There have been three times more anti-Israel articles appearing on social media in recent weeks than pro-Israel articles. An analysis by the Israeli company Media Intelligence Group (MIG) shows how dark this discourse has become on the Internet and especially on social networks. The geopolitical phenomenon is explained by nature: Why does the wind change direction? The warm air rises and sucks in the cool and heavy air over the sea. The wind blows from the sea to the coast. The wind changes direction overnight because the water retains heat longer than the land, and the air above is even warmer and rises. Then the wind changes and blows from land to sea. Such rules also exist in politics. In the first days, the world had polite pity for Israel because of the atrocities, because after all, the inhabitants of Israel are only human. But then overnight the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza grew hotter and hotter. The wind changed, and with it the policy against Israel. As a kitesurfer and editor, I know a little about both ocean wind and wind in politics.
Some 83 percent of online posts about war are now directed against Israel. Major news sites abroad publish three times more articles portraying Israel in a negative light than in a positive light. Patience with Israel is dwindling. That was to be expected, that’s what we said, because it’s always like that. The world public has simply forgotten what happened in Israel on October 7th and only hears the Palestinian voices.
Gaza health ministry says Israeli strikes kill 110 in Jabalia https://t.co/W40stlvJs1
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) December 18, 2023
A recent survey conducted by Harvard University is alarming, showing that more than half of young people in the USA see a new solution for Israel: the land of Israel should be handed over to the Palestinians. Fifty-one percent of Americans ages 18-24 said that the solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will actually be the end of the State of Israel. Sixty percent of them believe Hamas’s terrorist attack on October 7th was justified and accuse Israel of genocide. Half of them support Hamas.
Since October 7th, the networks have been reporting on Israel’s war with Hamas. The absolute majority of posts on social media and articles in major international media are directed against Israel. According to MIG, a total of 1.9 million posts have been written since October 7 that have received likes, shares and comments related to Israel’s “Iron Swords” war. Of these, more than 1.5 million posts were directed against Israel, an absolute majority of 83 percent. Only 9 percent of posts were pro-Israel, while 8 percent were neutral. These posts received a total of 4.3 billion likes, shares and comments.
Roughly half of young Americans say Israel should be “ended and given to Hamas and the Palestinians” amid the ongoing war despite continuing support for the Jewish state among older Americans, according to a new poll. | @dezward01 https://t.co/USFekANhv9
— National Review (@NRO) December 18, 2023
“Many manifestations of antisemitism, anti-Israel propaganda and the spread of fake news against Israel were observed on social networks,” explains Yonatan Hasidim, CEO of MIG. “In addition, narratives emerged about Israel’s existence. A terrorist state that commits genocide and deliberately kills children and citizens. This is an important point because many people, especially young people, are influenced and exposed to discourse surrounding war on social networks.”
The coverage Israel received on news sites is more balanced, but negative international sentiment predominates – for every article that portrayed Israel in a positive light, about three articles were written that portrayed Israel in a negative light. Of the approximately 372,000 articles published on war-related websites with over a million hits per month, 64 percent were neutral, 28 percent were against Israel and 8 percent were for Israel. But with regard to the 64 percent, it must be mentioned that they see Israel’s future existence only in a two-state solution and do not recognize Israel’s right to exist in the biblical heartland of Judea and Samaria. The leading media outlets reporting on Israel were Argentine news site Infobae, British news site Daily Mail Online, Russian news agency RIA Novosti, international news agency Reuters and Turkish news agency Anadolu.
“At the beginning of the war, it seemed that the international media was more focused on publicizing the atrocities committed by Hamas on October 7th. But after a short time, the reporting turned and focused on Israel’s destruction of the Gaza Strip,” Hasidim emphasized to N12. “As the massive ground offensive progressed and the damage to civilians and children was published, the negative reporting and thus the delegitimization of the activities of the Israeli army in Gaza also increased.” The positive reporting was characterized by references to personal stories of kidnapped and murdered Israelis that highlighted the brutality of the barbaric Hamas. News sites reported more balanced and informative than the social media discourse, which was clearly biased in favor of Gaza and Hamas.
That is our media work is more important than ever these days, because we report on what is going on in the country, we are not neutral and objective, but honest and responsible toward our enemies. By the way, God was not neutral and objective in His reporting in the Bible, but was always on Israel’s side.
The press, like the teachers of children, have much to give account for when they stand in judgement before the Lord. The teachers? you might ask, yes, they are those who teach hatred to little children who don’t hear it from their parents. They teach doctrines that are not in the word of the Lord, those doctrines are void of Biblical truths and are doctrines of death. Those who teach journalism in today’s world are guilty of teaching those doctrines.
The medias all over the world are guilty of choosing those doctrines to do their reporting leaving out the truth for the sake of getting a bonus on their paycheck, or they water the truth down or simply leave it out as they have also been taught to reject the conscious thinking about whether the things they are saying is true or not. The whole world is on the verge of war, words are very important right now, journalists, hold the lives of billions of people in their hands right now, what will they do with them?