A tweet reposted by Azad Essa, attacking Priyanka Chopra as “Hindutva-fascist”, asserting that she is somehow ‘uncomfortable’ standing next to Javier Bardem while he delivered remarks in support of Palestine. This, in spite of the fact that Priyanka Chopra has publicly supported Palestine – signing letters demanding ceasefires, tweeting on Rafah and so on.
Azad Essa, is an author that was recently spotlighted on Brown Pundits itself, via his propaganda work on comparing Palestine to the Kashmir valley. This is a particular echo chamber driven by a very explicit agenda, that seeks to weaponize and co-opt the language of the left, in pursuit of demonizing India and Hindus. Facts do not matter, its Priyanka’s ethnicity that matters, and the fact that she dares to be publicly proud of her heritage, her religion and her nationality.
This is but an anecdotal example, but one that quite neatly spotlights the suspect credibility of aspiring ‘academics’ like Mr Essa. The question is how does the ecosystem of academia defend itself against such explicit bad actors that misuse concepts of ‘academic freedom’ and ‘journalism’ to peddle insidious agendas.
Islamists have learnt the language of the woke left and use it to frame their points but scratch the surface and you see that they are extremely right wing and Muslim supremacists.
I do not think the Palestinian struggle is an Islamist one.
Sumud (Palestinian Resistance) is the direct descendant of Gandhian non-violence
Mr Essa is not Palestinian, he’s a “south asian” muslim who is tapping into a certain grift that was available to be monetized over the early 21st century. This window has started to close, and there are many still left over, trying the same hustle.
>Palestinian struggle is an Islamist one
As long as they are willing to kill kaffirs participating in music festivals, they will be Islamists. Remember they killed Nepalese with same ease as they did Israelis.
Off-topic: this is terrible if true
🇵🇰🇦🇫 Pakistan rejects Kabul hospital strike claims — state media
Pakistan’s state broadcaster said recent airstrikes targeted “ammunition depots” and military infrastructure in Afghanistan, rejecting Taliban claims that a rehabilitation hospital was hit.
According to Pakistan TV, strikes in Kabul and Nangarhar destroyed “technical support infrastructure and ammunition storage,” with footage showing secondary explosions.
The outlet cited security sources as dismissing statements by Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid as “absurd,” while saying multiple Taliban military sites were successfully struck.
This is awful but not surprising.
While PAF punches way above its weight in air-to-air combat, they suck at air-to-ground ops. Precision targeting needs specialized technology, sigint and pilot training – all of which seem to be missing when it comes to PAF.
The fact the Pakistan would deny hitting a hospital is not surprising either but it would be easily verifiable. Let’s see if the Indian or European media do their job. I trust American media to sit this one out.
They are really just projecting their desire that Hindu nationalism and Zionism merge into one menace. It would be a wasted opportunity if they didn’t.
Could you elaborate? I’m not sure I’m understanding your point.
Its strategic conflation. Fuse a locally specific adversary (hindu nationalism) with a globally established villain (zionism), which allows for the transfer of preexisting moral outrage from the latter onto the former.
Also consider that the Palestinian cause started as an anti-colonial left-aligned movement, and then underwent synthesis with islamism to become a youth-based totemic muslim identitarianism. Conflation with Kashmir would be most welcome to both the crude identitarians (globally) as well as the left (led by indians), who don’t hesitate to rally external sympathies.
What’s most interesting is that the enthusiasm for Israel among some very online nationalist youth (and bots), is an own-goal, falling for what was initially pakistani strategic deception to magnify India-Israel collusion from the 80’s and 90’s. They were furious with the growing neutrality of Arab nationalists, if not the latter’s slight india-tilt (as opposed to pre-1972 default support of pak). They needed a wedge, as Pakistan’s strength vs India lies in its savvier diplomacy and having real allies, unlike a navel-gazing India that thinks its a flex to declare that it doesn’t believe in alliances
very good comment as per usual. very high signal; I learn so much
Interesting perspective.
Who would you say are the ‘real allies’ of Pakistan, apart from the CCP?
