Introduction

Israel has been ramping up its propaganda expenditure as a form of soft power. Earlier this year, its Foreign Ministry received an additional $150m allocated to shaping public opinion on Israel.

As an occupying force, Israel carries out massive campaigns dedicated to legitimizing the state, readily attacking those who criticize or question its legitimacy. The focus is on marketing the state as a democracy, a safe haven for minorities and Jews fearing persecution worldwide. The premise remains, the existence of Israel as a Jewish sovereign nation protects Jews from experiencing another holocaust, and so, when criticizing the existence of Israel or Zionism as a political and ideological project built on the ethnic cleansing of a population, one is rendered anti-semitic, in support of another holocaust taking place (all while ignoring and supporting a holocaust unfolding in Gaza).

This affiliation is not reached through mere coincidence or fact-based evidence; it is instead a result of decades of paid Hasbara propaganda conflating antisemitism with antizionism, instilling fear in opposing occupation, ethnic cleansing, and genocide. Today, criticism of Israel has not only been labelled, but also institutionalized, as anti-semitic. This is done in an effort by Hasbara groups to shield the sovereignty of Israel against criticism.

Hasbara, a Hebrew word coined by Nahum Sokolow, directly translates to “explaining,” however, encompassing broader public diplomacy and propaganda efforts dedicated to the constant polishing of Israel’s image. This is prevalent in all aspects of life: the arts, politics, academia, and even infiltrating children’s video games. There is also a type of propaganda that is especially deployed in times of crises, as a crisis-management tactic, to counter attacks in response to the actions of Israel. Both forms work alongside one another to establish a firm base against criticism of Israel, and the United States has provided the most backing for this.

Since coming to power, Trump’s administration has utilized U.S. domestic policy to ensure the protection of Israel in the public and private spheres, with a special crackdown on freedom of speech and academic freedom, securing a future for Israel resistant to condemnation.

Hasbara on American Campuses

“You have got to learn to fight the political battle, which is even more important at this point than the military battle… If the war against Israel ever had to be fought on Israeli soil, do I have to tell you? It’s an impossibility. So it’s the same thing, don’t let the war of words ever be fought about Israel’s nature. Let it be fought about why you can’t accept Israel, why you have to single out this tiny people…teach them (American Jews) how to defend by attacking” – Ruth Wisse

This statement by Ruth Wisse, a Harvard professor of Yiddish and Comparative Literature, sums up deflection in hasbara tactics. She explains to the Jewish Americans in the audience that they should, in protecting Israel, defend its position by attacking the values/humanity of the person opposing them. This is a tactic that has been especially utilized post October 7 and serves the most powerful in the fight against freedom of speech in response to Israel’s crimes. Students often undergo Hasbara training not only to advocate for Israel on campus, but to fight for the silencing of pro-Palestinian speech.

The Hasbara Fellowship Israel Program, for example, regularly introduces and immerses 40 North American university students into Israel. According to their website, the goal is for students “to return to campus as more effective and informed pro-Israel activists” as they meet with Israeli “political, military and business communities.” The highly-subsidized program ($500 for round-trip flights from and to North America, accommodation, transportation, and programs)  runs a couple of times in the summer and winter, each trip lasting 10-13 days, and following their return, students continue “to receive support and resources from Hasbara staff.”

These trips aim to create little ambassadors for Israel across North American university campuses, reinforcing narratives taught to them on their “educational” trip. According to their website, students “learn, plan, and strategize ways to combat antisemitism and anti-Israel propaganda on campus, while developing strategies to effectively and consistently promote a pro-Israel message.” Therefore, students return to their campuses eager and prepared to disseminate the propaganda they were taught on their mission, playing a vital role in campaigns against freedom of speech and the crackdown on activism prevalent in the U.S.

These funded trips are done in a coordinated effort from Israeli hasbara groups to equip students across North American universities with Hasbara skills of deflection and victimization necessary to combating criticism against Israel, further affecting university dynamics that prioritize the perceived safety of a group of students over another.

Freedom of Speech and the Ivy Leagues

Across North America, students occupied their campuses protesting and setting up encampments in attempts to pressure universities to boycott, divest from, and sanction Israel in response to its genocide in Gaza, and to reject the US’s role in it. Students opposing their university’s role in advancing the war (whether through direct investments in arms manufacturers or their adoption of a pro-Israeli narrative) were met with severe repression from university body and police, infamously for example, Columbia University, which violently deployed police on its students arresting students and graduates involved in the encampments.

The encampment at Columbia, commencing on April 17, 2024, and lasting 14 days, was eye-opening on the level of influence Hasbara has on American politics and academia. The renowned Ivy League responded to students’ demands with mass arrests along with expulsion and the revocation of degrees, an exaggerated response to student activism in a country that projects itself as a democracy.

