https://www.mintpressnews.com/pro-israel-trolls-mobbing-twitter-community-notes/286099/ PROPAGANDA WAR: PRO-ISRAEL TROLLS ARE MOBBING TWITTER’S COMMUNITY NOTES Almost as important as its military campaign for Israel is its battle to control its public image. Even as it kills thousands of people in Gaza, the small Middle Eastern nation is spending millions of dollars on a propaganda war, purchasing ads on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and other online apps. At the same time, an army of pro-Israel trolls has invaded the Community Notes function on X/Twitter, attempting to influence the online debate around the ongoing crisis. SPENDING MILLIONS TO WHITEWASH MASSACRES Since October 7, Israel has inundated YouTube with advertisements, with its Ministry of Foreign Affairs spending nearly $7.1 million on ads in the two weeks following Hamas’ incursion. According to journalist Sophia Smith Galer, this equates to almost one billion impressions. With its campaign, the Israeli government overwhelmingly focused on rich Western nations, its top targets being France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Belgium and the United States. In France alone, the ministry spent $3.8 million. Other branches of the Israeli government undoubtedly also spent money on ads. The overwhelming message of the campaign was that Hamas are terrorists linked with ISIS and that Israel – a modern, secular democracy – is defending itself from foreign aggression. Much of the content blatantly violated YouTube’s terms of service, including a number of ads featuring gory shots of dead bodies. Another ad that piqued public attention was played before videos aimed at babies. Amid a scene of pink rainbows and soothing music, text appears reading: We know that your child cannot read this. We have an important message to tell you as parents. 40 infants were murdered in Israel by the terrorists Hamas (ISIS). Just as you would do everything for your child, we will do everything to protect ours. Now hug your baby and stand with us.” Nearly all the Ministry of Foreign Affairs views are inorganic. Most of their YouTube uploads garner only a few hundred views. But the ones selected as advertisements have hundreds of thousands or even millions of views. Israel’s YouTube campaign has been matched by expansive attempts to control the public debate on other social media platforms. In barely a week, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs ran 30 ads seen over 4 million times on Twitter. Like with YouTube, analytics data shows they were inordinately targeting adults in Western Europe. One ad contained the words “ISIS” and “Hamas,” showing disturbing imagery that gradually sped up until the names of the two groups blended into one. In case the message was not clear enough, it ended with the message, “The world defeated ISIS. The world will defeat Hamas.” The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has also bought large numbers of advertisements on Facebook, Instagram, mobile games and apps such as language trainer Duolingo. TAKING NOTES The Community Notes function on Twitter is an attempt to fight false information. Contributors who sign up for the feature can leave notes on any post, adding context to potentially misleading statements. The community then votes on these notes, and if enough people consider the note useful, it is presented below the original tweet. While it has its advantages, the system is ripe for abuse and infiltration. Since October 7, an army of pro-Israel trolls has brigaded the function and is attempting to undermine and attack as many posts as possible showing Israel in a negative light or Palestine in a positive one. This has often been done in an attempt to hide Israeli war crimes. “If you’re not a Community Notes contributor, then you may be unaware that any tweet about Gaza that poses an inconvenience to Israeli information interests is being mobbed by Israel apologists working to manipulate the narrative, including on tweets just voicing an opinion,” wrote journalist Caitlin Johnstone. A case in point is the attack on the Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza. Under a tweet from journalist Dan Cohen noting that Hananya Naftali (an aide to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu) had boasted that Israel carried out the attack before deleting his message, Community Notes wrote that “Naftali has openly retracted his statement, as conclusive evidence has since shown the explosion was fired from a misfired rocket from Gaza.” The “conclusive evidence” offered was a statement from the Pentagon and a tweet from a former Israeli Air Force squad commander. Meanwhile, a tweet from Lebanese political commentator Sara Abdallah breaking the news that Israel had just bombed the St. Porphyrius Church in Gaza was flagged by Community Notes. This meant that all users saw a note added reading, “False. Saint Porphyrius Orthodox Church in Gaza has posted they are untouched and operating as of October 9, 2023.” The problem was this was breaking news related to October 19, so any statement before that time was meaningless in assessing the news. Further undermining the community note was that Israel almost immediately accepted responsibility for the destruction. Pro-Israel trolls have also not been above blatant smears. On a popular post from myself where I shared a picture of Joe Biden and Benjamin Netanyahu embracing with the words, “In the future, this image will be looked upon as one of the most shameful moments in history,” Community Notes added the message: “Alan MacLeod is a Senior Staff Writer at MintPress News. MintPress is renowned for publishing far-left disinformation and antisemitic conspiracy theories.” Other MintPress staff, such as Lowkey and Mnar Adley, have also been consistently targeted with smears and arguments dressed up as clarifications.
HAMAS is the occupying force in GAZA. Israel can't bomb a hospital - they will need to go tunnel by tunnel to root out the terrorists there is no other way. DD
Unfortunately these days no major conflict can be fought with their sides also duking it out on social media. We see with this with Ukraine and Russia too.
Lord Balfour who started the attempts t o provide a modern legal theory for the settler colonial project , the infamous Balfour Declaration, of settling Euro Jews in Palestine was an anti-Semite and old fashioned British colonialist in the end of the classic British Imperalism.
People don't realize a large aspect of anti-semtisim is that Jews can't be part of a nation or community other than other Jews. They can't be a German Jew or an American Jew. They only belong in Israel.
They are self governing sort of in the way the NAZIs allowed self governance in their concentration camps.
This is against the American way of journalism. No disgusting pictures of Fallujah and Mosul and other cities flattened by American bombs.
Yep. Think about that frequently. Among other things better quality of lif often for the oppessors vs the oppressed.
don't be gaslighted, every single loss of life going forward is on Hamas they could offer unconditional surrender at any time
It's really like they just got new marching orders from whatever 4chan dark web site they frequent. "No need to feel guilty. It's all fake news! And if it's not, no problemo, it's their fault anyway!!!"
