Fadi Al-Asa-Bethlehem

Palestinian journalist Hisham Abu Shakra was surprised by a Facebook notification a few days ago that photos of him published in 2016 from the Dheisheh refugee camp in Bethlehem, south of the West Bank, were deleted on the anniversary of the start of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

Abu Shakra is surprised that Facebook deletes photos and news published several years ago, or that the American social networking company to prevent the publication of it just because it speaks of the Palestinian people, saying that the Palestinians are oppressed by the Israeli occupation in real life and Facebook in their virtual reality in which they express themselves freely.

Official Palestinian weakness
Hisham did not attempt to communicate with the Facebook administration, fearing that the ban would result in the closure of his own page as a photojournalist, and even not opening an account in his name again because he would be stalked, because the word "incitement" invoked by Facebook is loosely punitive.

Abu Shakra tells Al Jazeera Net that he will continue his work even if it takes to return to the primitive means of journalism, considering that Palestinian officials are indifferent to the matter, while Israeli officials use all their abilities to communicate with the Facebook administration to incite the Palestinians.

Many Palestinian activists see through social networking pages that what they called Facebook attack on Palestinian content was not limited to individuals, but extended to large pages.

The website of "Ada'at", which is diverse in its content of politics, literature, art, philosophy, history and others, which targets Arab youth between 20 and 35 years old, was closed on its Facebook page established in 2015, after five consecutive alerts arrived on 19 September last on the existence of the names of Yahya Ayash and Hassan Salama (two leaders of Hamas), and that the content violates Facebook standards.

No response from Facebook
The editor of marketing and marketing in the site "Illuminations" Mohammed Osman to the island Net that the page on Facebook follows a website that is not specialized in Palestinian affairs, and in just ten minutes these alerts arrived, and half an hour later closed the page.

I contacted the Facebook administration directly, saying that the "competent team would respond", but no official response so far - the date of the report - from Facebook, but another justification is that "the content supports terrorism and incite hatred."

Osman believes that the reason for the closure is clear to anyone or a page covering anything about the Palestinian cause even if they are not specialized in it.

According to Iyad al-Rifai, director of Sada Social Center, which specializes in monitoring violations on social media sites, the attack from Facebook administration is not an accusation, but facts through data. Since the outbreak of the Jerusalem gift in 2015, the Palestinian content has been heavily attacked upon official requests from the Israeli government that produced Officials talk to the Facebook administration, amid a Palestinian struggle to try to recover what was deleted.

Al-Rifai says to Al-Jazeera Net that the strange thing in this attack is targeting publications published years ago as if the punishment became retroactive, pointing out that Facebook has modified its algorithms to stop postings just to mention some words or pictures without even checking the full text content.

Forbidden words
It seems that the focus on the many words and images related to the martyrs, resistance, wounded and prisoners reached any word or picture related to the Palestinian factions, especially Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

The Sada Social Center monitored dozens of words that Facebook considers inflammatory, and more than 130 stoppages of personal and public pages were recorded in September 2019 simply because these words were received, although activists used methods to solve the problem but failed, such as "use of" Instead of the word "martyr.

Palestinian activists periodically follow up with Facebook administration, and strong messages have been sent that what is happening is a crackdown on Palestinian content that has prompted activists to launch several Facebook posts in support of Palestinian content and against Facebook's actions.

Activists say that the response was made by Facebook, which asked to send the accounts or pages that were closed, and that the technical team will meet and identify the reasons and explained, but without an official response.

According to Palestinian activists, the ban is not carried out on Israeli pages, even though it contains content that incites violence, hatred and even murder in a clear and explicit manner, but the reactions to it are shy and fall short of the level of Facebook management towards the Palestinian content.

Palestinian post deleted by Facebook (social networking sites)

Iyad al-Rifai says that all activities carried out to communicate with Facebook are voluntary, contrary to what the Israeli government, which harnesses its financial, political and technical capabilities to communicate with the administration of Facebook, and there is communication with the Palestinian government headed by Mohammed Shtayyah to develop a comprehensive national policy to keep the Palestinian digital content .

Facebook denies the accusations
In our various contacts with activists, we conveyed what the Facebook administration responded to the Palestinians' accusations that the suspension could be made in error, denying the existence of these policies, but without ending and resolving the problem.

Facebook management has organized several workshops to try to adapt its policies to serve users and solve their problems regardless of their ethnicity and orientation, but the problem with the Palestinian content still exists.