was very pro-Palestinian. Almost everyone I knew was. I grew up Protestant in a quaint, politically correct New England town; almost everyone around me was liberal. And being liberal in America comes with a pantheon of beliefs: You support pluralism, tolerance and diversity… The belief that Israel is unjustly bullying the Palestinians is an inextricable part of this pantheon. Most progressives in the US view Israel as an aggressor, oppressing the poor noble Arabs who are being so brutally denied their freedom.”  —Hunter Stuart in “How a Pro-Palestinian American Reporter Changed his Views on Israel and the Conflict”

 Lights, Camera, Action!

 Pallywood: a compound word merging Palestinian and Hollywood. “A coinage used to describe media manipulation, distortion or fraud by some Palestinians putatively designed to win the public relations war with Israel… The practice of staged filming of evidence against Israel for the benefit of the Palestinians.”  —Wikipedia

“Welcome to Pallywood! Pallywood is a bustling industry of alfresco cinema, staged news filmed in real time against the back-drop of a complex conflict we all think we know. It has directors, make-up men, sets, extras—often playing dead or injured—props, plenty of camera men and large audiences. The hallmarks of Pallywood are casualties that that look more like football players acting for the referee than real injuries, ever-ready ambulances and rough evacuations that would cripple or kill a truly wounded victim.”  —Richard Landes, American historian, author and filmaker in Pallywood: According to Palestinian Sources

Hamas can’t secure a military victory, “so it wants to get people killed in order to delegitimize Israel. And the press plays into that, the press enables Hamas to win.”  —Michael Oren, deputy minister for Public Diplomacy

“Hamas wanted the casualties, Hamas wanted people to die. Hamas wanted the pictures of the wounded and the overflowing hospitals and everything else. It’s been very difficult to tell our story.”  —Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus, head of the IDF international media department

“You don’t see what it’s like to be an 18 or 19-year-old kid seeing people coming at you and know that if you let a breach of the fence happen, you’ve got 2,000 people armed with knives in Nahal Oz [Israeli community located less than a kilometer from the Gaza border]. So the only perspective you get is the Palestinians’.”             —Michael Oren, deputy minister for Public Diplomacy

“Some of Israel’s greatest friends might have preferred that we had looked better in the media… but between vanity and truth, the IDF always chooses truth. The IDF will win where it matters—protecting our civilians in the face of terror.”  —Brig. Gen. Ronen Manelis, IDF spokesperson

Source: See individual quotes