By Alison Weir
If Americans Knew has produced a short video in response to an advertising campaign being launched by Israel’s Ministry for Diaspora Affairs. (The video is below.)
According to Jewish News Service (JNS), the new Israeli ads will be platformed by such news outlets as CNN, The New York Times, Fox News, Le Monde, BFMTV and Bild, and will also be promoted on YouTube and X and through Google’s search engine. They were produced in English and translated into Arabic, French, Russian, German and Spanish.
The new Israeli campaign is reportedly a response to growing, world-wide hostility to Israeli actions in Gaza. It was launched after 15 months of Israel’s latest war on Gaza, during which Israeli forces had killed over 60,000 people, mostly women and children; leveled most of Gaza; intentionally starved the population; and raped and tortured numerous men and women.
A video produced by the project is currently on YouTube and has received 257,000 views. It depicts a Palestinian boy going to school, where, according to the video, he is taught to hate Israelis.
The video ignores the fact that a recent study of Palestinian textbooks “largely disproves allegations of widespread incitement to hatred and violence in Palestinian textbooks” and “concludes the textbooks overall adhere to UNESCO standards.”
Meanwhile, a distinguished Israeli academic found that Israeli schoolbooks (and by extension, Israeli schools) inculcate Israeli children with suspicion, fear and hatred of Palestinians.
The new Israeli campaign is drawing on a massive public relations budget.
Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) reported in December: “Israel has spent millions trying to win hearts and minds abroad. It’s about to spend 20 times more.”
According to JTA, Israel’s Foreign Ministry will receive $150 million on top of what it’s already given for “hasbara” (Israel advocacy, or, as many define it, propaganda.)
JTA reports that the expanded PR budget “comes as public opinion about Israel in the United States and elsewhere around the world has been intensely battered as a result of a war that has left the neighboring Gaza Strip in ruins with much of its population facing displacement, disease, and hunger.”
JTA reports that officials say the $150 million will be used to “influence sentiment in the foreign press and on social media.” The plan is to be carried out “in cooperation with American Jewish groups and alongside similar efforts by the Diaspora Affairs Ministry.”
(Some of this money may come from American taxpayers, since US politicians pandering to the Israel lobby gave Israel over $18 billion in 2024. Israel has a history of using U.S. aid to influence Americans.)
Jewish Insider reports that there have been “brainstorming sessions with a wide array of individuals and groups who are involved in pro-Israel advocacy around the world.” Participants include “social media influencers, cultural figures, professional hasbara advocates and representatives of various Jewish groups.”
According to JNS, the head of international campaigns at the Diaspora ministry stated that their new advertising will “bring the facts to the attention of international public opinion.”
“The propaganda war is a daily war and is critical to the State of Israel in terms of its legitimacy in the world,” he stated.
When If Americans Knew learned of the Ministry’s campaign and saw its video, the organization decided to create a video to set the record straight. This replicates the visual style of the Israeli video but depicts the factual experience for Palestinian students.
Video by If Americans Knew, a nonpartisan American nonprofit organization.
The video portrays an average day for Palestinian students in the West Bank. Some days are far worse, with Israeli tanks invading their communities.
On February 5th, Amnesty International reported: “Under the cover of the relentless bombardment and atrocity crimes in Gaza, Israeli forces have unleashed unlawful lethal force against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, carrying out unlawful killings and displaying a chilling disregard for Palestinian lives.”
The Israeli military launched “‘Operation Iron Wall” in late January, systematically emptying entire West Bank refugee camps. On March 20, Israeli forces stripped, detained, humiliated, and terrorized two Palestinian children.
If Americans Knew is a nonprofit organization that has worked to give Americans the facts on Israel and Palestine for over 20 years despite death threats and defamation.
The organization is hoping to promote the video in the same locations that platform the Israeli one, and is requesting donations to make this possible.
Tax-deductible donations can be contributed on their website or mailed to them. Anyone who is tired of Israeli government lies and barbarity is invited to contribute.
Alison Weir is executive director of If Americans Knew, president of the Council for the National Interest, and author of Against Our Better Judgment: The Hidden History of How the U.S. Was Used to Create Israel. See her presentation on the issue here. Portions of this article are taken from her previous report on the Israeli ad campaign.
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