8 aug 2018
Palestinian poet and social media activist Dareen Tatour turned herself in on Wednesday to the Israel Prison Service to serve two months that were left of her five-month prison sentence.
Dozens of Palestinians and supporters had gathered at Tatour’s home to bid her farewell as she left her house to serve her prison term. Video
Tatour thanked her supporters, whom she said have not left her for one moment during her ordeal.
She stressed that she was on trial for her political views, saying “this proves that Israel is a democracy for Jews only and that freedom of expression is confined to one type of people in this entity that oppresses the Arabs who thought they live in a law-abiding country.”
An Israeli court had earlier sentenced Tatour, 36, to five months in prison for a poem she published on social media titled "Resist my people, resist them", which Israel claimed it included incitement to violence.
However, after already being held for three months in prison and two years and a half under house detention, Tatour, who was first detained on October 11, 2015 during pre-dawn raid at her home, was left with more two months to serve.
Dozens of Palestinians and supporters had gathered at Tatour’s home to bid her farewell as she left her house to serve her prison term. Video
Tatour thanked her supporters, whom she said have not left her for one moment during her ordeal.
She stressed that she was on trial for her political views, saying “this proves that Israel is a democracy for Jews only and that freedom of expression is confined to one type of people in this entity that oppresses the Arabs who thought they live in a law-abiding country.”
An Israeli court had earlier sentenced Tatour, 36, to five months in prison for a poem she published on social media titled "Resist my people, resist them", which Israel claimed it included incitement to violence.
However, after already being held for three months in prison and two years and a half under house detention, Tatour, who was first detained on October 11, 2015 during pre-dawn raid at her home, was left with more two months to serve.
1 aug 2018
Facebook social networking platform announced on Tuesday that it had removed 32 accounts and pages from both Facebook and Instagram, in order to combat foreign intervention in the midterm 2018 US congressional elections and the 2020 US presidential elections.
According to the social media giant, it uncovered "sophisticated" efforts of meddling with US policies and as a result removed the 32 fake accounts and pages.
US lawmakers called these social media attempts "a threat to democracy."
Although Facebook denied identifying the owners of the fake accounts and pages, the company revealed it was most likely associated with Russia, referring to alleged Russian attempts on social media platforms, tampering with the 2016 U.S. elections by posting and buying advertisments.
In response to the accusation, Russia has repeatedly denied any involvement.
Facebook labeled this move as a coordinated political influence campaign and explained that "this kind of behavior is not allowed on Facebook because we don't want people or organizations creating networks of accounts to mislead others about who they are, or what they're doing."
The company confirmed that the removed pages had created 30 events since May 2017, as well as more than 290,000 accounts were following at least one of the removed pages and that about $11,000 had been spent on more than 150 advertisement.
Some of the revealed deleted pages include Aztlan Warriors, Resisters, and Black Elevation.
The company identifies this influential activity as foreign manipulation of U.S. policies and as political misinformation through fake accounts and pages.
According to the social media giant, it uncovered "sophisticated" efforts of meddling with US policies and as a result removed the 32 fake accounts and pages.
US lawmakers called these social media attempts "a threat to democracy."
Although Facebook denied identifying the owners of the fake accounts and pages, the company revealed it was most likely associated with Russia, referring to alleged Russian attempts on social media platforms, tampering with the 2016 U.S. elections by posting and buying advertisments.
In response to the accusation, Russia has repeatedly denied any involvement.
Facebook labeled this move as a coordinated political influence campaign and explained that "this kind of behavior is not allowed on Facebook because we don't want people or organizations creating networks of accounts to mislead others about who they are, or what they're doing."
The company confirmed that the removed pages had created 30 events since May 2017, as well as more than 290,000 accounts were following at least one of the removed pages and that about $11,000 had been spent on more than 150 advertisement.
Some of the revealed deleted pages include Aztlan Warriors, Resisters, and Black Elevation.
The company identifies this influential activity as foreign manipulation of U.S. policies and as political misinformation through fake accounts and pages.
NGO says hacker tried to bait staffer with WhatsApp message about a protest at Saudi Embassy in Washington; malicious link traced back to a network of sites tied to the NSO Group, an Israeli surveillance firm; NSO says will investigate misuse of its product.
An Amnesty International employee has been targeted with Israeli-made surveillance software, the human rights group said Wednesday, adding to a growing number of examples of Israeli technology being used to spy on human rights workers and opposition figures in the Middle East and beyond.
