A diverse delegation of
Israelis will arrive in the US next week with the Reservists on Duty
organization to expose audiences to the reality on the ground for Israelis of
different religious and ethnic backgrounds.
While the number of
organizations dedicated to smearing Israel’s image on American college campuses
remains at an all-time high, a special group of Israelis, some of whom are IDF
veterans, has taken it upon themselves to expose the lies and half-truths that
pass as “facts” in the world of higher education.
This group, called
Reservists on Duty (RoD), has been challenging gatherings in America to
question the slanted narrative about Israeli society, which demonizes both the
government and people of Israel.
Next week, RoD will send
a unique group of Israelis to the US, composed of Muslim, Christian and Druze
citizens.
The group, which has
cleverly dubbed itself “Arabs Breaking the Silence,” “want to talk about their
personal experience in Israel. … to refute the claims that BDS organizations
are spreading against us,” said the group’s spokesman, Jonathan Elkhoury. “They use us, Israel’s minorities, to slander Israel and say that it is
racist and discriminates against its minorities, and we will say otherwise,”
Elkhoury explained.
Elkhoury, an Israeli
Christian who was born in Lebanon, is no stranger to real discrimination and
hate. On a previous trip to the US with RoD in May, the man was subjected
to verbal abuse from anti-Israel demonstrators at
the University of California-Irvine which became so severe that the police were
required to escort the speakers from the facility.
Hate-filled
demonstrations such as these have not phased RoD speakers. In 2017 alone, 50
volunteers traveled to over 15 campuses throughout America “to educate and give
truth to the lies BDS activists spread about the IDF and State of Israel,”
explains RoD’s website. During these activities, RoD groups “visited Jewish and
Christian communities and forged personal connections with community leaders.”
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