Sunday, September 15, 2024
Elder of ZiyonI saw in an Arabic website that Freeman claimed that "Ultimately, Israel has a goal not only to empty Palestine of Palestinians, but also to dominate its region." He added that there is a military badge worn by some people in the Israeli Defense Forces "showing Greater Israel , which includes parts of Egypt , northern Saudi Arabia , all of Jordan , Syria, Lebanon, and even the Euphrates in Iraq, that is, parts of Iraq."
I could not find this specific interview, but I saw where Freeman made the claim about the "military badge" on a mailing list on June 19:
He is claiming that IDF soldiers publicly display a map of "greater Israel" showing their goal to conquer all the land from the Nile to the Euphrates, with the Hebrew phrase "The Promised Land of Israel."
Where did he find this photo?
It was first tweeted by anti-Israel journalist Motasem A Dalloul (profile: "Follow me to help me expose #IsraeliCrimes and #GazaGenocide") on June 16. He gave no source as to where he found this. It spread, using a lot of fake accounts, and then was then picked up by a Jordanian site Roya News where it went viral.
There is no evidence of such a patch on sale, or any photos of it before this date. Ryan McBeth, an open source intel analyst, did some research on it and found (among other things) that IDF policy does not allow any unauthorized patches on uniforms. However, I have seen at least one soldier wear a "Moshiach" patch so I don't know how well this is enforced. (And the Moshiach patch, which can be found online, might even be authorized.)
From my own perspective, the fact that the image uses a green-tinged grey scale indicates to me that it was easier for someone to Photoshop a grey scale image - color is much more difficult. The "Greater Israel" patch is also much brighter than the Israeli flag patch,
In short, the only source for this image is highly suspect. No Gazan could have taken that photo and no Israeli source can be found for it. One can be certain that if soldiers were wearing such patches, Haaretz and +972 would be reporting it.
McBeth rates the chances of this being a legitimate image as "highly unlikely" and based on the pattern of social media spreading it in the three days between the initial post and Freeman's post, that it is likely part of a disinformation campaign.
This story is about as credible as the Arab insistence (that Yasir Arafat spread) that the two blue lines on the Israeli flag represent the Nile and the Euphrates.
Freeman did not do any research. He saw the post and immediately assumed it is legitimate.
Because that's how antisemites think - they work backwards from their pre-existing hate to make any "evidence" fit the crime.
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