New Media in Israel

This issue of the Newsletter covers the period 5-7 February 2018. Israeli social media networks were taken up by several issues. Mainly, Israeli social media activists were occupied by the operation carried out by 19-year-old Abdul Karim Assi. According to the Israeli police, Assi stabbed and killed rabbi Itamar Ben-Gal in the vicinity of the Ariel settlement. Assi holds the Israeli nationality and lives in Tel Aviv. His mother is an Israeli Jew and his father a Palestinian from Nablus. Israeli social media platforms engaged in incitement against Assi’s family in particular, and against Palestinians in Israel and the West Bank in general.

This week, the government of Poland cancelled an upcoming visit by the Israeli Minister of Education Naftali Bennett to Warsaw in response to his statements against Poland, which had approved a law that denies the role of the Polish people in the Jewish Holocaust.

On his visit to Poland, Bennett had planned to deliver Israel’s letter of protest to the Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland Jarosław Gowin against the Polish Law.

Bennett was moved to anger after Poland cancelled his visit. Although Poland denied the allegations, Bennett accused the Polish of taking part in the Jewish Holocaust. As a result, Israeli social media networks were so mad at Poland.