Israeli websites hacked

Alaraby, Hacked Israeli websites declare ‘Jerusalem is the capital of Palestine’ "Numerous homepages of Israeli schools, hospitals and municipalities displayed pictures of Friday's protests in Gaza, emblazoned with "Jerusalem is the capital of Palestine" and accompanied by muezzin chants, after being hacked by cyber group Anonymous on Tuesday evening."

Facebook Says It Is Deleting Accounts at the Direction of the U.S. and Israeli Governments

Glenn Greenwald, The Intercept, Facebook Says It Is Deleting Accounts at the Direction of the U.S. and Israeli Governments, 30 Dec 2017 "What makes this censorship particularly consequential is that “96 percent of Palestinians said their primary use of Facebook was for following news.” That means that Israeli officials have virtually unfettered control over a key communications forum of Palestinians." Important article from Gleen Greenwald.

Outrage against Saudi Arabia as Israeli blogger posts selfies from Prophet's Mosque in Medina

alaraby, Outrage against Saudi Arabia as Israeli blogger posts selfies from Prophet's Mosque in Medina, 21 Nov 2017 "Images posted by an Israeli blogger inside the Mosque of the Prophet Muhammad in the Muslim holy city of Medina in Saudi Arabia sparked outrage across the region this week over what many said was the religious insensitivity and double standards of Saudi authorities."

Pizza Hut Apology

aljazeera, Pizza Hut issued an apology for the post that mocked the leader of the Palestinian hunger strike in Israeli jails

'Gaza and Israel: War of the hashtags'

aljazeera.com, Gaza and Israel: War of the hashtags "How instant access to online images and information is helping to shape global reaction to the Israel-Gaza war."

(Selected) Opinions from Israel

David Sheen, Storify, Terrifying Tweets of Pre-Army Israeli Teens "On Thursday, July 10, I entered the Hebrew word for "Arabs", ARAVIM, into Twitter and searched for uses of the word over the previous few hours. What I found was young Israelis proclaiming their desire for all Arabs to die and in some cases be tortured to death."

Also see Mira Bar Hillel, Independent, Why I'm on the brink of burning my Israeli passport, 11 Jul 2014 "Ayelet Shaked represents the far-right Jewish Home party in the Knesset. This means she is well to the right of Benyamin Netanyahu, just in case you thought such a thing was not possible.

"On Monday she quoted this on her Facebook page: “Behind every terrorist stand dozens of men and women, without whom he could not engage in terrorism. They are all enemy combatants, and their blood shall be on all their heads. Now this also includes the mothers of the martyrs, who send them to hell with flowers and kisses. They should follow their sons, nothing would be more just. They should go, as should the physical homes in which they raised the snakes. Otherwise, more little snakes will be raised there.”"

Essential reading

Hackers hit IDF account

alarabiya.net. Hackers take over Israel army Twitter account "Internet hackers briefly took over an Israeli army Twitter account, the military said Friday, posting an alarming message that a nuclear facility had been hit by rocket fire."

Cyber warfare

Yaakov Lappin, Jerusalem Post, Israel, Iran wage cyber warfare in the battlefield of the future " What may begin as an enemy intelligence-gathering mission could later turn into a virus that disrupts military operations." Analysis and speculation

Hamas Vows Crackdown On Collaborators With Israel

al-monitor.com, Hamas Vows Crackdown On Collaborators With Israel, "Communication with the agents takes place with utmost secrecy for fear of exposure. Israeli intelligence has taken advantage of the spread and easy use of mobile devices and the internet, which provide cheap security compared to other means. "The language of communication between an agent and his Israeli recruiter is usually "Arabic and Hebrew." Also, a "code" is used to denote specific words, including special numbers and encrypted names. The agents send urgent, regular and secret information using the Internet, mainly via MSN and email, or dead drops."

Cyber Warfare In The Middle East

also see Sky News, Israel Moves To Block Trojan Computer Attack

Anonymous Arabs hack into hundreds of Israeli accounts

Digital Journal, Anonymous Arabs hack into hundreds of Israeli accounts "The cyber war between Arab hackers and Israeli websites continues. Anonymous Arab website announces they have hacked into hundreds of Israeli email accounts and revealed email addresses and passwords on their Internet site."

Flame update

Independent, Israel hints it may be behind 'Flame' super-virus targeting Iran, 29 May 2012 "A top Israeli minister yesterday fed speculation that the Jewish state could be responsible for a powerful new virus said to have been used in a fresh attack on computers in Iran and elsewhere in the Middle East."