Dubbed as antisemitism, Israel, under the auspices of the American government, is working to permeate a narrative villainizing university students opposing genocide. The Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), for example, has been spearheading antisemitism campaigns against student activists. Cited in congressional hearings on student protests and encampments, ISGAP reports were presented as evidence to deny students their freedom of speech. The institute, which receives funding from an Israeli propaganda agency closely tied to the Israeli government, specifically the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, along with the Ministry of Diasporic Affairs, continues to play a significant role in the Trump Administration’s response to pro-Palestine protests on campus. Their corroborated efforts to frame anti-zionism as antisemitism and therefore redefine it under US law set a dangerous precedent in which antisemitism becomes weaponized for foreign strategic leverage.

Trump’s Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism

Earlier this year, Trump announced his executive order to advance Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism. Following his order, the Justice Department created a Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism. This multi-agency task force has been at the forefront of tackling “antisemitism” in educational institutions, ensuring compliance with Trump’s order after universities witnessed widespread protests against Israel. Thus far, the task force has frozen funding for Harvard and Columbia and is investigating the University of Washington.

On March 7th, 2025, the Task Force announced the cancellation of $400 million in federal grants to Columbia University due to the “School’s continued inaction in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students.” The task force sent a letter to the university a week later with the necessary steps, including nine action points, awaiting Columbia’s response. Later the same month, Columbia released a statement with its plan to redesign various aspects of its structure, implementing a comprehensive strategy in adherence to the necessary steps outlined in the letter.

The strategy is separated into four categories, accepting of most of the requests in the letter including increasing the presence of police-like security on campus (able to arrest students & works alongside federal agents), advancing the university’s Tel Aviv Center, enhancing university laws against protests and encampments, and appointing a new Senior Vice Provost to oversee programs on the Middle East, ensuring “neutrality” and a “comprehensive and balanced” education system.

This persistent attack on academic freedom reflects long-term intentions to entrench Israeli propaganda dedicated to criminalizing criticism of Israel on an institutional level. As a result, pro-Palestine students continue to be brutally arrested from their universities, risking expulsion and deportation in many cases. The arrests of scholars and students like Mahmoud Khalil, Mohsen Mahdawi, Rumeysa Öztürk, Badar Khan Suri, and the intimidation lawyers face in defending them embody a clear commitment to the status quo, benefiting the United States’ strategic interest at the expense of its democratic values.

This intimidation, however, has not deterred the people from protesting the genocide unfolding, despite the grave consequences faced.

Countering Hasbara

Social media has been unequivocally at the forefront of dismantling hasbara propaganda. Israel’s bombardment on Gaza has been described as the first live-streamed—yet the most denied—genocide, documented by the very people under persecution, challenging the Israeli narrative dominant in the news.

In attempts to break the powerful narrative coming from the heart of Gaza, social media has become heavily censored as platforms have systematically silenced Palestinian voices. According to leaked data, a study finds that Meta (under which Instagram and Facebook operate) has been heavily censoring Palestinian speech, automatically removing posts in support of Palestine along with accepting “94% of takedown requests issued by Israel since October 7.” Insider data finds that while governments usually request takedowns of social media posts within the borders of their states, Israel has been primarily focused on broadening its censorship, affecting states globally. According to a Human Rights Watch report, platforms under Meta have been the most censoring of Palestinian speech, while platforms like TikTok saw fewer instances.

Meta’s systemic and global censorship of Palestinian speech is unsurprising due to its ties to the Israeli government and its propaganda units; many of Meta’s senior leaders have direct affiliation with the Israeli government. Shira Anderson, for example, Meta’s head of AI policy, has previously served (as a non-Israeli citizen) in the IDF voluntarily—and proudly, working under the Military Strategic Information Section, contributing to public relations and propaganda for the Israeli government. Anderson, now in charge of Meta’s AI policy, holds decisive powers in content management, public relations, and AI policies, influencing content viewed by Meta users. Anderson is one among many other Meta employees affiliated with the Israeli government’s propaganda unit, playing a role in the construction of a pro-Israeli narrative marked by censorship and suppression.

Concluding Remarks

At the heart of Hasbara propaganda lies a particular global image of Israel that has come under extreme scrutiny, shattering post Oct. 7. The illusion of a democratic state has eroded despite relentless efforts from Hasbara groups to influence public opinion. Israel, with unequivocal support from the US, is working to consolidate a reality whereby opposing genocide is incriminating, therefore maintaining a world order that justifies the annihilation and systematic starvation of over 2 million people.

Hasbara’s influence on American academia, domestic policies, and public opinion intends to redefine antisemitism within American law, providing a cover for Israel as it continues with its genocidal project.