The anatomy of a smear: Gift of the Givers under fire

It is amazing what confirmation bias will do to even the most level-headed person… which is why it’s no surprise there has such an outcry about Gift of the Givers and Dr Imtiaz Sooliman for allegedly being a funder of Gaza movement Hamas.

So many people desperately wanted to buy into the “bad Muslim”, “Muslim terrorist” trope that they didn’t bother interrogating the claims made about Gift of the Givers by Lawrence Nowosenetz, former chair of the Jewish Board of Deputies.

Nowosenetz – hardly an unbiased observer – claimed that Gift of the Givers was the second non-profit organisation founded by Sooliman, the first being the South African branch of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Al Aqsa Foundation, established in 1991 which was committed to “the destruction of Israel”.

He stated that while Sooliman had distanced himself from Al Aqsa Foundation, he continued to make donations to them and to the Union of Good, which was blacklisted by the US Treasury in 2008.

ALSO READ: Gift of the Givers flooded with support after ‘terrorism’ allegations

“This means Gift of the Givers may be directly or indirectly financing Hamas.”

May be? Directly or indirectly? Hardly smoking guns there…

Why have the Americans not banned Sooliman or his organisation?

A good smear or deliberate Israeli propaganda doesn’t rely on fact, does it?

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