There is a rhythm to propaganda, yes—but it is not syncopated or improvisational. It is practised, rehearsed, and choreographed to death. And in the sordid ballet of Israeli state apologia, the motif has become unmistakable. Call it “The Hasbara Salome” - after Wilde's tragic dancer, who drops her veils not to reveal truth, but to seduce the viewer into complicity. There is no final revelation here, no naked honesty—only another performance, another head on a platter.
Enter the cast: Alan the barrister, tossing legal citations like confetti at a war crimes tribunal, denying the detention of children as if B'Tselem, Amnesty, and the UN were idle fabulists. One can imagine him defending Pinochet, provided the paperwork was stamped correctly.
Next: Nathalie, the teacher. Her tone is one of genteel cruelty- she doubts the starvation of bombed-out Gazans because the footage isn't emaciated enough for her tastes. She is, she insists, an educator. Presumably of manners, not morality.
Yaron the psychologist follows - part therapist, part inquisitor. He demands hostages be released, as though grief were a debit column. To him, peace is simple arithmetic: the Palestinians need only surrender, apologise, and thank their captors.
All of them dance - like Wilde's Salome - not toward justice, but towards spectacle. They invoke democracy while defending apartheid. They lionise Israeli hospitals while ignoring the rubble of Palestinian ones. They perform liberalism with the dead eyes of ideologues.
This isn’t dialogue - it’s ventriloquism. And the dummy’s mouth is moving in sync with the state.
What we are witnessing is not an argument over facts, but a territorial war over narrative. And in this war, Hasbara plays both dancer and choreographer, inviting us to watch, applaud, and ask no questions.
But our job, if we have any integrity left, is not to clap politely. It is to rise, walk onto the stage, and interrupt the bloody dance.
Let the audience decide, then, whether silence is still applause.