Oxfam the First Target of Israel’s ‘Media Blitz’

A quick timeline of the backstory:

Late last month, international charity Oxfam split with “ambassador” Scarlett Johansson over her involvement with SodaStream, an Israeli company with a factory in the occupied West Bank settlement of Ma’aleh Adumim. SodaStream accused Oxfam of having joined the BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanction) movement against Israel.

A week and a half ago, Israel held a ministerial meeting about a planned “media blitz” against boycott backers, ordering its spies to dig up dirt to use against them and openly plotting to portray them all as supporters of terrorism.

You can see where this is going.

Today, it was announced that Oxfam is being threatened with a lawsuit by Israeli NGO Shurat Hadin, which was founded in 2003 explicitly to sue opponents of the Israeli government. They are accusing Oxfam of having ties with a pair of Palestinian charities, which Shurat Hadin claims are “instrumentalities of the terrorist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).”

Oxfam hasn’t responded to the totality of the allegations but insisted in the past that its support for one of the charities, the Union of Health Workers Committees (UHWC) was not a problem, and that the UHWC is registered to legally operate in Israel.

Still, the first whiff of Oxfam as a “terrorist organization” is out there, and it’s likely not to be the last, if Israel’s planned media blitz continues to progress.

9 thoughts on “Oxfam the First Target of Israel’s ‘Media Blitz’”

  1. Oxfam should sue the NGO for filing a SLAPP suit and hit them for all they've got. They should also sue the individual officers. There are many causes of action and the last thing the Israelis need right now is the publicity that they will sue someone for terminating a relationship in which the celebrity is doing business or advocating doing business with an illegal entity. My sense is that Shurat Hadin should get it good and hard in Court, and with both barrels.

  2. What a ridiculous idea. The israelis are loosing it completely. With everybody being pretty much sick of the war on terror and becoming aware that they always call their enemies terrorists or antisemites and both accusations are losing any real meaning. But accusing Oxfam of material support for terrorism, which could have people put into solitary confinement in a SHU somewhere, when Oxfam has a tremendous record fighting for human life…what a miscalculation. People already think Netanyahu cries wolf and this will discredit the accuser more than the accused. How bloody stupid.

  3. Israel should renew its links with Hollywood movie producers and the US media. Its propaganda effort is becoming embarrassingly inept. The hasbara have not been given much to work with, poor dears.

    No doubt Abe Foxman and Alan Dershowitz will shortly pop up telling us that Oxfam is 'antisemitic'. As Justin Raimondo says, for these guys it's always 1938 with a new terrorist Hitler, always and always and always…

    Half the Jews in the States don't even buy that line any more and feel mortified to be associated with the racist fruitcakes of 'the Jewish state'. Read Max Blumenthal's 'Goliath' if you want to know what the One True Democracy in the Middle East is turning into.

  4. Time for the reverse 'blood libel'. Whammy!

    Notice: thus far only a 'threat'. An announcement to draw flak.

  5. My guess is that Israel is pretty much running scared-not just of BDS but the likelihood of being indicted on war crimes charges over the Mavi Marmara incident in 2010 by the International Criminal Court. True Netanyahu and co are hardly likely to meekly troop en masse into the dock at the Hague, but even an indictment by the ICC would turn it into a virtual pariah- even more than it is now!

  6. Just a few clicks of your laptop mouse can take you anyplace on the Web. Satellite tv for pc and radio communication have modified the leisure business. Channels from all over the world at the moment are obtainable on your TELEVISION set, due to technology. Radio communication has made it attainable to broadcast programs to the remotest of locations. http://www.snofertilityclinic.com/

Comments are closed.