Shaked: Online anti-Israel incitement rose following Trump embassy decision
Shaked says government weighing legal action against Twitter
By GIL HOFFMANAyelet Shaked (Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Incitement against Israel reached new heights immediately after President Donald Trump’s December 6 announcement that he will move the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked revealed at the sixth Global Forum for Combating Antisemitism on Tuesday.Shaked spoke at a conference at the forum on online incitement alongside her counterparts from Italy, Greece and Malta and top Facebook officials.“I want to thank President Trump for moving the embassy in another month and a half, which will be an honorable 70th birthday gift to Israel,” she said.“But this decision, which was well covered internationally, led to Palestinian calls for violence and terror against Israelis.”Shaked revealed the findings of a study indicating that there were 12,351 requests from her ministry’s cybersecurity department to remove online incitement over the past year, a massive increase over the previous year. Most were removed, but she said Twitter was the least compliant in removing hate content and warned that her ministry may have to take legal action.“It is clear that those who carried out terror attacks in Israel were directly influenced by such incitement,” Shaked said. “We have also found that after large attacks, the social media networks were drowning in incitement, hatred, antisemitism and support for terror.”Shaked and the other justice ministers signed a joint statement on countering online hate speech and incitement to violence and terrorism.“We strongly encourage Internet users in our respective nations to report to law enforcement agencies hate speech, criminal conduct, and incitement and promotion of violence and terrorism encountered online to the Internet companies,” the statement said.
