Influence operation: How an Arabic media outlet was linked to Israeli intelligence

A prominent Arabic-language media outlet appears to have ties to Israeli intelligence. Jusoor, which boasts 11 million Facebook followers and bills itself as the “pulse of the Arab street”, may be anything but an ordinary news outlet, according to leaked documents seen by +972 Magazine.

+972 reported on 13 July that Jusoor:

describes itself as an “independent media platform” that is “not affiliated with any political entity” and seeks out stories that “reflect the pulse of all societies and peoples” in the Middle East and North Africa.

The publication’s main output consists of short video segments circulated largely through social media, where its audience has grown rapidly. On Facebook alone, it recently surpassed 1 million followers.

But new documents suggest that:

the outlet has been connected with intelligence services in Israel. And an examination of the organization and individual behind the outlet points to Jusoor’s role within a vast and long-term covert operation designed to engineer public opinion in the Arab world in favor of Israel and its allies.

The ‘Shia Axis’ project

The leaks came about after Iranian hackers got access to millions of documents:

from the inboxes of Israeli politicians, ministries, and other prominent institutions and organizations.

+972 reported how one recent hack:

made accessible to journalists via the nonprofit whistleblower group Distributed Denial of Secrets, targeted Israel’s foremost security think tank, the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS).

The INSS collaborates:

closely with Israel’s intelligence community — comprising the Mossad, the Shin Bet, and the Military Intelligence Directorate — and whose fellows often come directly from its ranks.

The INSS runs a program about the so-called “Shia axis”:

encompassing Iran and its allies including Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and, prior to its collapse, the Assad regime in Syria.

Among the thousands of leaked files and messages from this program, clues have emerged regarding who is actually behind Jusoor and what its real mission is.

One leaked email describes an October 2024 Zoom meeting between the Shia Axis project and the founder of the Center for Peace Communications (CPC) Joseph Braude. The emails claim CPC counters extremism in the region. Both Braude and CPC are key players in the project.

Another email claims CPC works to:

manage creative consciousness campaigns against Israel’s enemies, with a recent emphasis on Hamas and Hezbollah.

Jordanians, Cyprus and a secret meeting

Another leaked message from September 2025 describes:

a secret meeting took place in Cyprus involving an INSS fellow and several journalists, researchers, and influencers from Israel and Jordan. Israel’s deputy ambassador to Jordan was also present.

An INSS member summarised this meeting as being about:

actions needed in the media to improve relations between Israel and Jordan.

The workshop, the summary goes on:

was organised by the Center for Peace Communications and the Jusoor channel, led by Joseph Braude and his team.

The summary also says many of the Jordanian participants in the meeting:

take part, openly or covertly, in the activities of Jusoor.

According to +972:

the group agreed to establish teams for future projects, specifically to support “videos that will be produced by CPC and shown on the Jusoor channel” that would “disprove anti-Israeli conspiracy theories” or feature Israeli speakers “expressing appreciation for the Jordanian royal house.”

Gaza reporting and remarkable levels of access

The leaks contain other strange details about Jusoor too. At the height of the famine in Gaza, Jusoor still had on-the-ground access to the besieged area. And one leaked message details how Jusoor reached out to an “anti-Hamas activist” inside Gaza to try and source footage of thriving food markets, people shopping for food and:

videos of people cooking, eating, filling up buckets of water, and kids playing with water.

+972 reported:

Despite mounting international concern over the increasingly desperate humanitarian situation in Gaza, Jusoor appeared to be seeking footage portraying the exact opposite, which could then be used to fend off allegations of impending famine.

The footage was never provided, presumably because no such scenes existed in an active famine.

Jusoor also published:

a largely sympathetic video profile of Yasser Abu Shabab, the then-leader of the pro-Israel Popular Forces militia in Gaza, a little over a year ago.

Going even deeper, +972 reported that:

According to U.S. tax documents, CPC is a relatively small organization based in Long Island, New York, with an official annual budget of roughly $1.5 million. All of its publicly listed donors support Jewish and pro-Israel initiatives.

Jusoor editor Hadeel Oueis is “employed directly by CPC”, +972 reported. Oueis, a Syrian national based in the US, was once known as Hadeel Kouki. She came to prominence as a young anti-Assad activist during the Arab Spring.

+972 reported:

In 2012, still using the name Kouki, she was invited by the Geneva-based pro-Israel advocacy group UN Watch to a conference it co-organized, as well as a meeting of the Human Rights Council.

From there, according to Oueis’ biography on WINEP’s website, she met a U.S. delegation that helped facilitate her relocation to the United States.

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You can and should read the full, highly detailed +972 report here. If Jusoor is an influence operation, it is one of many. The Canary has reported on similar projects like the BlackCore scandal, English language psychological operations courses and Israeli military-controlled journalism. And as Israeli control of the narrative on Palestine cracks further, we can expect many more to come to light.

Featured image via the Canary

By Joe Glenton

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