Supporters of Israel and Hamas take cases to Facebook, Twitter
January 20th, 2009 - 5:09 pm ICT by ANI
New York, Jan.20 (ANI): Eager to find new ways to bypass reporters and get out their message unfiltered, Israelis and Palestinians found cyberspace fertile ground for a propaganda war.
According to the New York Daily News, frustrated by the media focus on the suffering of women and children, the Israeli Defense Forces have started their own YouTube channel, where they posted videos showing air strikes on Hamas rocket installations.
The IDF also posted videos showing schools and a zoo mined with complex booby-traps by Hamas, and film of weapons caches discovered in mosques.
One video, meant to show that Israel cares for wounded Palestinian children, showed a small body on a gurney being wheeled slowly past the barbed wire of a grim, rainy checkpoint to receive medical attention in Israel.
For a while, the IDF was posting a “vlog” - a video blog - featuring the Australian-accented spokesman Captain Benjamin Rutland staring earnestly into the camera to deliver a daily war update.
That effort fizzled, apparently after some netizens began overlaying his dry updates with bloody videos of maimed Arab babies and weeping mothers.
Such scenes didn”t air on American TV, but they went viral on the Internet, giving the Palestinians an edge in the online war that they didn”t have against Israeli real-world might. (ANI)
- At least 10 people killed, more than 100 injured in clashes along Israel's borders - May 15, 2011
- Peres: U.N. report on Gaza war is "a mockery of history" - Sep 16, 2009
- Israel fires at two Palestinians on Gaza border - Jan 18, 2011
- Israel Navy intercepts Gaza-bound aid vessels - Nov 04, 2011
- Palestinian reconciliation unlikely in 2012: Hamas official - Mar 31, 2012
- Israeli soldiers arrest senior Hamas operative in the West Bank - Jan 07, 2011
- Israeli soldier filmed humiliating female Palestinian detainee on video - Oct 06, 2010
- Palestinian negotiators deny Al-Jazeera report on Mideast peace compromise - Jan 24, 2011
- Israel considers referendum on peace deal with Palestinians - Sep 22, 2010
- Israeli diplomats world over use taxis after attacks - Feb 14, 2012
- Seven mortar shells fired from Gaza Strip into Israel - Dec 21, 2010
- One killed after Israeli air strikes hit the Gaza Strip in response to rocket fire - Aug 17, 2011
- Five Palestinians killed in Israeli airstrike - Oct 30, 2011
- Egypt confirms Israeli-Palestinian prisoners swap deal - Oct 12, 2011
- Israel begins dismantling section of West Bank barrier - Jun 26, 2011
Tags: air strikes, american tv, barbed wire, booby traps, fertile ground, gurney, hamas, israeli defense forces, israelis and palestinians, media focus, medical attention, mosques, netizens, new york daily news, palestinian children, propaganda war, unfiltered, vlog, weapons caches, york daily news
