Two prominent pro-Israel lobby groups are holding private briefings in New York City to coach elected officials and well-known figures on how to influence public opinion in favor of the Israeli military’s rampage in Gaza, The Grayzone can reveal. These PR sessions, convened by the UJA-Federation and Jewish Community Relations Council, rely on data collected by Frank Luntz, a veteran Republican pollster and pundit.
The Luntz-tested presentations on the war in Gaza urge politicians to avoid trumpeting America’s supposedly shared democratic values with Israel, and focus instead on deploying “The Language of War with Hamas.” According to this framing, they must deploy incendiary language painting Hamas as a “brutal and savage…organization of hate” which has “raped women,” while insisting Israel is engaged in “a war for humanity.”
In one focus group, Luntz asked participants to state which alleged act by Hamas on October 7 “bothers you more.” After being presented with a laundry list of alleged atrocities, a majority declared that they were most upset by the claim that Hamas “raped civilians” – 19 percent than those who expressed outrage that Hamas supposedly “exterminated civilians.”
Data like this apparently influenced the Israeli government to launch an obsessive but still unsuccessful campaign to prove that Hamas carried out sexual assault on a systematic basis on October 7. Initiated at Israel’s United Nations mission in December 2023 with speeches by neoliberal tech oligarch Sheryl Sandberg and former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a recipient of hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations and speaking fees from Israel lobby organizations, Tel Aviv’s propaganda blitz has yet to produce a single self-identified victim of sexual assault by Hamas. A March 5 report by UN Special Representative on Sexual Violence Pramila Patten did not contain one direct testimony of sexual assault on October 7. What’s more, Patten’s team said they found “no digital evidence specifically depicting acts of sexual violence.”
Reminder that TheGrayzone was one of the first that exposed the fraudulent NYT rape article, which article of written by an ex-IDF soldier without journalistic experience.
More fun leaked slides from the article about the Hasbara language for our politicians and “journalists”:
Every war is a war of propaganda.
Some propaganda is true, while some is a complete fucking lie manufactured by criminal psychopaths.
The thing I struggle with is, is it moral to use true propaganda to meet your ends?
You mean information?
This isn’t a war. It’s a genocide.
Every war is also a genocide imho.
That makes about as much sense as saying “every day is also a year”
The words you use do have definitions you know. And not nearly all military conflicts rise to the level of genocide.
And this isn’t even a military conflict. It’s the IDF genociding Palestinians in an open air prison with little to no resistance.
Something tells me that Israel isn’t going to start “leading with the facts” now, out of the blue. The facts do not make them look good at all. Any reporter who uses that line should be dismissed as fake news. Are we allowed to sue newspapers for lying?
Yes. But your pockets aren’t as deep as a media giant’s is, so expect a small settlement instead.
Let’s start with the facts, Israel is committing genocide.
This is Palestinians holocaust.
Israel/US are working together to commit a war that rapes and kills babies and toddlers.
Remember Israel is committing barbaric atrocities.
Everything after October 7th: Brutal, Savage, Inhumane.
Everything before as well. Israel started this conflict a long time ago, not on oct 7th.
You type like a Facebook boomer
Theyre quoting the list above and modifying the language to reflect Israels crimes.