An anti-Israel campaign was launched this week on the public transportation system in the western Canadian city of Vancouver, by a coalition of seven pro-Palestinian organizations. The campaign consists of 15 bus posters illustrating the “disappearance of Palestine due to Israeli occupation over the past 65 years.”
The group that created the campaign, the Palestine Awareness Coalition, published a statement: “This campaign is intended to raise awareness about a complicated issue. [We] find the 65 year-long Israeli occupation of Palestine an international outrage and an ongoing punishment of the Palestinian people.”
The organization is fully aware that these controversial ads will concern “a number of traditional Jewish organizations that have tried to suppress the ads.”
TransLink has refused to take them down because “these are educational ads that are well within national advertising guidelines and the Canadian Charter,” said a coalition member.
Vancouver SkyTrain station has become the latest platform for the misleading anti-Israel propaganda ads, boasting a large mural that depicts the territory of “Palestine” steadily shrinking into the state of Israel in a succession of dated maps.
“The ad is just one more attempt to literally wipe Israel off the map thereby making common cause with terrorist entities like Hamas or Hezbollah,” said the CEO of B’nai Brith Canada, Frank Dimant, to Canada Free Press. “We encourage members of the community to write to Translink and let them know that such a vicious campaign is not welcome and should be stopped by pulling the ads immediately.”
“If the transit system will be used to attack Israel and the Jewish people, who is next?” said another Jewish leader in the community.
The cost of the campaign is 15 thousand dollars and will last for four months. The Palestine Awareness Coalition plans to take the campaign to other Canadian cities later this year.
The Palestine Awareness Coalition has also put out a short animated video, created by the Jewish Voice for Peace in San Francisco, which presents the conflict with one-sided facts, calling for a solution to “the tremendous harm that Israeli occupiers are causing for the Palestinian people.”
