The American New York Times said that the solidarity of the Arab street with Gaza and the Palestinian cause has witnessed a transformation during the current war on the Strip, as it moved from the streets of Arab cities to the virtual world and gained a global dimension and a wider influence.
A newspaper report indicated that it was customary for protests to take place in the streets of Arab cities whenever Palestinians were subjected to an Israeli attack, and this was putting pressure on leaders in the Middle East and the West who were monitoring the temperature of what used to be called "the Arab street."
However, the reaction of Arab capitals this time was muted. After a week of continuous Israeli bombing of Gaza, which resulted in the death of 212 Palestinians in the Strip, only small and sporadic protests took place, which did not constitute a great pressure on Arab governments to act to resolve the crisis, according to the newspaper.
The newspaper said that instead of these protests, Arab solidarity with the Palestinians has turned into the virtual world and acquired a global dimension, and there has become a virtual Arab street that has the ability to make a wider impact than the effect of the protests in the streets of Arab cities.
The report pointed out that the online demonstrators had links with other popular movements that defend the rights of minorities, such as the Black Lives Matter movement, seeking to return the Palestinian cause to the main media and gain support for it in the Western countries that have consistently supported Israel.
Sympathy for the cause
In an indication that the virtual Arab street uprising in support of Palestine is beginning to bear fruit, and is changing the position of some Democrats on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the New York Times said that although basic support for Israel is still widespread and deep in the United States, an increasing number of Democrats are starting to doubt In Israel, America's closest ally, they are pressing Biden to do the same.
The newspaper said that the most prominent sign of the shift in the position of some Democratic lawmakers was the position of Senator Robert Menendez, a Democratic representative from the state of New Jersey and chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who has long been proud of being one of Israel's most steadfast allies in the Democratic Party.
On Saturday, he said he was "extremely disturbed" by the Israeli air strikes that killed Palestinian civilians and targeted a tower housing the offices of media outlets, including the Associated Press.
His comments came as a group of progressive Democratic lawmakers intensified their criticism of Israel, including Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib, the first Palestinian American to be elected to the US Congress.
The New York Times report sheds light on the sympathy of some celebrities in the West, especially in the United States, with the Gaza Strip and residents of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in Jerusalem, and the efforts of Arab activists in the virtual space to translate content related to what is happening in Jerusalem and Gaza into other languages to garner sympathy for the Palestinians.
The newspaper concluded that the Palestinian activists say that they seek to control the narration of the media, which they accuse of withholding their viewpoint, and trying to portray the suffering of Israel as equal to the suffering of the Palestinians in the territories it occupies.