A delegation of Pakistani journalists and educators made a rare visit to Israel last week, defying a travel ban by the South Asian Muslim country which has no diplomatic relations with the Jewish state.
The 10-member group, which came through the Israeli NGO Sharaka, or partnership in Arabic, is the largest delegation from Pakistan that the organization has brought to Israel to date.
“I always wanted to come to Israel to find out all the questions in my mind and to clear all the confusion about what my country and the Muslim world has been telling me about the Jews,” Pakistani journalist and documentary film director Sabin Agha, one of two women in the group, told JNS in an interview in Tel Aviv during their visit. “I am not surprised to find the complete opposite of what the state narrative of Muslim countries was.”
The secular Karachi-based journalist hopes to become a messenger of peace and harmony between the two nations in the wake of the Hamas-led terror attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, especially in what she called “a very anti-Israel, anti-Jewish” Pakistan where people get offended “just by the mention” of Israel or the Jews.
The group of Muslim influencers visited the hard-hit southern Israeli communities, including Kibbutz Nir Oz, where they met with survivors of the Hamas-led terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, 2023; prayed at the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem; and visited the Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center, also in Jerusalem.
“It was a pleasant surprise to be in Israel because before we came we had been getting only one-sided information,” said Kaswar Klasra, editor-in-chief of The Islamabad Telegraph, noting the warm welcome the group received immediately on landing at Ben-Gurion International Airport from immigration officials to airport cleaners and then throughout their trip. “It will not be easy for Pakistanis to accept the reality because they have been fed baseless negative lies about Israel by both world and local media.”
Most of the members of the delegation did not want to be interviewed or photographed due to security concerns and fears of repercussions on their return home.
But the Pakistani editor said that he was determined to tell his countrymen the reality in Israel, including how he was able to pray freely at the Al-Aqsa Mosque—which, he confessed, shocked him—even if it meant losing his job after over a quarter century as a journalist.
“They are poisoning minds across the globe,” he said. “This disinformation needs to be addressed.”
