RAMALLAH (Dispatches) – Facebook is being criticized for letting companies advertise the sale of property in illegal Zionist settlements on Instagram, amid continued outrage at the social media giant’s censorship of Palestinian accounts in recent weeks.
Images posted online showed a Zionist company advertising properties in the northern occupied West Bank settlement of Beit Aryeh-Ofarim on Instagram, the social media platform owned by Facebook.
Facebook, like other social media companies, is facing mounting pressure over its policing of pro-Palestinian content in the wake of the recent deadly escalation by the occupying regime against Palestinians.
At least 253 Palestinians, including 66 children, were killed in the reigme’s bombardment of the Gaza Strip in 11 days that began on May 10. The regime’s airstrikes also brought widespread devastation to the already impoverished territory.
Twitter, TikTok, Instagram and Facebook have all been accused of banning, blocking or restricting accounts that published photos of the Zionist regime’s bombardment of civilians in the besieged Gaza Strip.
The social networks have also been accused of restricting posts that included the words or hashtags “Palestine”, “resistance”, “Israel”, “Hamas”, and “al-Aqsa.”
In a bid to beat the algorithms, activists and other social media users have taken to not writing the words “Israeli” or “Palestinian”, or using an alternative Arabic font, fearing that their posts could be suppressed.
Zionist settlements in the occupied West Bank and East al-Quds breach the Fourth Geneva Convention, which outlaws the transfer of a civilian population into militarily occupied areas.
All settlements are illegal under international law. The UN Security Council has condemned the regime’s settlement activities in the occupied territories in several resolutions.