This bulletin covers the period from 1 – 7 January 2018; through which Israeli social media was preoccupied with two issues. The first is the approving of the death penalty bill.
The Knesset approved the first reading of the death penalty bill last Wednesday. The voting was 52 to 49 in favour of the bill, of 120 which is the total number of MKs in the Israeli Knesset.
The bill was proposed by MK Robert Ilatov the Chairman of the Parliamentary Group of Yisrael Beitenu, chaired by Minister of Defence Avigdor Lieberman.
The Israeli social media was divided into those who opposed the law, saying it is a degrading step and that it does not respect human dignity; and those who supported it saying that it is fair to ‘whoever would think about harming Israelis and staying alive’.
The second issue that Israeli social media hugely reacted to was the statement made by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs disapproving of threats made by the American President Donald Trump to cut US funding to UNRWA.
The American President Donald Trump tweeted threatening to cut the US funding to Palestinians accusing them of ‘not being appreciative’.
In return, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared disapproval of the threat made by American President Donald Trump for fear that this can aggravate the humanitarian situation in Gaza strip.
The statement made by the Israeli Foreign Affairs preoccupied the Israeli social media networks greatly, especially after the Minister Naftali Bennet (known for his right-wing stands) posted on Facebook criticizing the statement made by the Foreign Affairs, saying that the Israeli Foreign Affairs is strengthening Hamas by this:
