BLM’s Hamas support is no shock, faking the ‘Russian bot’ menace and other commentary

0
8



Race beat: BLM’s Hamas Support Is No Shock

“After Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israeli civilians,” notes The Wall Street Journal’s Jason L. Riley, “BLM groups in Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington issued statements supporting Hamas’s tactics.”

What’s “shocking” isn’t their rhetoric but that “so many people who ought to have known better got played.”

In 2016, BLM labeled Israel an “apartheid state” and declared America complicit in genocide against Palestinians.

Yet in 2020, more than 600 Jewish groups, including the Anti-Defamation League, signed on to a full-page New York Times ad endorsing BLM.

“If accusing Israel of genocide isn’t defamation, I don’t know what is.”

ADL boss Jonathan Greenblatt argued it would be “foolish to cede the conversation to the most intemperate voices,” but BLM’s antisemitism, responds Riley, “isn’t a quirk.” 

Twitter files: Faking the ‘Russian Bot’ Menace

The late-2018 Senate Intelligence Committee report “showing Russia ran a major social media campaign” left many “certain Russians had used Twitter and other platforms to elect Donald Trump,” recalls Susan Schmidt at Racket News.

Yet top Twitter execs “knew a flawed research method, created by outside analysts commissioned by the Senate, was generating hundreds of false news stories.”

The consultants were from New Knowledge, and Twitter insiders for years had “little faith in New Knowledge’s methodology for identifying Russian influenced Twitter accounts.”

Plus, just days after the Senate report landed, news broke that New Knowledge had run “what the firm itself referred to as a ‘false flag’ operation” that “created thousands of fake Russian bots” to smear GOP Senate “candidate Roy Moore in a hard-fought special election.”

The folks driving the “disinformation” hysteria were the real disinfo-pushers.

War desk: The Real Context of Israel’s Conflict

“No shortage of Hamas apologists insist that the jihadists’ mass atrocities perpetrated against civilians in southern Israel and their indiscriminate rocket attacks extending to much of central Israel must be placed in context. But the apologists don’t provide a reliable account of Hamas’ motives, ideas, goals, and conduct,” complains Peter Berkowitz at RealClearPolitics.

They “suppress facts, invent narratives, and repackage outlandish neo-Marxist talking points.”

An open letter signed by hundreds of Princeton professors, students and alumni accused Israel of targeting civilians and meting out collective punishment.

But none of its links “provides evidence” — in fact, Israel is “striking legitimate military targets that Hamas has placed in densely populated civilian areas, thereby converting them into battlefields.”

Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, and two years later Hamas turned it “into an armed camp for launching war.”

Those “sincerely concerned for Gaza Palestinians should hope and pray that Israel achieves the declared aim of its just war of self-defense: Hamas’ destruction.”

From the right: Haley’s Path to Victory

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been “so focused on winning over MAGA that he’s communicated very little interest in having the support of non-Trump voters,” creating “the opening for” Nikki Haley, who is overtaking DeSantis in some polls, argues Rich Lowry at Politico. 

Haley’s approach has been to “establish dominance among the Trump-skeptical wing of the party and then use that strength to eat into soft Trump supporters willing to give her a look as she rises.”

Meanwhile, “the way DeSantis has positioned himself has created lots of natural enemies and risked pleasing no one.”

If Haley is “”the last non-Trump candidate standing and Republican voters conclude early next year that they want something new, she’ll be in position to benefit.”

Conservative: Border Crisis is No Secret

“The Biden administration has gone to great lengths to cook the books and conceal the record levels of illegal migration it has enabled,” charges Sen. John Cornyn at Fox News.

Cornyn’s Southern Border Transparency Act forces the Department of Homeland Security “to reveal the details of its shady catch-and-release practices.”

The American people deserve to “have an accurate picture of President Biden’s border policies.”

And if Biden and Democrats in Congress believe those policies “are above board, they should have nothing to hide.”

— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board