Israel Secretly Targets U.S. Lawmakers With Influence Campaign on Gaza War
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- Written by Sheera Frenkel | The New York Times Sheera Frenkel | The New York Times
- Published: 05 June 2024 05 June 2024
Israel organized and paid for an influence campaign last year targeting U.S. lawmakers and the American public with pro-Israel messaging, as it aimed to foster support for its actions in the war with Gaza, according to officials involved in the effort and documents related to the operation.
The covert campaign was commissioned by Israel’s Ministry of Diaspora Affairs, a government body that connects Jews around the world with the State of Israel, four Israeli officials said. The ministry allocated about $2 million to the operation and hired Stoic, a political marketing firm in Tel Aviv, to carry it out, according to the officials and the documents.
The campaign began in October and remains active on the platform X. At its peak, it used hundreds of fake accounts that posed as real Americans on X, Facebook and Instagram to post pro-Israel comments. The accounts focused on U.S. lawmakers, particularly ones who are Black and Democrats, such as Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader from New York, and Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia, with posts urging them to continue funding Israel’s military.
ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence-powered chatbot, was used to generate many of the posts. The campaign also created three fake English-language news sites featuring pro-Israel articles.
Read more at:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/05/technology/israel-campaign-gaza-social-media.html
Support the Oregon Food Bank Now!
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- Written by Peter Miller Peter Miller
- Published: 02 June 2024 02 June 2024
Reject messaging from local media outlets and the Jewish Federation of Portland that criticizing Israel and calling for unobstructed humanitarian aid is antisemitic. Add your voice to shift the narrative and demonstrate that Jewish values demand a permanent ceasefire, and an end to the occupation.
Add your name here and spread the word: https://www.jvpportland.org/food-bank-support
ICC prosecutor seeks arrest warrants for Israeli PM and Hamas officials for war crimes
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- Written by Bethan McKernan | The Guardian Bethan McKernan | The Guardian
- Published: 20 May 2024 20 May 2024
The chief prosecutor of the international criminal court has said he is seeking arrest warrants for senior Hamas and Israeli officials for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his defence minister, Yoav Gallant, a move that puts the post-second world war rules-based order to the test and presents new challenges for Israel’s western allies.
Karim Khan said his office had applied to the world court’s pre-trial chamber for arrest warrants for the military and political leaders on both sides for crimes committed during Hamas’s 7 October attack and the ensuing war in Gaza.
He named Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas chief in the Gaza Strip, and Mohammed Deif, the commander of its military wing, considered to be the masterminds of the 7 October assault, as well as Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of the group’s political bureau, who is based in Qatar, as wanted for crimes of extermination, murder, hostage-taking, rape, sexual assault and torture.
Netanyahu and Gallant are accused of extermination, causing starvation as a method of war, the denial of humanitarian relief supplies and deliberately targeting civilians.
“The world was shocked on 7 October when people were ripped from their homes, from their bedrooms in different kibbutzim … people have suffered enormously,” Khan told CNN on Monday. “We have a variety of evidence to support the applications we’ve submitted to the judges.”
“These acts demand accountability,” Khan’s office said in a statement.
The ICC has previously issued warrants for Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Muammar Gaddafi of Libya, and the Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony, but no leader of a “western-style” democracy has ever been issued a warrant. The court has moved remarkably quickly, by its usual standards, to request warrants within eight months; the case against Putin over his invasion of Ukraine took a year to build.
Read more on The Guardian
As Maxine Dexter Touts Progressive Values, Conservative Donors are Flooding Her Campaign Coffers
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- Written by TAYLOR GRIGGS | Portland Mercury TAYLOR GRIGGS | Portland Mercury
- Published: 18 May 2024 18 May 2024
Over the past two weeks, it’s become clear that Maxine Dexter’s campaign to represent Oregon’s 3rd Congressional District in the United States House has been the beneficiary of millions in donations from political action committees (PACs) with unknown contributors.
Dexter’s campaign has also received hundreds of thousands of dollars in recent contributions from individual, out-of-state donors—many of whom have donated to Republican candidates and pro-Israel groups in the past. Millions in PAC money has gone toward mailer ads attacking Susheela Jayapal, Dexter’s top opponent in the race.
Jayapal and Eddy Morales, another candidate in the race, have both spoken out strongly against the recent flood of donations. Jayapal and Morales—along with dozens of Portland voters—say Dexter hasn’t condemned the dark money spending strongly enough.
Read more on The Portland Mercury
Israel’s Meddling in US Politics Is Aggressive and Unceasing
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- Written by BRANKO MARCETIC | Jacobin BRANKO MARCETIC | Jacobin
- Published: 18 May 2024 18 May 2024
For all the periodic meltdowns about foreign interference in US elections and politics by countries like Russia, it’s actually Israel, a nominal ally, that has done far more meddling in American politics — with far more influence.
The fact is that Israeli political meddling in the United States has gone from an open secret in Washington to more-or-less public knowledge nationwide under Netanyahu’s leadership — something complained about by media commentators, US officials, intelligence officers, and prominent Jewish public figures. More and more, this political interference is not so much linked back to the Israeli government as a whole but to its most right-wing factions. And its scale, frequency, and power far outdo the meddling of any other foreign power, making Israel, in practice, closer to an adversarial state than a friendly one.
Read more: Israel’s Meddling in US Politics Is Aggressive and Unceasing