Jordan Peterson's message to Muslims is about Israel

On the 13th of July, the ubiquitous Canadian academic and human algorithm, Jordan Peterson, published a controversial video message to Muslims on YouTube, produced by his new employer, The Daily Wire. It has garnered almost 2 million views in the space of two days and has been met with sharp criticism for its content.

Many prominent media figures have taken issue with the crude assumptions about Muslims contained in the video, but few have commented on his explicitly stated aim. The caption for the video spells it out clearly:

“In the aftermath of the Abraham Accords, Dr. Jordan B. Peterson suggests that the Muslim community can set a historical example by reaching across the aisle and making contact with whom they regard as the enemy.”

As is his signature style, to individualise macro issues, he sternly reprimands Muslims, imploring them to take inspiration from the Israeli normalisation vehicle, the Abraham Accords, and embrace other groups of people. This can be read as an attempt to encourage support for the dispossession of Palestinians and the subjugation of regional governments to the will of Israel, in the name of religious tolerance.

''It seems clear that Peterson was part of a wider push to promote the Abraham Accords, whether wittingly or unwittingly. The question is: was the push from the US side? The Israeli side? or both?''

So, what could explain Peterson’s sharply pro-Israel turn? The infrastructure behind this video indicates that it is a part of a coordinated campaign to sell the Abraham Accords to Muslims.

The Daily Wire

Peterson’s video message to Muslims was produced by The Daily Wire media organisation. Its chief operating officer, Jon Lewis, is a former intelligence analyst in the US Marine Corps, and the organisation also employs former US Military intelligence officer Wesley Schmidt in customer service analytics.

As founder of The Daily Wire and friend of Peterson, Ben Shapiro, is also likely to have been involved in the making of the video. The very same day Peterson's Abraham Accords-inspired message to Muslims was released, Shapiro published an interview with Aryeh Lightstone, the US special envoy for economic normalisation, on his own podcast for The Daily Wire.

According to the US State Department website, Lightstone is tasked with representing "U.S. interests in normalising economic relations between Israel and the UAE, Bahrain, Sudan, Kosovo, and Morocco.” Lightstone, who eagerly describes himself as a “friend” of Shapiro, is reported by the Jerusalem Post to “play an instrumental role in the big strategic moves that have taken place along the US-Israel axis,” particularly “the series of normalisation and peace deals that have come about in recent months.”

The Daily Wire has published several puff pieces on the Abraham Accords, including two interviews with then-Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, on the subject for Shapiro’s podcast, both of which were transcribed and promoted on the US State Department website.

It seems clear that Peterson was part of a wider push to promote the Abraham Accords, whether wittingly or unwittingly. The question is: was the push from the US side? The Israeli side? or both?

The founders of The Daily Wire, Ben Shapiro and Jeremy Boreing, have both worked for organisations with significant connections to Israeli military and intelligence institutions. Ben Shapiro previously Tweeted that "Israelis like to build. Arabs like to bomb crap and live in open sewage.” His Tweet contained the hashtag #settlementsrock.

Before founding The Daily Wire, Shapiro was a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. His position was directly funded by Robert Shillman, simultaneously to him sitting on the board of The Friends of the IDF  and pumping millions of dollars into the Zionist Organisation of America along with key settlement building organisations.

Jeremy Boreing was instrumental in developing the Prager University project, founded by Israel lobbyist Dennis Prager. According to PragerU co-founder Allen Estrin, Boreing "came up with the site's signature visual style." The CEO of the organisation, Marissa Streit, is an ex-agent of the infamous Israeli military intelligence Unit 8200. Streit is simultaneously director of operations at the Israeli-American Council and publicly boasted about working for Israeli intelligence in a PragerU interview.

The Abraham Global Policy Initiative

Jordan Peterson is also linked to the Canada-based Israel lobby group, the Abraham Global Peace Initiative. The organisation was setup as an offshoot to “give strength to the Abraham Accords” and is home to several prominent supporters of Peterson. The founder of this organisation, Avi Benlolo, has written about supposed attempts to silence Peterson.

The work of key Abraham Global Peace Initiative board member, Richard Cravatts, has been publicly supported by Peterson several times. The most recent took place during the bout of very mild resistance that an increase of US military aid to Israel faced in US congress.

An indignant Cravatts published an article titled "The Murderous Anti-Semitism of the Effort to Kill Iron Dome" in the Times of Israel. Peterson gave the article his seal of approval and publicly promoted it to millions of followers on his Twitter page.

Mohamad Tawhidi, another AGPI board member and close friend of Benlolo, has sycophantically lauded Peterson as "one of the greatest scholars to ever contribute to human thought." Tawhidi publicly promoted Peterson’s Message to Muslims with the hashtag #AbrahamAccords, suggesting a coordinated effort. Stockwell Day, former Canadian Senator and Minister and current AGPI board member, has also enthusiastically supported Jordan Peterson.

It seems to me undeniable that Jordan Peterson’s latest intervention is focused on selling Israel to a Muslim audience, and judging by the company he keeps, along with the company that currently employs him, it is likely to be part of a concerted campaign.

Lowkey is a British-Iraqi hip hop artist, academic and political campaigner. He is a patron of Stop The War Coalition, Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the Racial Justice Network and The Peace and Justice Project founded by Jeremy Corbyn. His latest album Soundtrack To The Struggle 2 featured Noam Chomsky, Frankie Boyle and Ken Loach and has been streamed millions of times.

Follow him on Twitter: @Lowkey0nline

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