Gal Gadot’s “F-You” moment to BDS, courtesy of the Tonight Show

Writing for a living affords me the luxury to watch television all day. In the process, I’m easily assaulted with mainstream network programming from sun up to sun down. Usually, it means that I end the day with late night talk shows, one of them being the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. On October 5, I caught the interview that Fallon had with Wonder Woman star, Gal Gadot.

As you very well know, mainstream television is generally packed full of advertisements and product placement around the clock. These late night shows are no exception. Neither was this interview, where Gadot allegedly tried a Reese’s peanut butter cup for the first time in her life. Most of the articles that were written about the interview were subtle in their design as click bait, where people who have nothing better to do might wonder what Gadot’s reaction to eating a Reese’s product was like. But there’s a chance that her claim was designed to deceive and send a more hostile message to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. In fact, her possible deception has been eating away at me for days now.

What makes it even worse is knowing that underneath that alluring, stunningly beautiful  exterior is likely a blood thirsty sadist. To better explain, we should go back to 2014 when Gal Gadot debuted in Zack Snyder’s “Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice” and the actress stirred up controversy with a Facebook post.

2014 was an especially horrific year for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip who were being bombarded with missiles from Israel. There were frequent reports by human rights organizations of mass casualties. In all fairness, the militant Hamas group that often defies the Palestinian Authority had been launching missiles at Israel. Gal Gadot’s post chided Hamas’ horrific acts, saying that the group was hiding behind women and children using them as human shields.

That is one aspect of the conflict that doesn’t veer too much into Zionist ideology. Not until she said: “We shall overcome!!! Shabbat Shalom! #weareright. To also be fair, there were other more neutral hashtags with her statement such as #stopterror #coexistance, but her position clearly wasn’t to criticize Israel’s violence against innocent women and children. In fact, her statement appeared to defend the violence, especially with the undeniable #weareright hashtag.

The conflict lasted from July 8 – August 26 with over 2,000 Palestinian civilians killed and over 10,000 wounded, depending on where the figures come from. What sets Gal Gadot apart from other Hollywood starts is that many of them who are either Jewish or from Israel, have been vocally opposed to Israel’s attacks, but it didn’t seem as if Gadot could be bothered.

It should be noted that Gal Gadot had served in the Israeli Defense Forces before she got into acting which certainly helps to align her view of the Israel-Palestinian conflict to side with Israel. Of course, it’s possible that she has a more pragmatic view of the ordeal, but we might never know as she’s been forced to stay away from that subject. For instance, it was reported that BDS Lebanon had boycotted her debut Batman V. Superman film and Wonder Woman, banning it from being shown in Lebanese theaters.

But we come back to Gal Gadot’s conditioning, such as with her being in the IDF; a requirement for everyone in Israel who turns 18-years of age. While she was being interviewed by Channel 2 in Israel for the Wonder Woman film, she was asked about her views of the BDS boycott which would have revealed a bit about her views.

According to one report, she apparently gave a candid response. But producers for the film were present and ordered the producers of the program to delete those segments of the interview. But rather than cut it, Channel 2 made a scorched-earth effort and deleted the entire interview.

The BDS movement’s goal is to boycott Israeli products, especially perishables like chocolate which brings us back to the Fallon interview, as she brought Cow Chocolate by Israeli company Strauss-Elite for him to try. This was before she tried the Reese’s which she again claims she’s never had, which is interesting as Reese’s is common in Israel.

In the interview, Jimmy Fallon tries to pronounce Gadot’s pronunciation of the product as “Shokolad Para”, but he couldn’t and said that it sounded as if she had chocolate stuck in her throat. According to one article by Forward, there couldn’t be a better descriptor for the product as it doesn’t dissolve very well and turns into a sticky lump. The article goes through a thorough review of how “terrible” Israeli’s mass-produced chocolate is, with the writer admitting that while they don’t agree with the BDS movement, Israeli chocolate should be boycotted simply for being so bad.

And Jimmy Fallon never has anything bad to say about anything as he’s a great hype-man, but didn’t really seem very hyped about the chocolate. Fallon is seen leaning into the mic with Gadot so the audience can hear the pop rocks that are put in the product, almost acting as if pop rocks were alien to Americans.

But again, it might be that Gadot is simply indoctrinated to believe that people should try Israeli chocolate or it was simply an effort to indoctrinate others to buy whatever chocolate Wonder Woman eats, thus, a big “fuck you” to BDS. Especially because the Tonight Show being such as massive and efficient promotion machine. Here’s a clip from the show, you decide.