Saudi Arabia and Turkey, and the US, far more than acknowledged. Pakistan nominally was part of both SEATO and CENTO and the broader cold war. The depth of coordination with the west is significant, which is why the US and Pakistan have a resilient relationship despite questionable behavior from both parties.
We didn’t conflate it though. Hindu nationalists themselves conflated this with their distasteful support for the Gaza genocide. This is a point that not just Pakistanis but Arabs and even most Westerners picked up. Recent India hate online and in real life is downstream of the Hindutva support of Israel which has caused a lot of bad press.
But its clearly being weaponized regardless of facts – Priyanka has a consistent track record when it comes to support for Gaza. Do you disagree?
Honestly I dont know why people are targeting Priyanka Chopra as I have never heard anything in support of Israel or Hindutva from her. I think she is being unfairly targeted.
I do remember that this started in 2019 with that viral video of a Pakistani American girl confronting her about her support for Indian strikes on Pakistan.
This is a very online take. The pro-Israel brigade and the retconning of India-Israel foreign relations, is largely an astroturfing op. The vast majority of hindu nationalists one interacts with in real life are profoundly uninterested in Israel and the Abrahamic mythos in general. Some israel sympathizers have imbibed some online hasbara that basically calls the Gaza genocide fake news, which is very different from supporting it. Also, at the moment, one feels like the the common sentiment, even among the bjp supporters, is rooting for Iran to win the war, and to a somewhat lesser extent, a bit gleeful of the idea that the news of Netanyahu being killed is real.
What’s happening online is just 2-3 years earlier than what’s going to happen in real.
Here, the Israel-Palestine issue essentuilly became India vs Pakistan, whereby the Hindu nationalists (indians) started advocating (often tactlessly) in favor of Israel while Pakistanis in favor of Palestine.
Since most of the online world was horrified by Israel’s actions, the opposition and hate towards them have also flown towards Indians in general due to this advocacy. X has some of the most egregious examples of this, but IG is not far behind.
The Indian hate has subsided somewhat because of the ceasefire and Israel moving onto Iran. As you noted since not a lot of Indians have been supporting Israel against Iran, the anti-india sentiment is somewhat muted.
Supporting Zionism or Israel is poison these days. I prediceted a couple of years ago – based on online discourse alone- that 2028 may be the last time Israel gets a pro US president.. and that prediction is playing out nicely now, even swifter than I expected.
Naah, online discourse is not how geopolitics work.
“X users” don’t dictate foreign policy which is far more complex.
According to “online discourse”, Pakistanis hate Israel and want it to be nuked but reality is that Israel has the US behind it and Pakistan itself needs the US so is on the Board of Peace and will never go against Israel.
Similarly despite the Hindu nationalist hate for Palestine, the Indian government actually recognizes Palestine and Modi has even got the highest civilian honour from Palestine.
Similarly, India has good relations with both Israel and Iran. Modi was in Israel a few days before the war but still Iran is letting Indian ships through the Strait of Hormuz.
The US government will always be pro-Israel no matter who comes to power – Democrat or Republican because it serves the interests of Americans by being a reliable outpost in the middle east.
Most Americans don’t really care about Israel-Palestine one way or the other and are more concerned with domestic issues (like most people around the world). The online left on X are not big enough to influence elections in the USA and is just an echo chamber.
Arabs maybe but not westerners. They don’t particularly care either way.
And all this “hate” is in online echo chambers, not real life.
Arab countries as well as Western countries both have good relations with India as can be seen by the slew of trade agreements/FTAs as well as things like visa policies and increased investment in India.
why Priyanka Chopra Hindutva btw?
She isn’t.
Pakistanis just label anyone they don’t like that.
She tweeted in support of India in 2019.
That’s the point, she isn’t.
Kat Abughazaleh loses the Illinois 9th.
Junaid Ahmed loses the Illinois 8th.
Kina Collins loses the Illinois 7th.
Joey Ruzevich loses the Illinois 6th.
Robert Peters loses the Illinois 2nd.
Hilarious that online progressive influencers have been audience captured by their muslim foreigner audience into thinking Palestine is the biggest issue for Dem primary voters.
Americans don’t care about Palestine outside Muslims and genderqueer leftists.