As a supporter of Israel, I’m unclear as to how additional support of Israel actually defeats “Jihad.” While one could make an argument for defeating radical Islam’s aims, they a. generally have little to actually do with Israel and more with local governments, b. cannot therefore be well accomplished through support of Israel, c. would be better served through more (not less) engagement with Arab spring leaders including not just secularists but potentially radical Islamic parties themselves, or d. by supporting a more moderate, modern strain of Islam in a political and educational form of Jihad against more radical strains attempting to hijack said Arab Spring. Of course, all of these seem to go against the wobbly train of logic in the ad.
We are, after all, talking about Pamela Geller. Logic is in short supply. This is her form of Israel advocacy, and it is quite vile. With friends like her, Israel doesn’t need enemies to fan the flames of hatred- she’s doing it quite well on her own. In response to these ads, the normally quite right-wing Anti-Defamation League said:
“The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) objected to the advertisement from the anti-Muslim group as “highly offensive and inflammatory,” but said it agreed with a federal judge’s finding that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority was wrong in rejecting it.
“We support the court’s conclusion that the ad is a form of protected speech under the First Amendment, yet we still strongly object to both the message and the messenger,” said Ron Meier, ADL New York Regional Director. “We believe these ads are highly offensive and inflammatory. Pro-Israel doesn’t mean anti-Muslim. It is possible to support Israel without engaging in bigoted anti-Muslim and anti-Arab stereotypes.” Well put.