Rights group monitors rise in anti-Palestinian hate speech on social media

AMMAN — 7amleh (The Arab Centre for the Advancement of Social Media) has documented over 103,000 instances of hate speech and incitement against Palestinians in Hebrew on social media platforms, during the period between October 7 and October 18.

7amleh is a non-profit organisation that advocates for Palestinian digital rights. It has recently developed a “Violence Indicator” which employs artificial intelligence technology to monitor the spread of hate speech and violent content targeting Palestinians in the Hebrew language on social media platforms.

The vast majority of the instances recorded by the indicator were found on the "X" platform and are largely a result of the absence of sufficient moderation on harmful content, the watchdog group said.

Its report also revealed that 63 per cent of documented “violent speech” was political, 36 per cent was racial and the remaining 1 per cent was related to gender, religion or other issues.

The report warned that this type of content could translate into “real” attacks against Palestinian communities.

At least 75 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli troops or settlers in the West Bank since the Gaza conflict erupted on October 7, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

The report stated that a digital war has been taking place on social media platforms since the onset of the ongoing Israeli attacks on Gaza, following the “Al Aqsa Flood” operation led by Hamas on October 7.

Citing news reports from last week, the report said that Meta responded to 90 per cent of requests by the Israeli government to remove content and accounts that allegedly promote “violence and terrorism” on the company’s social media platforms, while TikTok responded to 85 per cent of submitted requests.

However, content inciting violence against Palestinians remains unaddressed, according to the report.

The Palestinian NGO Sada Social said in a video statement on Sunday that users who attempt to expose the “crimes” of the Israeli occupation against Gazan civilians or express their solidarity with Palestinians face various restrictive measures from social media platforms, which “turn a blind eye” to content inciting violence against Palestinians.

Sada Social has recorded over 13,000 anti-Palestinian content items published on various social media platforms in Hebrew and other languages since October 7.

Some of the inciting phrases detected by the organisation include “Kill Palestinians”, “don’t let one drop of water enter Gaza”, “I hope to drink their blood”, “kill Palestinian captives” and “exterminate Palestinian cities. They don’t have the right to live”.