BlueStar switcheroo

Vandals replace pro-Israel ad with parody poster
Friday, February 25, 2005 | by dan pine

Vandals targeting BlueStar PR's ongoing pro-Israel ad campaign have struck again, this time with a twist. At a San Francisco bus stop, a BlueStar poster was illegally replaced with a parody ad that condemned Israel.

The phony poster (which was reported Feb. 14 and removed a day later) closely resembles a recent BlueStar ad that says Palestinians look to Israel as a model for building a future democratic state.

The bogus poster accuses Israel of murdering Palestinian children.

BlueStar founder Jonathan Carey blasted the vandals for spreading false information about Israel. "[Their poster] says Israel has injured 100,000 Palestinian school kids and tortured 80 percent of them," noted Carey.

A spokesman for Viacom Outdoor, the company that maintains the ad space, said vandals are definitely responsible for the poster switch.

"This has happened before," said Steve Shinn, a Viacom Outdoor transit manager. "People will break open our ad cabinet, mock up the ad and reinstall

it. No one contracted with us to put up an ad that is anti-Israel."

The vandalized bus stop is located at the corner of Ninth Avenue and Lincoln Way in the inner Sunset District. BlueStar's Carey said his posters are frequently defaced or destroyed, but this was the first time a parody ad had been pasted up.

"I'm complemented that someone paid so much attention to us," added Carey, "but I'm outraged they did it in such a negative way. It's very sarcastically written and reads like our style. But it's meant to confuse, not educate. We want to know who did this."

Every month for the last year, BlueStar PR has placed at BART and Muni stations up to 30 poster-sized ads which, according to Carey, were seen by more than 100,000 San Franciscans each day.

Said Carey: "Over the months, BlueStar PR has received countless e-mails from Jews and non-Jews alike who were proud that something positive was finally being said about Israel."