Twitter Suspends 128 Palestinian Accounts
The Claim
A massive network of bots on social media caught spreading anti-Israel propaganda.
News posted on
Emerging story
Israel’s Strategic Affairs Ministry released in October 2020, its periodic report on the manipulation of social-media networks to delegitimize Israel.
The report, named “Manipulating Social Media,” claimed there are 250 suspicious Twitter accounts—170 of which were found to have carried out “inauthentic activities” with the aim of stirring anti-Israel sentiment online and manipulating the discourse against Israel.
4IL tweeted the handles of dozens of accounts it claimed were “anti-Israel bots and trolls who try to steer public opinion.”
On the other hand, Palestinian accounts claimed their Twitter accounts were suddenly suspended.
Misbar’s Analysis
Misbar found the circulating claim misleading, here are some facts we found during our investigation:
1) Botometer:
At Misbar, we use Botometer to check the activity of a Twitter account and to know if it's an automated bot or not.
We checked three Twitter users mentioned to be accused of being anti-Israel bots. Low scores indicate that the account is not a bot.
2) Suspending prominent account.
Twitter suspended Dr. Basem Naim's account. Dr. Naim is a former health minister in Gaza. There is no way a health minister is a bot!
3) Censoring news and accounts from Palestine.
Facebook has previously shut down pages belonging to the health ministry in Gaza. Following inquiries by The Electronic Intifada, Facebook apologized and reversed the decision, claiming it was a mistake.
Twitter also shut down the accounts of a major Palestinian news publication, without warning or explanation in 2019.
4)Breach of freedom of expression.
Sada Social released a statement on Twitter's decision to suspend accounts highlighted in the Israeli government report was considered "a dangerous indicator of the high-speed response of the Twitter platform's administration to the official Israeli requests against an occupied people".
"[It] is a clear violation of international law and the human rights principles that the Twitter platform is supposed to uphold."
Sada Social has been recording and monitoring the suspension of Palestinian content and accounts on Twitter and Facebook since September 2017.
