INTERNET HASBARATS

RE:Bombastic, bullying and preposterous Netanyahu epitomizes the toxic hasbarat

by Greg Felton 10/15/09

Blog gregfelton.com 9/30/09

"Israel’s colony on thePotomacprepared to sabotage the report, the UN’s darkest days may in fact soon be upon us. Israel’s strategy for opposing The Goldstone Report consists of ignoring its contents, misrepresenting it, shouting it down, and forcing the UN to change the laws of war to legalize genocide.

What is a "hasbarat"? Is this a real word or a made up term to describe the irrational name-calling zionist- Israel defenders.

According to Felton,

"If you have ever visited a blog or on-line discussion group on the Middle East you have doubtless had the misfortune to run into them.

They are known by the language they use: depraved sexual insults, bile, bigotry, threats, disinformation and character assassination. That’s right: I’m talking about “hasbarats,” zionist trolls who infect the Internet with hasbara, pro-Israel propaganda. Of course, mainstream media hasbarats have been around for decades, as have “hasbaratchiks,” fifth-columns in foreign governments who subvert national policies to serve Israel. The Internet, though, is the latest, some might say the greatest, propaganda playground, and Israel cannot cope with factual, passionate, well-documented stories that expose its war crimes and unrepentant criminality."

If you’ve come across a hasbarat, on-line or otherwise, you have learned that no amount of reasoned argument or intellectual maturity has any effect. That’s because hasbarats don’t care if they come across as ignorant, obnoxious, nasty or inane. All that matters for them is sabotaging criticism of Israel and support for Muslims. They're like anti-intellectual stink bombs: designed to cause maximum discomfort but have little if any real power.

The object of this Blog is not Jew hating or Israel bashing, though one wonders how this site has escaped the onslaught of the hasbarat attacks--perhaps their browsers have missed the blogspot URL. The author has encountered them by placing comments on discussion sites.

"This deliberate proliferation of on-line hasbarats raises two points. The first concerns why anyone would spend hours a day to prostitute themselves for Israel. Money, of course. Ilan Shturman, deputy director of the Israeli foreign ministry’s hasbara department (!), told an Israeli business newspaper in July that US$150,000 had been allocated for the first stage of a campaign to seed the Internet with hasbarats:

“Our people will not say: ‘Hello, I am from the hasbara department of the Israeli foreign ministry and I want to tell you the following.’ Nor will they necessarily identify themselves as Israelis. They will speak as net-surfers and as citizens, and will write responses that will look personal but will be based on a prepared list of messages that the foreign ministry developed.”

The second point is why Israel felt it had to resort to intellectual fraud on an international scale. The Internet has shown that Israel is a failed oppressor state that commits crimes against humanity as a matter of policy. The last straw for many was “Operation Cast Lead,” an act of such unspeakable unapologetic sadism that allusions to Nazi Germany are entirely appropriate."

The hasbara campaign is one of the ways the Israel propaganda machine has influenced and controlled America's foreign policy. The Israel supporters are in both political parties--not just the Lieberman faction. The leftists of Hillary Clinton and Ted Kennedy are flanked by the Christian rightists Pat Robertson and G.W. Bush.

Why are they so violently opposed to any factual discussion of the Holocaust or Iranian nuclear program and meet such discussions with 'depraved sexual insults, bile, bigotry, threats, disinformation and character assassination'?

Me thinks you object too much.

With Love and Kindness,

THE HATMAN