* Israeli activist with Israel’s pro-Palestinian “peace” group, Gush Shalom
* Frequent lecturer who is billed as an “expert” about the Middle East conflict
* Wrote master’s thesis falsely charging that Israel’s Alexandroni Brigade had committed a massacre at the village of Tantura during the 1948 War, shooting 200 unarmed villagers after they had surrendered
* “I’m not beginning to count now all of the terrorists that are involved now in the Israeli government ; there are too many.”
An Israeli activist with Israel’s pro-Palestinian “peace” group, Gush Shalom, Theodore Katz is also a protégé of Ilan Pappe, an Israeli revisionist historian who is marginalized even by other revisionists. Katz gained notoriety when he submitted a master’s thesis charging that Israel’s Alexandroni Brigade had committed a massacre at the village of Tantura during the 1948 War, shooting 200 unarmed villagers after they had surrendered. Surviving members of the Brigade sued Katz for libel. Katz accepted $8,000 from a PLO Minister to mount his defense. An Israeli court found Katz guilty, and Katz signed a statement admitting that he had garbled and fabricated evidence, though he later retracted his confession. Haifa University reviewed his thesis and found the same flaws. The University would not even accept Katz’ revised thesis.
Nonetheless, Katz is now on the lecture circuit as an “expert” about the Middle East conflict. Like other members of Gush Shalom and like Ilan Pappe, he simply presents pro-Palestinian propaganda and details Israel’s “crimes” over the past century in lurid colors. He does this gently, using the language of peace, justice and morality. Unrepentant, he still talks about the supposed massacre at Tantura, and throws in others as well. His particular contribution to the anti-Palestinian discourse is that Israel “silences” and censors those who expose Israel’s crimes and the falsity of the Zionist narrative, and that Israel forces everyone to accept the Zionist dogma. He uses his own unhappy experience with his thesis as the textbook case of this ideological oppression. Of course, he is unlikely to mention the reasons why his work was criticized and rejected. Katz is not above making up facts to suit his ideology, and he is willing to use dubious evidence and to take financial contributions from sources bent on promoting anti-Israel propaganda.
Among Katz’s most oft-repeated themes are these:
Here are a few of Katz’s more troubling statements:
This profile is adapted, with permission, from Stand4Facts.org.