The Israeli algorithm criminalizing Palestinians for online dissent | openDemocracy
▻https://www.opendemocracy.net/north-africa-west-asia/nadim-nashif-marwa-fatafta/israeli-algorithm-criminalizing-palestinians-for-o
The algorithm-based program monitors tens of thousands of young Palestinians’ Facebook accounts. It searches for such elements as photos of Palestinians killed or jailed by Israel to identify individuals it deems suspicious. The Israeli army also monitors the activity of relatives, friends, classmates, and co-workers of recent Palestinians killed by Israel to assess their potential risk.
(...) While systematically targeting Palestinians online, Israel does not punish its Jewish residents for their social media posts, though a significant number of them are racist and violent toward Arabs or Palestinians. A recent report from the Palestinian organization 7amleh reveals that in 2016 almost 60,000 Israeli internet users wrote at least one post containing either racism or hatred towards these groups, mostly on Facebook. This translated into a violent post every 46 seconds.
Even government officials write such content. In the lead-up to Israel’s bombing of Gaza in 2014, Ayelet Shaked, an extreme right-wing Israeli parliamentarian, posted a Facebook message that said that Palestinian fighters’ mothers should be killed and their homes destroyed. She, nor any other Israeli Jewish internet user who publishes such language has been arrested or even called to account.