'It was my moral failure': Anwar's ex-staff remorseful for 2017 pro-Israel essay

A former research assistant to Anwar Ibrahim has expressed regret for previously supporting Israel, saying that what he wrote on an Israeli news website in 2017 in support of the Zionist state reflected his "moral failure" driven by "blindness".

"I once defended the indefensible, excused suffering I recognised, and ignored the truth for the sake of narrative. That was not analysis; it was moral failure," said Yusoff Rawther in an article for MalaysiaNow, more than four months after he was acquitted of controversial charges of possession of drugs and firearms.

Read: When moral failure led me to overlook injustice

In September 2024, Yusoff was ambushed by a team of policemen as he walked towards his car parked outside his condominium block.

He was later accused of possessing firearms and drugs, which police claimed were found in his car.

He was denied bail and spent the next nine months behind bars, before the High Court freed him following a trial that saw prosecution witnesses bumbling during cross-examination, lending credence to widespread speculation that he was a victim of a conspiracy by politically connected individuals.

Yusoff, the grandson of the late Penang consumer advocate SM Mohamed Idris, has consistently said he was framed by people in power who harboured a grudge against him due to his ongoing civil suit for sexual assault against Anwar.

The 32-year-old, who was recruited by the PKR leader to work at the latter's bungalow office in Petaling Jaya in 2018—just a few months after his controversial pro-Israel article was published, drawing condemnation on social media – filed a lawsuit alleging that the politician sexually assaulted him in October 2018.

Anwar has denied the allegations.

In July 2021, Yusoff filed his civil suit against Anwar, but a much-anticipated trial fixed for June 16 this year failed to materialise after the prime minister was granted an interim stay pending a decision by the Federal Court on his application for prime ministerial immunity.

'I overlooked the voices for dignity'

Yusoff was 24 years old when his article, "One Malaysian, standing with Israel", was published by Israel National News in December 2017.

In it, he defended Israel's occupation of Palestinian lands and claimed that the Arabs were "playing victim", while repeating a familiar argument by the Zionists that Palestine had never existed.

The article became fodder for Pakatan Harapan supporters as they sought to discredit Yusoff, with a pro-PKR group lodging a police report in June urging that he be investigated.

In response, Yusoff's lawyer Rafique Rashid questioned why Anwar still recruited his client despite the pro-Israel article.

In his latest essay, Yusoff said he wanted to redeem himself, especially in light of Israeli war crimes in Gaza which have so far claimed more than 60,000 lives, mostly women and children.

"There comes a point when silence is not thoughtfulness; it is betrayal. A moment when moral ambiguity no longer protects conscience but stains it. We are living in that moment," he wrote.

He said his own experience of being a victim of the "corrupt machinery of institutional power" had taught him how far he had erred when he took the side of the Israeli oppressors.

"I do not equate my experience with those under siege or occupation, but I know what it means to have freedom stolen by deceit. That time, painful and quiet, forced me to reconsider everything I thought I understood about justice, power, and truth."

Yusoff said his article was written based on "certainty I had not earned" and "pain I did not bear".

"I overlooked the voices pleading for dignity," wrote Yusoff.

"An entire population has been trapped between occupation and exile, denied sovereignty, and stripped of the basic conditions of life. What has been called a 'conflict' is not a clash of equals. It is the prolonged subjugation of one people, enforced through military power, bureaucracy, and collective punishment."

Yusoff further said he was aware that his explanation does little to undo past mistakes.

"Words are not redemption. They are a beginning. Redemption lives in alignment with truth, with conscience, and with the relentless refusal to accept injustice," he said.