It Should Terrify Everyone that the Left is Falling for Radical Islamist Propaganda Right Now

It’s time to start listening — when radicals are saying “by any means necessary,” they mean it.

Imagine amidst a global surge in terrorism that you see a post on social media, and it says “Glory to the martyrs. Long live the resistance.” Who do you think posted this? Were you imagining something along the lines of an ISIS terrorist? Alas, these were the words posted by an ex-friend of mine; an atheist, queer, transgender, polyamorous mixed-race Black leftist living in Brooklyn.

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident. To the shock of many (and very much predicted by others), so-called progressives have been coming out in droves over the past several weeks to defend Hamas. You read that correctly — they are not coming out to promote peace and sovereignty and liberation for Palestinian people (and Jewish people), but specifically to glorify the very terrorists that tortured, raped, kidnapped, beheaded, and executed more than 1400 babies, children, elderly, men, and women civilians just over three weeks ago.

Yes, the Left is increasingly sympathizing with the terrorists who use Palestinian civilians as human shields, the ones that will kill or incarcerate people for being LGBT, the ones that steal humanitarian aid and infrastructure from their own people in order to endlessly bomb Israeli civilians. Those guys.

And make no mistake, this should concern every single person living in the West, and anyone who values democracy and freedom. The narrative framing of the incomprehensibly barbaric pogrom that victimized Israeli (and non-Israeli! This was indiscriminate killing of anyone in Israel, which included Nepali, French, Russian, American, Chinese, and many, many other people) civilians as “freedom fighting” or “decolonizing” is a grim warning to people across the world, but especially in the West: You are next.

Since Donald Trump’s rise in 2016, but especially following the tragic events of George Floyd’s murder in 2020, there has been a resurgence of radicalism in the United States to combat white nationalism. While this time has been illuminating in shedding light on many injustices marginalized people face in the United States, it has also cultivated a dogmatic radicalism — especially in younger people — that is intrinsically and unapologetically violent.

The phrase “By any means necessary,” popularized by Frantz Fanon, now reverberates through many leftist and activist circles. “Did you think decolonizing was going to be non-violent?” many leftists playfully asked their followers in response to the events of 10/7. Of course, the irony is not lost that many of these people championing horrific acts of terror as “liberation” are white people who are themselves sitting on stolen land. Many are not.

When activists chant about “Land back!” (which, to be clear, there does need to be a concerted effort to restore autonomy, sovereignty, and resources back to Native Americans), and when they say “No justice, no peace!” in response to the gross injustices Black Americans are facing, what do they mean? What exactly is the statute of limitations on “by any means necessary?” According to the logic of these activists, the acts of 10/7 are not only entirely justifiable, they are the pinnacle of ideal “resistance.”

The president of the Student Bar Association at NYU Law School (pictured below with her friend, both of whom were proudly removing flyers of Israeli children taken hostage) doubled down after publishing a letter immediately following the massacre and mass rapes of 10/7, blaming it entirely on the Jews. These are not merely “intellectuals” and members of the “left” who influence social justice, but literally future attorneys in America.

It should terrify everyone that universities across America are seeing antisemitism normalized. Jewish students at Cooper Union were offered the ability to hide in the attic as pro-Palestinian protesters attempted to break into the library to assault them. This is not 1939 — this is 2023. University professors have praised Hamas’s attack as “exhilarating” and forced Jewish students to stand in the corner after labeling them “colonizers.”

There is a creepily racist and infantilizing narrative in leftist spaces that the Arab world is wholly and intrinsically good, that Arab Muslim people are incapable of causing any harm, and that any harm that they do cause is the fault of America and the West. The incapacity for critical thought in leftist spaces seems to have caused them to forget the simple fact that human beings are flawed everywhere — and all people across time and space have been imperfect and sometimes violent and colonial long before America even existed. These same people either conveniently forget or actively wish to return to the imperialism of an Islamist caliphate.

So here we are, where the Left, setting the tone for the morality and actions of liberals across the board (especially for younger people), is inciting another “flood” like what happened in Israel on 10/7 to indiscriminately kill, maim and torture Jews across the world.

And it isn’t just the average “anarcho-Marxist” who attends a $70k/year university peddling this kind of hateful propaganda. Even the so-called “liberal media,” including the New York Times has been complicit in promulgating the same type of radical Islamist propaganda.

NYT was among several “liberal” publications that took the word of Hamas as fact and published an incendiary report claiming that Israel had bombed a hospital in Gaza, which was disproven and demonstrated to be a misfired missile coming from the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. But the damage was done — before an overdue editor’s note (and after they re-hired a journalist who literally praised Hitler), the Times and similar outlets did irreparable damage to international relations, and put Jews worldwide in harm’s way.

Tens of thousands of fake accounts on social media are helping to fuel anti-Israel hatred and disinformation in the war against Hamas. Research shows strong indications of Russian interference online in spreading hatred and disinformation against Israel as well (not that this should surprise anyone, given what we know about Russian interference in American elections). Iran and Qatar are also providing cash, resources, and refuge for Hamas terrorism. Not to be left out of the totalitarian party, China has also been accused of spreading antisemitism and disinformation about Israel through their state media.

It’s interesting that Western liberalism, which has long been philosophically aligned with democracy and free speech and human rights, is siding with not only radical Islamism (which is foundationally opposed to all of those things), but with the likes of Russia, China and Iran.

But make no mistake, liberals who are looking to fools like Ijeoma Oluo or Adrienne Maree Brown to lazily define their entire worldview and morality — they will come for you next.

I leave you with the words of Mahmoud al-Zahar, Senior Hamas Commander: “The entire planet will be under our law, there will be no more Jews or Christian traitors.”