How do Beauty Pageant Winners Link Gaza Aid Director Johnnie Moore to an Anti-Muslim Influence Campaign?
A PR specialist running aid sites in a Muslim-majority country where the IDF have killed hundreds of Palestinians may also be promoting Islamophobia
Johnnie Moore, who directs the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) -(the IDF is a client of theirs), has connections to a pro-Israel global disinformation operation that promoted anti-Muslim sentiment across multiple countries, according to new evidence.
A “protest” by the Miss Mississippi winner (2015) and Miss Tennessee winner (2020) against the luxury brands Valentino and Balmain was promoted by Moore’s PR firm, JDA Worldwide. The protest event, however, was linked to the “It's in Your Hands” campaign, which was part of a multi-million dollar anti-Muslim and anti-Immigration influence operation identified in 2024.
The alarming finding raises further questions about Moore’s suitability to run an operation tasked with feeding Palestinians, especially after killings at GHF sites mean that the GHF may have legal liability for complicity in Israel’s war crimes.
Context and background
In mid-2024, Sohan Dsouza and I revealed a sprawling propaganda campaign that sank at least $1.2 million on ads across Facebook, X, and TikTok. The operation targeted dozens of countries with content designed to generate fear about Muslim migration to Europe, demonize Shia communities in Lebanon, and portray Qatar as orchestrating the "Islamization of Europe."
Following our investigation, META eventually published a report confirming the campaign's existence and financial scope, though META attributed the operation to Vietnam based solely on some infrastructure locations, without identifying the true organizers.
The Qatar Connection
Sohan and I had identified links between the influence campaign and some public figures who were endorsing the campaign. Anuj Chopra at AFP also used our investigation as a basis to dig deeper behind the campaign. One strand of the campaign specifically targeted Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, Qatar's prominent royal family member, claiming she could secure the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza if she chose to act.
AFP's investigation found the first direct link to Johnnie Moore after asking about a photo we had found on one of the network's FB pages:
"Earlier this year, US educator Katrina Lantos Swett tweeted a photo holding a poster of a similar campaign targeting bint Nasser at a religious freedom summit in Washington, alongside the fake change.org petition.
A spokeswoman for Swett told AFP she was asked to promote the poster by Johnnie Moore -- an American evangelical leader, businessman, and advocate for Israel”
When AFP attempted to interview Moore about this connection, he initially accepted AFP's interview request via LinkedIn but stopped responding when confronted with Swett's claim and probed about his apparent association with the campaign.
Moore’s silence after being probed by AFP is of course not definitive evidence of anything, although it is suspicious.
The "It's In Your Hands" Campaign
A big part of the original influence campaign and broader network was a group of FB ads, videos, and webpages with the branding ‘itsinyourhands’. The website attached to the campaign was called ‘itsinyourhands24.com’. The campaign, like the rest of the operation, hid its origins, using a front group called “Citizens for Human Lives”, who ran a petition calling on Shaikha Moza to release the hostages. The petition, hosted on Change.org, was taken down when Change.org were informed that the organization likely did not exist. The link to she petition was also shared by Katrina Lantos Swett on her X account. Itsinyourhands24’s most prominent advert was probably a massive billboard they ran in Time Square New York.
Two Pageant Models and a Protest in Atlanta
Something that we did not find before we released the report last yearwas a video of a ‘protest’ that took place in Phipps Plaza in Atlanta Georgia.
Two former U.S. pageant contestants, Justice Enlow (Miss Tennessee 2020) and Hannah Roberts (Miss Mississippi 2015), protested outside Valentino and Balmain stores in Atlanta to highlight Qatar’s alleged human rights abuses and inaction in freeing Israeli hostages held by Hamas. The protests, timed before International Women’s Day, targeted the Qatar-based Mayhoola For Investments - which owns Valentino and Balmain.
The video, which can be seen here (caution, it’s cringe), shows the two pageant winners, hands-bound, fake blood on their face, being dragged by a model playing Shaikha Moza. They’ve even gone to the trouble of using a replica of a blue dress once worn by Shaikha Moza. (nb, It would also be curious to know if the two models, Justice Enlow and Hannah Roberts knew who they were working for. )
Moore and JDA Worldwide
So where does Johnnie Moore come in again? Firstly, the original story about the protest was posted on AllArabNews.com, with the protest video hosted as an unlisted link on you the AllArabNews YouTube channel*. It is worth noting that Johnnie Moore is an advisory member to AllArabNews.com. It is also worth noting that AllArabNews is a sister site to AllIsraelNews, both edited by Joel Rosenberg - Rosenberg is an American-Israeli evangelical Christian and communications strategist. Needless to say, their editorial mandate is unabashedly Christian Zionist.
Anyway, more importantly, if you watch the video you will see that it has the watermark ‘itsinyourhands24.com’ on the bottom.
Johnnie Moore is also the President of JDA Worldwide, a full-service marketing and communications agency that merged with Moore’s former PR outfit The Kairos Company. The website CatholicVote reported that JDA Worldwide actually issued a press release on behalf of the models engaged in the protest!
“JDA Worldwide recently issued a press release on behalf of Miss Tennessee USA 2020 and Miss Mississippi USA 2015, who are both protesting the brands for associating with a Qatar-based investment group known as Mayhoola for investments, which is controlled by the matriarch of Qatar, Sheikha Moza.”
In other words, Johnnie Moore's JDA Worldwide was actively promoting content that appears to be part of the ItsInYourHands24 campaign.
So what that means is that Johnnie Moore, either directly or through his company, has been involved in at least two separate instances in relation to part of a broader, sprawling anti-Muslim influence operation. The press release from JDA Worldwide indicates more formal involvement than him handing an image to Katrina Lantos Swett. (Another point worth mentioning is that some of the content produced by the disinformation network included the watermarks “CBN”. CBN might also be the Christian Broadcasting Network, which is also listed as a client of JDA Worldwide).
These connections raise a number of questions. Was JDA Worldwide the agency (or one of several agencies) contracted by another entity to run a campaign that, among many other things, pushed pro-Israel narratives, demonised Muslims, immigrants, and Qatar? It seems plausible given JDA Worldwide were directly involved in the promotion of content connected to itsinyourhands24.com - itself a sub-component of the broader network. (It is also worth noting that the IDF are actually GHF’s client)
It’s an important question in and of itself, but it also raises the question, why is someone like Johnnie Moore, who appears to be connected to a virulently anti-Muslim disinformation campaign, involved in providing ‘aid’ to a majority Muslim population in Gaza? Certainly Moore’s experience in PR would explain his continued attempts to deflect or mislead the public about the well-documented massacres of hundreds of people near or at GHF aid sites by IDF troops supported by US mercenaries.
Moore’s potential connection to anti-Muslim campaigns, and the fact that the GHF aid sites are more akin to death traps, raises questions about his suitability, fitness and motivations for running GHF. Certainly it would be in the public interest to find out more about Moore’s involvement in influence operations….
What We Don't Know
Several questions remain unanswered:
The full extent of Moore's or JDA Worldwide's role in the influence campaign and the broader network
Whether the beauty pageant contestants knew who was ultimately funding their protest (assuming it was funded)
The identity of the primary organizers and funders behind the $1.2 million operation
*The original All Arab News article is datemarked 27th December 2023, while the video on the Youtube channel was posted 11th March. Most press coverage of the event is later than March. It is not clear what the reason for these discrepancies are. An April 2024 story in Ynet news also reported the event was conducted in December 2023.
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