Bibi's edgelords
As Netanyahu reportedly gave out a golden beeper to Trump, his political disruptors were booted from a rally outside the White House led by parents of Israeli hostages.
Last updated on February 20, 2025 at 5:35 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.
Properly capturing the scale of aggressive political campaigns with loose ties to intelligence services, outsized social media presence, and access to politicians can be challenging, especially for those whose bread and butter is trolling and a willingness to disseminate outright lies. But the author was not expecting to witness Betar, a self-described “right-wing Zionist” movement infamous for its implied death threats and a now-former executive director who is contesting reporting that he was , loudly ejected from a pro-Israel rally outside the White House on Tuesday, even as Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly handed out a “golden beeper” to President Trump during their discussion of a U.S. “take over” of Gaza.
(As exposed by the author last month, a shell company operated by the former chief of the CIA’s paramilitary arm is currently helping to run the vehicle checkpoints along Gaza’s Netzarim corridor.)
Following the silent cancellation of Betar’s publicly announced press conference on Monday with two members of the newly formed Judea and Samaria Caucus, Reps. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) and Randy Weber (R-TX), both offices stated by phone that their representatives had not actually confirmed attendance. Entitled “Press Conference To Support Trump’s Deportation Program of Jihadis and Support PM Netanyahu,” the coorganizer was listed as the Zionist Organization of America, whose senior manager Yigal Brand simultaneously chairs the global Betar movement.
When emailed for comment by the author and pressed on X by the journalist Max Blumenthal regarding the open secret that Betar’s executive director, Ross Glick, had plead guilty to second-degree harassment in relation to ‘revenge porn,’ the organization issued public statements stating that Glick was no longer in the role and had only worked with the movement for three months. After publication of this article, Mr. Glick published a lengthy legal notice admitting to the second-degree harassment charge, but contesting that it was a crime.
Another long-time leader of the U.S. arm of Betar, political operative Ronn Torossian, was arrested in early May 2024 while confronting pro-Palestinian student protestors at Syracuse University. As reported by the newsroom Zeteo the following October, Torossian has claimed to be the “number one fundraiser since Oct 7.” of Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY).
While not previously reported, Torossian is also secretary of the U.S. branch of the prominent Israeli lawfare organization Shurat HaDin, Letter of the Law Inc., which published the 2018 book “Harpoon” detailing the organization’s early role as a covert arm of Israel’s foreign intelligence service, the Mossad, following the relationship having been exposed by a leaked diplomatic cable authored by U.S. Ambassador Robert H. Jones in 2007.
Much like Betar, Shurat HaDin co-founder Craig Arthur “Aviel” Leitner, the husband of fellow co-founder Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, has been a follower of the controversial, assassinated Jewish power advocate Meir Kahane and was arrested in 1986 for acts of terrorism against Arabs. In another similarity with Betar, Shurat HaDin has been criticized for its outsized public relations, with The New York Times in 2015 quoting one critic stating that Ms. Darshan-Leitner is “pretty good at filing cases and putting out news releases, but she has really no involvement in actual litigation.” Shurat HaDin has also, for many years, prominently advertised its “Ultimate Mossad Mission,” a vacation package to Israel whose speakers in May this year are said to include several former Mossad agents, including a central character from the book “Harpoon,” Uzi Shaya.
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With Betar’s Monday press conference cancelled, the organization fell back to its mainstay strategy and threatened the editor-at-large of Jewish Currents, Peter Beinart, with delivery of beepers. “We urge all Jews on the upper west side to give @PeterBeinart a [beeper] he is a traitor, a kapo and we must oppose him,” Betar US wrote on Monday. In response, the influential Jewish advocacy organization J Street publicly condemned Betar as “the lowest of low.”
The social media platform X removed Betar’s quasi-death threat on Wednesday, replacing the content with a notice that it “violated the X Rules.” And on Thursday, one day after publication of this article, the conservative comedian Michael Cernovich strongly criticized Betar aggressively handing a beeper to historian Norman Finkelstein, stating on X: “if a pro-Palestine person did this to Ben Shapiro, there would be calls for arrests.”
Betar’s subsequent rally on Tuesday at the corner of 17th and Pennsylvania Avenue was originally scheduled for 10 a.m. but, as a result of being delayed at the last minute until noon, coincided with another rally led by the grassroots movement UnXeptable and Einav Zangauker, whose son Matan has been held hostage by Hamas since October 2023. Just as the two rallies were set to start, a confrontation broke out, with the Netanyahu-affiliated Betar contingent accusing the much larger, hostage-focused rally of being supporters of Hamas. “My son is not Hamas,” stated Ms. Zangauker, shortly before the Betar contingent was politely ejected from the southwest to northwest corner of the street. At the end of the rally, a spokesperson for Ms. Zangauker stated that the only concern of Betar is supporting Netanyahu.
Views of the small group of outcasts from the main rally were frequently obstructed by a truck Betar had hired to circle around the White House, covered in screens alternating between the provocations that “There is NO genocide in Gaza” and expressing support for “Trump’s plan to deport jihadis from USA and Gaza.”
As part of Betar’s push for political visibility, the organization has spent months advertising itself as a vanguard for the new Trump administration’s commitment to deport many critics of the Israeli government’s military invasion of Gaza, which is currently in the third week of a six-week ceasefire agreement which has suffered significant temporary setbacks. In addition to claiming to employ a dubious facial recognition program named NesherAI run by an equally unreliable CEO as part of doxxing pro-Palestinian student protestors, Betar attempted to claim credit for the apparently fictional deportation of UCLA student “Liu Lijun.”
“She was among those very high on our list. Many more are coming very soon,” stated the U.S. branch of Betar on the social media platform X on Friday evening, in response to an allegation of the student’s deportation. In addition to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirming to the author that it had “no evidence” regarding the alleged deportation of such a student, an editorial intern at The Nation publicly reported on Saturday that UCLA organizers had confirmed that the widely shared footage alleged to show “Liu Lijun” was of a different person, who is not a Chinese international student.
Update on February 20, 2025 at 5:35 p.m. Eastern Standard Time: A note was added regarding a legal notice posted by former Betar executive director Ross Glick regarding the New York Post’s reporting on his alleged dissemination of ‘revenge porn.’
Update on February 7, 2025 at 9:47 a.m.: A note was added regarding the conservative comedian Michael Cernovich strongly criticizing Betar’s actions.
Update on February 5, 2025 at 10:22 p.m.: A note was added regarding the social media platform X removing Betar’s quasi-death threat against Jewish Currents editor-at-large Peter Beinart.
Betar is a terrorist group. There is no argument.
U.S. national security has been completely compromised by radical Zionists.