by Yoni Kempinski
Israel advocate Yoseph Haddad speaks with Arutz Sheva about the challenges and importance of pro-Israel activism and explains how Israel should get along with its neighbors.
Arab Israeli activist Yoseph Haddad spoke with Arutz Sheva-Israel National News about the growing challenge of advocating for Israel on the world stage.
Haddad explains that BDS supporters have millions and millions of dollars and they outnumber us because they have millions of people, from the Arab world and from the Western world, who came from the Middle East to the West.
According to Haddad, the anti-Israel side "prepared themselves for the judgment day, and the judgment day was October 7th. While we only focused on the ground - military force; we didn't focus on Hasbara (advocacy), on explaining what's going on. Today it goes together."
He says the "Arab world could not defeat Israel militarily so they focus their millions of dollars and programs into the propaganda that they are using and they put their virus everywhere: in politics, in academics, in sports, in television, everywhere. They prepared themselves for exactly this situation and that's why they are better than us. The only advantage we have is the truth backed up by the facts and they lie. Every time we expose those lies that's where we win."
To prove the importance of advocating for Israel in hostile locations, Yoseph recounts a speaking engagement in New York that only four students attended. "The event organizer came and asked 'Do you want to just call it off?' I said, 'For four people, I'm going to do a full lecture.' I did not realize who I was speaking to. At the end of the lecture, a student told me that 'next week, there is supposed to be a resolution against Israel and boycott Israel. I am the head of the student body, I am going to block it. And indeed, a week later he blocked that resolution. One student - one big change. Every voice counts and that's why I will fight for every voice."
After the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas came into effect, the terror organization celebrated it as a victory. Haddad comments on this phenomenon and states: "If we decimate Hamas, and turn Gaza into a parking lot, and one Hamas terrorist would be left, he would get up with a V sign and say 'We won.' This is Hamas. So I'm not actually impressed by it."
According to him, while Hamas may be claiming victory, the Arab world and the people of Gaza know that the organization was defeated. He explains that the reason they feel that they won while Israelis feel like they lost despite the IDF having massive successes is that "we treasure and value life and even if one Israeli was killed, for us it's the whole world. That's why we feel like this. But the Palestinians lost 40,000 people because of Hamas but they still celebrate it. They do that to try to manipulate the world, but deep down they know that they lost and they lost big time." He adds that the Arab world also understands Israel's power.
As the main front of the war moves from Gaza to Judea and Samaria, with Hamas calling on residents of the region to fight Israel, Haddad has a message for those residents: "If you don't want Jenin and Ramallah become Jabaliya and Kan Yunis - do not fight."
With a new administration in the White House, Haddad shows strong optimism: "The people who Trump chose to be in his administration. All of them are Zionists - proper Zionists. They speak better than a lot of Israeli Jews here. Donald Trump is a businessman so you can't know exactly where he will go, but we can not ignore the fact that he loves Israel and he wants to see Israel secure."
Yoseph says that President Trump also understands the Arab world and relates something an Emirati once told him: "The Arab world loved Barak Obama, but did not respect him. The Arab world hates Donald Trump, but they're afraid of him and that's why they respect him." He says that this strength and respect will lead to the expansion of the Abraham Accords between Israel and the Arab states.
He adds that he works to get Israelis to understand that "we are a Western country, but we are a Western country in the Middle East and if we do not, know how to balance those two things, we do not have the right to exist here. That's why we have to understand, if we want to be part of the Middle East, we have to speak to our enemies in the language of the Middle East."
Yoni Kempinski
Source: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/402710
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