The Palestinian TV correspondent with 400,000 followers on Facebook, Christine Rinawi, uploaded a video On December 4 showing Israeli police brutality against a Palestinian man. Shortly after, Rinawi had noticed that the video had been removed from her account for violating Facebook community guidelines. According to Rinawi, this experience has been occurring on multiple occasions.
Facebook’s corresponding company Meta responded with a statement indicating that their community guidelines policies apply equally to all their users to give everyone a chance to voice their opinions while keeping their platform safe. Despite the latter, allegations of pro-Israel bias by the Human rights Watch were made in October. Human Rights Watch stated that Facebook had “suppressed content posted by Palestinians and their supporters speaking out about human rights issues in Israel and Palestine.”
Indeed, according to Sada Social, a Palestinian social media monitoring center, around 600 pro-Palestine accounts and posts have been suspended, restricted, or deleted in 2021.
To understand the reasons behind the immense support the state of Israel receives, two aspects are to be discussed: high financial gain of social media platforms impacting content restrictions, and Israeli government attempts at concealing its crimes and maintaining a decent international image.
First, the lack of visibility pro-Palestinian accounts face due to Facebook algorithms are true attempts carried out by the social media management teams to increase their profit. Building on the aforementioned, specifically, Rinawi’s struggles to provide coverage apropos the struggles of Palestinians, Facebook management repeatedly “prioritized profits over social good”. Subsequently, Facebook’s algorithms prioritize posts that drive up engagement due to sparking controversy and debates they trigger on the platform. This system has led Facebook to gain 98% of its revenues in 2020.
As Facebook continually attempts to increase its profits, it indirectly harms and silences the voices of struggling Palestinians. For instance, in the midst of a violent armed conflict that erupted in May 2021, Facebook admitted to the deletion of Palestinian posts, blaming it on a technical mishap.
Second, tactical actions and positions the Israeli government takes, ultimately shut down Palestinian attempts to magnify their voices and reach out for help. To clarify, Israel diverts the attention of the international community away from its human rights violations and imperialist schemes against Palestinians. It does so by hiding behind a friendly façade, queer-positive actions, and feminist marketing strategies. More specifically, greenwashing, pinkwashing, and purple washing, amongst other tactics, are used to deflect the attention away from their crimes.
Ultimately, instead of focusing on the struggles and livelihoods of Palestinians against Israeli Defense Forces, media outlets focus on the IDF’s leather-free boots and wool-free berets.
Moreover, as Israel promotes itself as being the most LGBTQ+ friendly destination in the middle east, it seems to disregard the rights of Palestinians and Palestinian queer people. For the Israeli government, different principles and values seem to apply when it comes to the rights of Palestinians who are part of the LGBTQ+ community. As Israel promotes its gay-friendly environment, it forgets to pay attention to the fact that Tel Aviv is built on demolished Palestinian houses. Palestinians carrying West Bank or Gaza strip IDs are in exile regardless of their sexual identities.
Finally, while the Israeli parliament establishes gender-equality committees to build safer environments, that same parliament does not condemn sexual harassment against detained Palestinian women.
Unfortunately, as the Israeli government, along with its strong allies and influential media coverage, maintains its clean-image promotion strategies, Palestinian struggles remain unheard by many.
Certainly, The Israeli Ministry of foreign affairs gives huge importance to its image and how it is seen by the international community. This is why Israeli administrations invest in providing aid to foreign countries when man-made or natural disasters occur. For instance, when the 2010 Haiti earthquake took place, Israel was quick to send a first response team to provide humanitarian assistance. In addition, the Ministry is continually providing statements to show exemplary levels of aid towards Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
“Even after years of provocation, rocket attacks, and bombings, Israel defies terror organizations and works to uphold the highest standards of assistance and support to civilians everywhere, whether it's in Asia, Africa, Europe, Iraq, or the West Bank and Gaza,” the Ministry of Foreign affairs specified in a statement posted on their official website.
Another way in which the Israeli government seems to be gaining support is through funding Birthright Israel. Birthright Israel is a non-profit organization that has been providing free trips to Jewish people around the globe in order to “bolster distinct Jewish identity, and forge an emotional connection to Israel”. The NGO has provided trips to Israel for over 700,000 young Jewish individuals. The trips aim to focus on building Israeli support by enhancing the Jewish sense of nationality towards the apartheid state. These trips focus on showing a specific peaceful side of Israel whilst disregarding Palestinian struggles in the country.
This clean international image, strengthened by greenwashing, purple washing, and pinkwashing techniques, coupled with Israeli-leaning social media algorithms, do nothing but rally up intense support which advocates for the state of Israel, all while silencing rightful Palestinian voices purposefully.