Tyra Zafar
Overview
Tyra Zafar has expressed hatred of Israel and was an activist with anti-Israel organization Canadian Defenders for Human Rights (CD4HR) as of May 2022.As of May 2023, Zafar’s LinkedIn said she had been a human resources specialist at PFC Flexible Circuits Limited in Scarborough, Ontario, since November 2018.
Also as of May 2023, Zafar’s LinkedIn profile said she received a post-graduate professional certificate in human resources management from Centennial College School of Business in 2013. Zafar’s LinkedIn also said she studied “Business IT Systems, Business and IT” at Seneca College between 1991 and 1994.
As June 2023, Zafar’s Instagram bio said she was a “Digital creator | Beauty + Fashion + Lifestyle + Cat Lover |.”
As of May 2023, Zafar’s LinkedIn said she was located in the greater Toronto area.
As of June 2023, Zafar used the handle “@tyrazafar786” on Instagram.
Hatred of Israel
On May 7, 2021, Zafar tweeted: “Exposed: @instagram Censoring Palestinian Resistance, Covering Up Zionist Ethnic Cleansing In Sheik Jarrah, Palestine
#SaveSheikJarrah #DefendPalestine #FreePalestine #WithinOurLifetime.”In May 2021, calls to “save” Sheikh Jarrah, a Jerusalem neighborhood at the center of a property dispute, led to violence against Israelis and were one of the leading factors in Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorists firing over 4,300 rockets from Gaza into Israel that month. Israel responded by launching Operation Guardian of the Walls (OGW), carrying out targeted military strikes against the terrorists and their infrastructure in Gaza.
On May 12, 2021, during OGW, Zafar tweeted: “The World Is With Palestine
…#FreePalestine…#PalestineWillBeFree #IStandWithPalestine.” The tweet linked to a YouTube video in which activists accused [00:00:21] Israel of “genocide,” claimed [00:00:34] that “animals are given more rights than people in Palestine” and said [00:00:51]: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!”
“From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” is a chant calling to dismantle the State of Israel. It has also been employed by Hamas leader Khaled Mashal to call for the replacement of Israel with an Islamic state.
The Iranian government initiated International Quds Day in 1979, as an annual protest against Israel’s existence. The protest has historically been a platform for anti-Semitism.
The allegation that Jews “threaten” to destroy the Al-Aqsa Mosque has been a pretext for Arab attacks on Jews long before the existence of the modern Jewish state. Such propaganda has led to multiple periods of violence against Israeli civilians.
One photo showed a protester holding [slide 2] a sign that said: “A state built on the ashes of the Holocaust is now committing a holocaust against Palestinians in Gaza.”
Anti-Israel Activism (CD4HR, BDS)
On May 29, 2022, Zafar participated in a protest in Toronto planned by CD4HR with the aim of disrupting a pro-Israel event organized by the UJA [United Jewish Appeal] Federation of Greater Toronto. A flyer for the CD4HR protest said: “Walk against apartheid ‘israel’ as thousands walk with ‘israel’ to celebrate the occupation of holy Palestine.”An Instagram post by organizer Aliya Hasan thanked Zafar for marshaling the event.
A video from the protest showed [00:00:19] a sign that said: “APARTHEID ZIONIST CHILD KILLERS,” and which featured an image of the Israeli flag with blood dripping down it.
On December 26, 2021, Zafar participated in a “banner drop” by Toronto4Palestine, where activists hung a banner that promoted BDS on a bridge over a highway. While participants stood on the bridge, an activist said in Arabic: “We urge all fighters to continue to resist…and we hope that you will continue to fight.”
Among Palestinians and anti-Israel activists, the term “resistance” can be a euphemism for nationalistic terror. It is often used to excuse or even glorify anti-Israel and anti-Semitic violence.
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.