This was also useful:

Telegraph, Flame virus most powerful espionage tool ever, UN warns "The Flame virus is the most powerful espionage tool ever to target countries, a United Nations agency responsible for regulating the internet has warned."

Google Street View in Jerusalem

huffingtonpost.com, Google Street View Comes To Israel "After months of consultations with Israeli security officials, Google has launched its popular Street View service in the country's three largest cities. The new Street View provides images of ordinary life, contested areas and religious sites in the Holy Land."

Also See Ha'aretz, Google Street View catches the beauty and hardships of Jerusalem's Old City

There's quite a lot of detail to be found (in my cursory exploration of this) - and of course many political implications and issues relating to this data being published (and how it is labelled):

 
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Israeli netizen campaign

Peace-minded Israeli reaches out to everyday Iranians via Facebook - CNN.com

www.cnn.com

"It is not possible to dial an Iranian number from an Israeli telephone. It will simply not go through. That lack of communication stems from the government level, where there is no dialogue between the two countries aside from public speeches meant to carry weighty threats of war to each camp."

Also see Global Voices, , A Love Letter From Israel to Iran, 18 Mar 2012 "A message of love from Israelis to Iranians sounds stranger than fiction in these tense years where Iranian and Israeli governments threaten each other with any imaginable words. "But we see examples of just this in a Facebook campaign launched by Pushpin Mehina (real name Ronny) in his timeline that says: “We will never bomb your country. We love you.”"

The Pushpin Facebook page has more information about this particular campaign

Commercial controversy

alarabiya.net, Iran considers partial ban on Samsung after Israeli ad shows bombing of nuke facilities, 3 Feb 2012 “A commercial in Israel featuring Mossad agents disguised as Iranian veiled women who end up blowing up an Iranian nuclear plant using a Samsung tablet has earned the wrath of the Islamic republic."

'Israeli commercial ridicules veil'

alarabiya.net, Israeli commercial ridicules veil, angers Muslims, 2 Feb 2012 "The commercial, which was produced by Israelis, spread rapidly on the social networking website Facebook and the video sharing website YouTube. It depicts four male Mossad agents disguised as women wearing headscarves."

'Pro-Palestinian hackers apologise for cyber attack on Haaretz newspaper website'

The National, Pro-Palestinian hackers apologise for cyber attack on Haaretz newspaper website, 27 Jan 2012, "The group claimed responsibility shortly after the attack, tweeting: "haaretz.co.il Tango Down :)". But yesterday morning an apology appeared on the same Twitter account "@haaretzprint we are sorry, we didn't know that haaretz is a good newspaper, we sorry about this, and be sure no one will attack u again"."

'Saudi hackers target Israeli credit details'

Channel 4 News, Saudi hackers target Israeli credit details, 4 Jan 2012, "Saudi Arabian hackers have claimed a successful cyber attack on Israeli computer servers, publishing the financial details and mobile phone numbers of an estimated 400,000 people."

Facebook: 'Third Palestinian Intifada'

I've been picking up some interesting coverage on the Facebook page(s) 'Third Palestinian Intifada'. For example, see Ha'aretz, ADL slams Facebook for refusing to remove 'third Intifada' fan page, 26 Mar 2011 "The fan page, which has over 308,395 fans, is dedicated to encourage the outbreak a third Intifada in Israel, and warns that if Facebook removes the page "all Muslims will boycott Facebook forever."

Also view Yaakov Lappin, Jerusalem Post, Facebook 'monitoring' page calling for 3rd intifada, 28 Mar 2011 "The Facebook social networking site is monitoring an Arabic-language page which calls for a “third intifada” against Israel, but the site’s bosses have concluded that it has not gone beyond the bounds of acceptable speech, and have decided not to remove it, The Jerusalem Post learned on Sunday.

"The Facebook page, called “Third Palestinian intifada,” has attracted over 330,000 fans since going online, and has issued a call for a mass march into Israel from neighboring countries."

There's also (predictable) Facebook campaigning against 'Third Palestinian Intifada'.

'Taking the Middle East conflict online'

Netta Ahituv, European Journalism Centre, Taking the Middle East conflict online, 29 Nov 2010 discusses blogging in Israeli and Palestinian contexts - and dialogue between diverse parties online.

"Despite the substantial presence of pro-Israeli organisations and activity on the web, there is a general feeling among the Israeli public that the Palestinian side is ‘winning’ this virtual battle. There are many more anti-Israeli blogs and websites than pro-Israeli ones."

article refers to middleastpost.com