Israeli Gov't Attempts to Discredit Flotilla with Hoax Video Claiming Flotilla Is Anti-Gay

Efforts to discredit the flotilla have been made through social media. But a YouTube video promoted by Israeli government offices and purporting to show a gay rights activist whose offer of help was spurned by flotilla planners has turned out to be a hoax.

In the video, a man identifying himself as Marc claims that his offer on behalf of a network of gay rights activists to bring supplies to the flotilla was rejected. He warns that the organizers of the flotilla were embracing Hamas, one of whose leaders had denounced homosexuals as “a minority of perverts.”

“Be careful who you get in bed with,” Marc says. “You might wake up next to Hamas.”

The video was posted on the private Twitter account of an intern working in the office of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, and later cited in Twitter feeds from the Israeli Government Press Office and the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

After the Electronic Intifada, a pro-Palestinian Web site, identified the man in the video as Omer Gershon, an Israeli actor from Tel Aviv, the press office apologized on Twitter for promoting a hoax and the Foreign Ministry removed a link to the video on its Twitter feed. A spokesman for Netanyahu said the intern had acted without authorization.


Israel ramps up campaign against Gaza aid flotilla
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/israel-ramps-up-campaign-against-gaza-aid-flotilla/2011/06/28/AG59dbpH_story.html

What does fraudulent "anti-gay flotilla" video tells us about Israeli hasbara strategy?
http://electronicintifada.net/node/10117