In a 20-page report, Amnesty outlined how it thinks a hacker tried to break into an unidentified staff member's smartphone in early June by baiting the employee with a WhatsApp message about a protest in front of the Saudi Embassy in Washington.
The London-based human rights organization said it traced the malicious link in the message to a network of sites tied to the NSO Group, an Israeli surveillance company implicated in a series of digital break-in attempts, including a campaign to compromise proponents of a soda tax in Mexico and an effort to hack into the phone of an Arab dissident that prompted an update to Apple's operating system.
Joshua Franco, Amnesty's head of technology and human rights, said the latest hacking attempt was emblematic of the increased digital risk faced by activists worldwide.
"This is the new normal for human rights defenders," Franco said.
NSO said in a written statement that its product was "intended to be used exclusively for the investigation and prevention of crime and terrorism" and that allegations of wrongdoing would be investigated. In response to a series of written questions, the company said past allegations of customer misuse had, in an undisclosed number of cases, led to the termination of contracts.
Amnesty's findings were corroborated by internet watchdog Citizen Lab, which has been tracking NSO spyware for two years and is based at the University of Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs.
In its own report being released Wednesday, Citizen Lab said it so far had counted some 175 targets of NSO spyware worldwide, including 150 people in Panama identified as part of a massive domestic espionage scandal swirling around the country's former president.
The Amnesty International report said the organization identified a second human rights activist, in Saudi Arabia, who was targeted in a similar way to its staffer. Citizen Lab said it found traces of similar hacking attempts tied to Qatar or Saudi, hinting at the use of the Israeli spyware elsewhere in the Gulf.
Any possible use of Israeli technology to police dissent in the Arab world could raise uncomfortable questions both for Israel, which still sees itself as a bastion of democracy in the region, and for countries with no formal diplomatic ties to the Jewish state.
For Amnesty's Franco, it was a sign of an out-of-control trade in high-tech surveillance tools.
"This is a huge market that's completely opaque and under-regulated," he said.
An Amnesty International employee has been targeted with Israeli-made surveillance software, the human rights group said Wednesday, adding to a growing number of examples of Israeli technology being used to spy on human rights workers and opposition figures in the Middle East and beyond.
In a 20-page report, Amnesty outlined how it thinks a hacker tried to break into an unidentified staff member's smartphone in early June by baiting the employee with a WhatsApp message about a protest in front of the Saudi Embassy in Washington.
The London-based human rights organization said it traced the malicious link in the message to a network of sites tied to the NSO Group, an Israeli surveillance company implicated in a series of digital break-in attempts, including a campaign to compromise proponents of a soda tax in Mexico and an effort to hack into the phone of an Arab dissident that prompted an update to Apple's operating system.
Joshua Franco, Amnesty's head of technology and human rights, said the latest hacking attempt was emblematic of the increased digital risk faced by activists worldwide.
"This is the new normal for human rights defenders," Franco said.
NSO said in a written statement that its product was "intended to be used exclusively for the investigation and prevention of crime and terrorism" and that allegations of wrongdoing would be investigated. In response to a series of written questions, the company said past allegations of customer misuse had, in an undisclosed number of cases, led to the termination of contracts.
Amnesty's findings were corroborated by internet watchdog Citizen Lab, which has been tracking NSO spyware for two years and is based at the University of Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs.
In its own report being released Wednesday, Citizen Lab said it so far had counted some 175 targets of NSO spyware worldwide, including 150 people in Panama identified as part of a massive domestic espionage scandal swirling around the country's former president.
The Amnesty International report said the organization identified a second human rights activist, in Saudi Arabia, who was targeted in a similar way to its staffer. Citizen Lab said it found traces of similar hacking attempts tied to Qatar or Saudi, hinting at the use of the Israeli spyware elsewhere in the Gulf.
Any possible use of Israeli technology to police dissent in the Arab world could raise uncomfortable questions both for Israel, which still sees itself as a bastion of democracy in the region, and for countries with no formal diplomatic ties to the Jewish state.
For Amnesty's Franco, it was a sign of an out-of-control trade in high-tech surveillance tools.
"This is a huge market that's completely opaque and under-regulated," he said.
31 july 2018
The Israeli Magistrate Court of Nazareth sentenced Palestinian poet Darin Tatour, from the al-Reineh village in northern Israel, to five months of prison and 6 months of suspended sentence, on Tuesday.
The Israeli prosecution accuses Tatour of “incitement and supporting a terrorist organization” for writing a poem criticizing the Israeli occupation and posting it on her personal page on Facebook.
The Israeli prosecution demanded that Tatour be imprisoned for periods between 15 and 26 months.
