RAMALLAH, Palestine
Scores of Palestinian social media activists continue to complain about bias by social media platforms as they face growing restrictions, with many contents being blocked or removed.
The activists said social media platforms have intensified monitoring of Palestinian content and blocked accounts that show sympathy with Palestinians in the light of the fighting between Palestinian groups and Israel.
The Sada Social Center, an organization dedicated to monitoring and documenting digital violations against Palestine content online, said social media platforms removed thousands of posts and accounts since Oct. 7, the day fighting erupted between Hamas and Israel.
Palestinian narrative faces obliteration
Nada Basyouni, media coordinator for the Sada Social Center, said the Palestinian narrative is exposed to real dangers as social media platforms and governments remove Palestinian content from the digital memory of users.
"The measures to fight the Palestinian narrative are taken by a political decision from governments, and then implemented by these social media platforms, consistent with the Israeli occupation," Basyouni told Anadolu.
She cited Facebook's parent company, Meta, classifying "from sea to river" as anti-Semitic.
Meta removes Palestinian content
After three days of fighting since the outbreak, Meta said Oct. 13 that it "removed or marked as disturbing more than 795,000 pieces of content for violating" its policies.
It said it blocked several hashtags on Instagram because hashtags, mostly pro-Palestinian ones, violate community guidelines.
Meta's statement followed the US stance which firmly and absolutely stood by Israel and fully adopted its narrative in describing the Hamas’ military operation as "terrorist attacks."
Basyouni said Instagram blocked several pro-Palestine hashtags including #طوفان_الأقصى, or Al-Aqsa Flood.
Inflammatory posts
The Sada Social Center said it documented more than 8,000 inflammatory posts in the Hebrew language against Palestinians on social media platforms.
The posts include incitement to kill and annihilate Palestinians, yet, they still exist, it said.
Basyouni noted that Meta also removed the option to object to restricted access -- meaning it will not review the restricted posts or accounts it removes.
"These measures contribute to obliterating the Palestinian narrative,” said Basyouni. “These measures are a big obstacle to reaching the truth.”
She noted restriction policies are in favor of the Israeli narrative which is spread on social media platforms without restrictions.
Quds News Network
The chief editor of the Quds News Network (QNN), Yousef Abu Watfa, said Meta removed QNN's Facebook pages under the claim of several previous violations.
He told Anadolu that QNN's Arabic language Facebook page, which was liked and followed by 10 million, and the English language page, liked and followed by more than a million, were removed, citing policy violations.
He said QNN reached out to groups working in the field of digital rights to help retrieve the removed Facebook pages, but Meta insisted on the accusation of violating the company's policies and guidelines.
"QNN believes what happened, and still happening, is related to the pressure by the (Israeli) occupation government on all the social media platforms," said Abu Watfa.
Israeli-Palestinian fighting
Israel's bombardment and blockade of the Gaza Strip has continued for 12 days into the conflict with the Palestinian group, Hamas, with more than 1 million people displaced -- almost half of Gaza's population, according to the UN Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, (UNRWA).
The fighting began Oct. 7 when Hamas initiated Operation Al-Aqsa Flood -- a multi-pronged surprise attack that included a barrage of rocket launches and infiltrations into Israel by land, sea and air. Hamas said the incursion was in retaliation for the storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and increased violence by Israeli settlers.
The Israeli military then launched Operation Swords of Iron against Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip.
Israel's response has extended into cutting water and electricity supplies to Gaza, further worsening the living conditions in an area that has reeled under a crippling siege since 2007.
An estimated 3,478 Palestinians, including more than 1,000 children have been killed in Israeli airstrikes on Gaza, while the death toll from Israeli attacks in the West Bank has reached 60.
More than 1,400 Israelis have been killed in the armed conflict.
*Writing by Ahmed Asmar
