New Tolerance Campaign (NTC) President Gregory T. Angelo, who is gay, said that the offer should serve as a "wake-up call" for LGBTQ organizations that side with the Hamas terrorist organization over Israel.
“I don’t want people to just shrug off this campaign as some kind of publicity stunt or something that is supposed to be comical. It actually is a legitimate offer,” Angelo, who formerly served as president of Log Cabin Republicans, told Fox News Digital.
“This campaign emerged to call out these purported advocates of LGBT equality and put our money where their mouths are,” he explained. “I think that this is a real opportunity for these groups to legitimately step up and host an event that would either highlight the fact that the Palestinian territories are not indeed a good place for LGBTQ individuals to be living, or it could be a breakthrough moment for pluralism and peace in the Middle East.”
Angelo added, “Obviously, the $1 million prize is something that is flashy. It was designed to get attention; it was designed to turn heads. But the greater drive behind this project is one of equality and broad human rights."
NTC has stated that it has the commitments necessary to award the million dollars to anyone who rises to the challenge. Billboards advertising the campaign and its accompanying reward will be placed near Columbia University, UCLA, and the Human Rights Campaign in Washington DC.
Anti-Israel LGBTQ groups, activists, and organizations have been criticized for for supporting Hamas or the Palestinian Authority over Israel despite Israel's far superior record on LGBTQ rights.
In 2019, the Palestinian Authority banned public LGBTQ events such as pride marches, while a gay man was beheaded in 2022. In Gaza, coming out as gay has been described as a "death sentence." In 2016, Hamas executed one of its own commanders for homosexuality. Many LGBTQ-identifying Palestinian Arabs have sought asylum in Israel to escape discrimination, violence, and even death.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu specifically called out the queer activists who protested his speech before Congress in July, saying, "Some of these protesters hold up signs proclaiming 'Gays for Gaza'. They might as well hold up signs saying 'Chickens for KFC'."
Earlier this month, Mike Sapraicone, a Republican Conservative candidate for the US Senate in New York and a retired New York detective, told Arutz Sheva-Israel National News, "Some of the protesters are saying that we need more rights as gay people and we need to stand by Palestine. Well, if you were gay and you came to Palestine, you wouldn't survive. I don't think our students even know this. Their heads are being filled up with this antisemitic garbage and we're allowing it." Israel National News - Arutz Sheva