Tatour had previously spent more than 2 years and 8 months between prison and house arrest for writing the poem.
Read the poem here.
She said that the decision was “unjust” and that there was no reason for the court to place her under trial in the first place. However, she added that she was not surprised by the ruling.
She added, according to Ma’an News Agency, that she does not trust the Israeli court system, pointing out that the her detention was politically motivated; “democracy is confined to one type of people in this country,” Tatour said, pointing out to the discrimination against Palestinian citizens in Israel.
Tatour was previously detained in October of 2015, indicted in November on charges of “incitement to violence and support for a terrorist organization.”
The Israeli prosecution accuses Tatour of “incitement and supporting a terrorist organization” for writing a poem criticizing the Israeli occupation and posting it on her personal page on Facebook.
The Israeli prosecution demanded that Tatour be imprisoned for periods between 15 and 26 months.
Tatour had previously spent more than 2 years and 8 months between prison and house arrest for writing the poem.
Read the poem here.
She said that the decision was “unjust” and that there was no reason for the court to place her under trial in the first place. However, she added that she was not surprised by the ruling.
She added, according to Ma’an News Agency, that she does not trust the Israeli court system, pointing out that the her detention was politically motivated; “democracy is confined to one type of people in this country,” Tatour said, pointing out to the discrimination against Palestinian citizens in Israel.
Tatour was previously detained in October of 2015, indicted in November on charges of “incitement to violence and support for a terrorist organization.”
19 july 2018
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg says not right to 'take someone off the platform if they get things wrong, even multiple times.' Instead, he says, the social media giant won't widely distribute the offensive content on users' News Feed.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg defended the right of users to upload posts denying the Holocaust, thrusting to the fore yet again a debate on whether limits should be imposed on the use of the social media giant.
“I just think, as abhorrent as some of those examples are, I think the reality is also that I get things wrong when I speak publicly. I’m sure you do. I’m sure a lot of leaders and public figures we respect do too, and I just don’t think that it is the right thing to say, ‘We’re going to take someone off the platform if they get things wrong, even multiple times,’” Zuckerberg said in an interview with tech blog Redcode.
He insisted he doesn't think people are "intentionally" getting things wrong.
At this point, Swisher cut in and said that in the case of Holocaust deniers, it may be intentionally wrong.
Zuckerberg responded by saying that "It's hard to impugn intent and to understand the intent."
The portion of the interview was about hate speech and its potential impact in regions of strife led to an outcry online, and Zuckerberg followed with an email to Swisher attempting to expand on what he had said.
"I personally find Holocaust denial deeply offensive, and I absolutely didn't intend to defend the intent of people who deny that," Zuckerberg wrote in an email, which was published by Recode.
The goal of Facebook is not to prevent someone from saying something untrue, he said, but to stop fake news from spreading across the social network.
Zuckerberg, himself Jewish, offered a compromise to people who make Holocaust denial posts and other highly offensive content.
“What we will do is we’ll say, ‘Okay, you have your page, and if you’re not trying to organize harm against someone, or attacking someone, then you can put up that content on your page, even if people might disagree with it or find it offensive.’ But that doesn’t mean that we have a responsibility to make it widely distributed in News Feed. I think we, actually, to the contrary…” he said.
'Facebook will have to adhere to German laws on Holocaust denial'
Despite Zuckerberg’s comments, the Justice Ministry in Berlin said on Thursday that Facebook must stick to German laws which ban Holocaust denial.
Zuckerberg's remarks have fuelled further criticism of Facebook after governments and rights groups have attacked it for not doing enough to stem hate speech.
Officials in Germany, which has enforced a law imposing fines of up to 50 million euros ($58 million) on social media sites that fail to remove hateful messages promptly, made it clear that Holocaust denial was a punishable crime.
"There must be no place for anti-Semitism. This includes verbal and physical attacks on Jews as well as the denial of Holocaust," Justice Minister Katarina Barley said on Thursday.
"The latter is also punishable by us and will be strictly prosecuted," Barley said.
A ministry spokesperson said Facebook must adhere to German law and so far there had been no complaints that the firm had violated it.
Social media networks in Germany must delete or lock obvious criminal content within 24 hours of a filed complaint and other reported content must be resolved by the platform within a week.
"Nobody should defend anyone who denies the Holocaust," tweeted German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, who introduced the Facebook law in his previous job as justice minister.
Facebook uses automated software and employs around 7,500 workers to spot controversial content and delete entries that violate its policy.
The justice ministry also said that Facebook and other big social media platforms must report to officials by the end of July on how effective they had been in deleting hate messages from their sites.
