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Hamas is winning the PR war

It is shocking to ask whether Israel has lost or is losing the public relations war against Hamas, but it is worth posing the question. We are witnessing an epoch-defining communications disaster.

Because not only is Israel losing, terrorist organisation Hamas is winning. A week ago, Australia voted yes to a UN General Assembly resolution to grant ‘‘rights and privileges’’ to Palestine. This is interpreted by many in the Jewish community as rewarding Hamas for the barbaric attacks on Israel on October 7.

Recognition comes despite Hamas still holding more than 100 Israeli hostages taken in that attack (though analysts suggest it’s likely many have died in captivity). And inevitably, Palestine’s new UN status will become part of the chain of events unleashed on that day.

Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong claims the vote is not a win for Hamas because, she says, the resolution is a step towards a two-state solution, and ‘‘a twostate solution, both Israel and Palestine, is the opposite of what Hamas wants’’. This is not quite true. Hamas does not accept a two-state solution long-term because, it asserts, only Islam should rule in the Middle East. But as a Hamas leader recently indicated, it is willing to accept a temporary two-state-like solution. This, of course, would serve a strategic purpose.

So while we can safely assume Wong and the Albanese government did not mean their vote at the UN to be an endorsement of Hamas, it ultimately can be read as such.

It is easy to see why Hamas would be relaxed about acceding to a temporary two-state solution when it is winning the PR war on other fronts, putting it in a strong strategic position to realise its long-term goals. As I’ve written before, since the 1960s, universities have been incubating an anti-Israel movement which is at times indistinguishable from antisemitism.

Support for the anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign is now a staple of university life, in which groups such as Socialist Alliance have absorbed into their platforms the fight against the perceived Jewish global capitalist.

Many Jewish groups have responded by seeking their support in right-leaning media, which are willing to rail against these campus attitudes. But as commentators on these platforms have become increasingly strident, that strategy has resulted in turning a discussion about the right of Jewish people to a homeland – a question they see as standing for their very right to exist – into a partisan issue.

The louder Sky News after dark shouts, the more left-partisans learn that to be pro-Israel is unaligned with their personal politics. (Conversely, the more the ABC avoids the Jewish perspective, the more convinced right-partisans become that no pro-Palestinian arguments can have merit.) The media, political parties and even the broader population are starting to pick sides on a topic that demands nuance.

Now university students and hobby protesters are reciting Hamas’ favourite slogan, ‘‘from the river to the sea’’, at anti-Israel protests across Australia. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has said the slogan is violent and has no place here. That couldn’t prevent West Australian Labor senator Fatima Payman using it at a pro-Palestine rally outside Parliament House.

Payman, who was born in Afghanistan, is the first Muslim woman to wear the hijab in federal parliament. Rarely discussed before this war, it should now be obvious that the dispute between Israel and Palestine is not just territorial, but faith-based. Muslims are generally supportive of Palestine, regardless of their country of origin. Around the world, MPs in areas with significant Muslim voting blocs are feeling pressure from these communities to take their side against Israel.

This points to another reason why Hamas can be quietly confident that things are heading in the right direction for its purposes. In Australia, a new organisation, Muslim Votes Matter, has been formed to influence political outcomes, and Muslim advocacy groups are undertaking media training.

These things are not in themselves sinister – many interest groups lobby governments to make themselves heard. But with Muslim groups becoming more powerful throughout the Western world and feeling the connection to the Palestinian cause through shared faith, the negotiating position of whoever leads Palestine is only getting stronger.

Meanwhile, despite the fact that Israelites lived in the Jewish city of Judea before the land was renamed Palestine, Israel stands accused of colonialism, that most odious of modern sins.

For Jewish people around the world, there is a nightmarish quality to the trajectory. Since the vote at the UN, Albanese has acknowledged that antisemitism is being expressed more openly than at any other point in his lifetime. More to the point, it has come back so soon that some Holocaust survivors are still alive to see it.

After decades of relying on education to ensure that anti-Jewish sentiment never rises again, it is devastating that antisemitism is manifesting in concentrated form on university campuses. For universities, the preference of the encamped protesters for slogans over arguments is a brand-damaging demonstration of the way education can render people stupid.

For Jewish students, it’s a live reenactment of their grandparents’ plight: they can remove outward evidence of their Judaism and hope they’re not spotted, or answer to the protesters’ satisfaction the question of whether they are, or have ever been, a supporter of Zionism.

Most horrifying is the growing realisation that the public relations strategies they have been relying on to prevent this moment from coming again have been outflanked by an opponent which contains elements who wish for their destruction. But then, totalitarians have always been good at propaganda.

Parnell Palme McGuinness is managing director at campaigns firm Agenda C. She has done work for the Liberal Party and the German Greens.

Article link: https://www.smh.com.au/world/middle-east/why-israel-is-losing-the-pr-war-20240517-p5jegt.html
Article source: Sydney Morning Herald | Parnell Palme McGuinness | 19 May 2024

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