Brooke Lober
Overview
Brooke Lober denied the Hamas terrorist war crimes of October 7, 2023, while speaking at a public hearing. She also spread anti-Semitism and hatred of Israel as a speaker at an anti-Israel rally during Israel’s war against Hamas following the terror attacks.In 2023, Lober was an activist with the anti-Israel group Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). She is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.
Lober’s activism took place during Israel’s war against Hamas terrorists. Israel launched the war, called called “Swords of Iron,” after a series of Hamas terror attacks and war crimes against Israeli civilians, including mass murder, torture, rape, beheadings and kidnappings. The atrocities were executed on October 7, 2023, and left over 1,200 Israelis dead, hundreds kidnapped and thousands wounded.
As of June 2024, Lober was listed online as a lecturer in the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley), which is located in Berkeley, California.
Also as of June 2024, Lober was listed online as having received a PhD from the University of Arizona (Arizona) in 2016.
As of the same date, Brooke’s Facebook About page said she was located in Oakland, California.
Denying Hamas Terrorist War Crimes
On November 27, 2023, Lober attended a special city council meeting in Oakland, California, titled: “Affirming Oakland’s Support For The Congressional And Worldwide Calls For Immediate Ceasefire In Gaza.” The meeting was convened to vote on a resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.When the council opened the floor to the public, Lober said [00:00:27: “The notion that this was a massacre of Jews is a fabricated narrative. Many of those killed on October 7th, including children, were killed by the IDF [Israel Defense Forces]. An amendment condemning Hamas is bald propaganda…”
Denial of the Hamas war crimes of October 7, 2023, among anti-Israel activists has been likened to Holocaust denial among neo-Nazis.
Hamas terrorists murdered at least 40 Israeli Jewish babies during its October 7, 2023, terror attacks. Some of the babies were beheaded and some were murdered in front of their parents.
Lober concluded [04:03:22]: “Even in the heartbreak of these weeks, I’m here to oppose their lies. New reports cast doubt on the initial narrative of the so-called terrorist attacks on October 7th. We now know that a large percentage of those killed on October 7th were not civilians…”
On Saturday, October 7, 2023, approximately 2,900 heavily armed Hamas terrorists breached Israel’s border with Gaza. They executed numerous war crimes on civilians, including mass murder, beheadings of children, rape of men and women, torture, kidnappings and mutilation. Hamas broadcast videos of their butchery on social media, often to victims’ accounts for families to see. Israel retaliated with a war called “Swords of Iron.” As of November 10, 2023, over 1,200 Israelis, the vast majority of them civilians, were murdered during the attacks. Hamas kidnapped 242 Israelis, including at least 30 children. At least 3,500 people were wounded, many severely.
Anti-Semitism and Hatred of Israel during a Hamas War
On October 14, 2023, Lober was featured in a Twitter video, where she spoke on behalf of JVP at an anti-Israel rally titled: “Bay Area Rally Against Genocide in Gaza.”At the rally, Lober said [00:00:03]: “...Jewish people…end this genocide, call for a ceasefire. The U.S. should not send a single weapon. The U.S. should not send a single dollar. If there’s anything we can learn from Jewish histories at all, it is to stand against genocide. Never again for anyone. Never again for anyone. Never Again is now.”
The phrase “Never Again” is often deployed as a general declaration against genocide, invoking the Nazis’ war of extermination against the Jews.
JVP
JVP was founded in Berkeley, California in 1996, as an activist group with an emphasis on the “Jewish tradition” of peace, social justice and human rights. The organization is currently led by Rebecca Vilkomerson and its board members include Israel critics Naomi Klein, Judith Butler, Noam Chomsky and Tony Kushner.
JVP, which generally employs civil disobedience tactics to disrupt pro-Israel speakers and events, consists of American Jews and non-Jewish “allies” highly critical of Israeli policies. A staunch supporter of the BDS movement, JVP claims to aim its campaigns at companies that either support the Israeli military (Hewlett-Packard) or are active in the West Bank (SodaStream).
Although several Jewish groups critical of Israeli policies, like J Street and Partners for a Progressive Israel, make efforts to operate within the mainstream American Jewish community, JVP functions outside. The group is often criticized for serving as a tokenized Jewish voice for the pro-Palestinian camp and is widely regarded as the BDS movement’s “Jewish wing.”
JVP denies the notion of “Jewish peoplehood” and has even gone so far as to refer to its own Ashkenazi (Jews who spent the Diaspora in European countries) leadership as “white supremacy inside of JVP.”
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has accused JVP of being “the largest and most influential Jewish anti-Zionist group in the United States,” and said the group “exploits Jewish culture and rituals to reassure its own supporters that opposition to Israel not only does not contradict, but is actually consistent with, Jewish values.”
The ADL also claimed that “JVP consistently co-sponsors rallies to oppose Israeli military policy that are marked by signs and slogans comparing Israel to Nazi Germany, demonizing Jews and voicing support for groups like Hamas and Hezbollah.”
According to the ADL website, JVP “uses its Jewish identity to shield the anti-Israel movement from allegations of anti-Semitism and provide it with a greater degree of legitimacy and credibility.”
BDS
The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement was founded by Omar Barghouti in 2005 to challenge “international support for Israeli apartheid and settler-colonialism.” BDS is an allegedly “Palestinian-led movement,” although leading BDS activists have admitted [00:01:01] this is not true.
One of the demands of BDS includes [point 3] what is generally known as the “right of return,” a demand discredited as a way to eliminate Israel. Barghouti said the “right of return” is a means to “end Israel’s existence as a Jewish state.”
Barghouti has said that BDS “aims to turn Israel into a pariah state, as South Africa once was.”
In his activism, Barghouti has also said [00:05:55] regarding Israel: “Definitely, most definitely, we oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine. No…rational Palestinian, not a sellout Palestinian, will ever accept a Jewish state in Palestine.”
The movement has been linked to numerous terrorist organizations and received a public endorsement from Hamas in 2017.
BDS initiatives include calling on institutions and individuals to divest from Israeli-affiliated companies, promoting academic and cultural boycotts of Israel, and organizing anti-Israel rallies, protests and campaigns.
The movement’s most notable achievement has been the infiltration of university campuses through lobbying for “BDS resolutions.” In these cases, student governments and student groups, backed by their own anti-Israel members and affiliates, have proposed resolutions on some form of boycott of, or divestment from, Israel and Israeli-affiliated entities.
Boycott resolutions, although non-binding, have been passed by student governments on numerous North American campuses.
BDS activity is often aggressive and disruptive. It has been noted that universities that pass BDS resolutions see a marked increase in anti-Semitic incidents on campus. On one campus, when the student government debated a BDS resolution, reports emerged of violent threats against those opposing it.
Social Media and Weblinks
Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/brooke.loberTwitter:https://twitter.com/brookespeeking
Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/brookestardust/ [Private]
LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/brooke-lober-b0a070117/ [Deleted]
Academia.edu:https://berkeley.academia.edu/BrookeLober
University Website:https://gws.berkeley.edu/people/brooke-lober
Personal Website:https://www.brookelobervisual.com/
Videos
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