A Facebook spokesman in Germany referred Reuters to Zuckerberg's later statement which clarified his comments, saying he didn't intend to defend the intent of people who deny the Holocaust.
Online anti-Semitism has become a "worrying phenomenon" in Germany, a study by the Technical University in Berlin, which analyzed more than 300,000 entries from Facebook and other online forums, showed earlier this month.
The proportion of anti-Semitic content in German social media rose from 7.5 percent in 2007 to more than 30 percent in 2017, the study showed.
Josef Schuster, the head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany said the study empirically proved that online anti-Semitism was increasing and becoming more aggressive.
"Because words will eventually be followed by deeds. Online anti-Semitism is not virtual, but a real threat," Schuster said.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg defended the right of users to upload posts denying the Holocaust, thrusting to the fore yet again a debate on whether limits should be imposed on the use of the social media giant.
“I just think, as abhorrent as some of those examples are, I think the reality is also that I get things wrong when I speak publicly. I’m sure you do. I’m sure a lot of leaders and public figures we respect do too, and I just don’t think that it is the right thing to say, ‘We’re going to take someone off the platform if they get things wrong, even multiple times,’” Zuckerberg said in an interview with tech blog Redcode.
He insisted he doesn't think people are "intentionally" getting things wrong.
At this point, Swisher cut in and said that in the case of Holocaust deniers, it may be intentionally wrong.
Zuckerberg responded by saying that "It's hard to impugn intent and to understand the intent."
The portion of the interview was about hate speech and its potential impact in regions of strife led to an outcry online, and Zuckerberg followed with an email to Swisher attempting to expand on what he had said.
"I personally find Holocaust denial deeply offensive, and I absolutely didn't intend to defend the intent of people who deny that," Zuckerberg wrote in an email, which was published by Recode.
The goal of Facebook is not to prevent someone from saying something untrue, he said, but to stop fake news from spreading across the social network.
Zuckerberg, himself Jewish, offered a compromise to people who make Holocaust denial posts and other highly offensive content.
“What we will do is we’ll say, ‘Okay, you have your page, and if you’re not trying to organize harm against someone, or attacking someone, then you can put up that content on your page, even if people might disagree with it or find it offensive.’ But that doesn’t mean that we have a responsibility to make it widely distributed in News Feed. I think we, actually, to the contrary…” he said.
'Facebook will have to adhere to German laws on Holocaust denial'
Despite Zuckerberg’s comments, the Justice Ministry in Berlin said on Thursday that Facebook must stick to German laws which ban Holocaust denial.
Zuckerberg's remarks have fuelled further criticism of Facebook after governments and rights groups have attacked it for not doing enough to stem hate speech.
Officials in Germany, which has enforced a law imposing fines of up to 50 million euros ($58 million) on social media sites that fail to remove hateful messages promptly, made it clear that Holocaust denial was a punishable crime.
"There must be no place for anti-Semitism. This includes verbal and physical attacks on Jews as well as the denial of Holocaust," Justice Minister Katarina Barley said on Thursday.
"The latter is also punishable by us and will be strictly prosecuted," Barley said.
A ministry spokesperson said Facebook must adhere to German law and so far there had been no complaints that the firm had violated it.
Social media networks in Germany must delete or lock obvious criminal content within 24 hours of a filed complaint and other reported content must be resolved by the platform within a week.
"Nobody should defend anyone who denies the Holocaust," tweeted German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, who introduced the Facebook law in his previous job as justice minister.
Facebook uses automated software and employs around 7,500 workers to spot controversial content and delete entries that violate its policy.
The justice ministry also said that Facebook and other big social media platforms must report to officials by the end of July on how effective they had been in deleting hate messages from their sites.
A Facebook spokesman in Germany referred Reuters to Zuckerberg's later statement which clarified his comments, saying he didn't intend to defend the intent of people who deny the Holocaust.
Online anti-Semitism has become a "worrying phenomenon" in Germany, a study by the Technical University in Berlin, which analyzed more than 300,000 entries from Facebook and other online forums, showed earlier this month.
The proportion of anti-Semitic content in German social media rose from 7.5 percent in 2007 to more than 30 percent in 2017, the study showed.
Josef Schuster, the head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany said the study empirically proved that online anti-Semitism was increasing and becoming more aggressive.
"Because words will eventually be followed by deeds. Online anti-Semitism is not virtual, but a real threat," Schuster said.
