Antisemitic TruNews “Church,” Bethlehem Bible College, and Info-Op at UMASS – Beyond the Matrix [audio]

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Rod Reuven Dovid Bryant and Jerry Gordon interview Dexter Van Zile, Christian Media Analyst of Boston-based Committee for Accuracy for Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA). Van Zile gave the latest update on extremist Christian and sinister academic groups fostering anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism – “the likes of which we haven’t seen since Father Coughlin of the 1930’s and Henry Ford.” Top of the list is TruNews, a Vero Beach, Florida church with an antisemitic news podcast and YouTube Channel. Van Zile found TruNews principals Rick Wiles, Ed Zsall and Doc Burkhart at a Christ at the Checkpoint Conference {CATC) in Bethlehem in May 2018, a pro-Palestinian Christian “peace” group that endeavors to dissuade Evangelicals from supporting Israel. He found them splicing their anti-Semitic hate into video productions of the CATC. During TruNews reports, Rick Wiles declared that Israeli Jewish rabbis are “just like Judas … looking for a political savior who will rule a political kingdom on earth, a super race that will dominate the planet. That’s really what Zionism is all about.” He also said that “Kabbalah is voodoo that Jews do” and that “If Jesus himself walked the streets of Jerusalem again, they would crucify him again. They would crucify him. They would release Barabbas and they would crucify him. Nothing has changed.” TruNews called the Impeachment Inquiry against President Trump, a “Jew Coup” intent on putting a Jewish cabal in power. It accused Trump of being a secret convert to Judaism and declared that the anti-Christ will appear as a Jewish homosexual. Despite all this, TruNews’ Ed Zsall showed up at White Press conference asking Trump a question about the “Deal of the Century” peace plan. Moreover, he showed up at an economic forum in Japan again asking President Trump questions. TruNews is not a member of the White House Press Corps, but they were given the run of the place at the Christ at the Checkpoint Conference organized by Bethlehem Bible College. Prior to that, they attended an International Security Conference in Moscow and a NATO conference in London. Van Zile noted that the Bethlehem Bible College that sponsors the Christ at the Checkpoint Conference at their Oklahoma Conference in 2018 may have crossed over to the dark side by engaging in Anti-Israel invective touting as a Jewish cabal in a picture of President Trump’s advisers. As Van Zile said, this amounts to saying that it is “now cool to be anti-Israel’ i.e., Anti-Semitic. The Bethlehem Bible College, which has a US NGO that raises funds here, didn’t respond to Van Zile’s concerns. In effect it is promoting anti-Israel doctrine in the US. Christians, as he points out, have little standing in the Muslim-majority Palestinian society. The Palestinian Authority rewards the College for its hostility towards Jews and its connections to US Church sponsors. Van Zile discussed his own involvement lodging a complaint with the Chancellor of the University of Massachusetts over anti-Israel counter-factual documentaries produced by head of the Communications Department, Professor Sut Jhally. Jhally declared at a Beirut conference that college classrooms provide a captive audience to spread anti-Israel doctrine. As Van Zale pointed out Jhally rigs his examinations in such a way as to produce grades for affirming Jhally’s anti-Israel doctrine. Van Zile, who has a daughter in college, asserts that Jhally uses his position to deprive students at UMASS of a liberal education. This is an outrage, Van Zile asserts, particularly since the annual cost for in-state students to attend UMASS is $30,000 and that taxpayers in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts spend $361 million a year to support such an institution. Van Zile filed a compliant against Jhally for academic misconduct but the administration at UMass didn’t want to touch the issue, he said. Van Zile contacted the Administration, writing the Chancellor Kumble Subbaswamy about the problems at the school. Van Zile fears that the school’s Resistance Studies Initiative promotes leftist agitation and not legitimate liberal arts education. He suggested that Chancellor Subbaswamy was worried about the reactions of the Jewish community in Massachusetts and moreover rank and file taxpayers. Van Zile asks why parents are expected to pay for anti-American, anti-Israel and anti-Western doctrine being poured into the minds of their children. Currently, he suggests all too many US college campuses are “anti-Israel fun Houses” and “not safe places to send Jewish students”. As examples of pro-Israel activist groups on college campuses in the US, he cited the Academic Engagement Network chaired by Professor Miriam Elman that works with members of university faculties to address anti-Israel BDS activities on campuses. Another group that Van Zile considers worthy is Professor Tammy Benjamin’s AMCHA Initiative that documents the relationship between faculty supported BDS campaigns and hostility toward Jews on college campuses. Van Zile discussed the history and scope of both CAMERA and its college campus activist programs and CAMERA’s Christian Partnership. CAMERA was founded in 1980 to counter anti-Israel propaganda in the media. CAMERA is a member of the Council of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations (CPMAJO). CAMERA has offices throughout the US and Jerusalem and monitors media in the UK and in the Spanish-speaking world. More information can be found at CAMERA.org and CAMERApartnership.org