16 july 2018
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The Palestinian Information Ministry issued a statement strongly denouncing the new Israeli “Facebook Bill,” and described it as one of Israel’s illegal policies, especially those aiming at concealing and burying the truth, and the ongoing crimes committed by its army against the Palestinians in occupied Palestine.
In a statement released Monday, the Ministry said the new Israeli bill, is a continuation of its policies, which aim at inciting against the Palestinians, and silencing those who expose its crimes on social media networks. “Israel’s parliament should act on stopping the platforms that openly incite against our people, calling for killing them,” it said, “Instead of celebrating the release of Israeli terrorists who murdered and burnt our children in Palestine, Israel should be prosecuting them, rather than abducting and |
imprisoning the Palestinians, including journalists, who expose these crimes.”
It called on parliaments and governments around the world to intervene, and “to stop this wave or racism and fanaticism the Israeli Knesset is trying to pass into laws, and the protection it provides to the murders.”
On Monday, Israel passed the bill, allowing it to proceed to the final readings before it becomes a law.
The bill was submitted by Israeli Justice Minister, Ayelet Shaked of the “Jewish Home Party,” and Public Security Ministry Gilad Erdan, of the ruling Likud party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The bill does not only call for removing what it described as “terrorist content,” but also gives Israeli district courts the legal authority to order social media companies, including Facebook, Google, YouTube and Twitter, to remove all posts that are deemed “illegal,” or “endangering personal, public and national security.”
Another important part of the bill is directly linked to the victories achieved by Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) activists as it deems illegal social media posts and pages that “could seriously cause damage to Israel’s economy or infrastructure.”
On the ground, Israel has already been abducting and imprisoning Palestinians for Facebook, Twitter and other social media posts that were deemed “incitement,” or “promoting violence,” but failed to act on posts by Israelis openly calling for killing and harming the Palestinians.
Last month, the Palestinian Authority’s Information Ministry sent a letter to the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) complaining about the preliminary Israeli Knesset proposal, which passed the first reading, forbidding journalists, and ordinary residents, from filming and documenting Israeli invasions and military activities in occupied Palestine.
It called on parliaments and governments around the world to intervene, and “to stop this wave or racism and fanaticism the Israeli Knesset is trying to pass into laws, and the protection it provides to the murders.”
On Monday, Israel passed the bill, allowing it to proceed to the final readings before it becomes a law.
The bill was submitted by Israeli Justice Minister, Ayelet Shaked of the “Jewish Home Party,” and Public Security Ministry Gilad Erdan, of the ruling Likud party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The bill does not only call for removing what it described as “terrorist content,” but also gives Israeli district courts the legal authority to order social media companies, including Facebook, Google, YouTube and Twitter, to remove all posts that are deemed “illegal,” or “endangering personal, public and national security.”
Another important part of the bill is directly linked to the victories achieved by Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) activists as it deems illegal social media posts and pages that “could seriously cause damage to Israel’s economy or infrastructure.”
On the ground, Israel has already been abducting and imprisoning Palestinians for Facebook, Twitter and other social media posts that were deemed “incitement,” or “promoting violence,” but failed to act on posts by Israelis openly calling for killing and harming the Palestinians.
Last month, the Palestinian Authority’s Information Ministry sent a letter to the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) complaining about the preliminary Israeli Knesset proposal, which passed the first reading, forbidding journalists, and ordinary residents, from filming and documenting Israeli invasions and military activities in occupied Palestine.
7 july 2018
Israeli police on Saturday morning launched a new attack on Bab al-Rahma area east of al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied Jerusalem.
According to Jerusalem's Islamic Awqaf Department, Israeli policemen in the early morning hours wreaked havoc in Bab al-Rahma area.
It added in a brief statement that al-Aqsa guards confronted the Israeli police and forced them to stop the attack.
Bab al-Rahma has been repeatedly attacked by the police over the past month after settler groups claimed on social media websites that the cleaning campaign launched in the area following some restorations there is an "act of vandalism".
The Israeli police further uprooted olive trees planted in the area and destroyed the new stairs built of al-Aqsa Mosque stones.
According to Jerusalem's Islamic Awqaf Department, Israeli policemen in the early morning hours wreaked havoc in Bab al-Rahma area.
It added in a brief statement that al-Aqsa guards confronted the Israeli police and forced them to stop the attack.
Bab al-Rahma has been repeatedly attacked by the police over the past month after settler groups claimed on social media websites that the cleaning campaign launched in the area following some restorations there is an "act of vandalism".
The Israeli police further uprooted olive trees planted in the area and destroyed the new stairs built of al-Aqsa Mosque stones.
