Op-Ed: The War on Social Media

[Valin]

Shalom Life:

While rockets continue to divide the Israelis and Palestinians, a different kind of war is taking place, online

Daniel Koren

July 14th, 2014

 

 

Over the course of the last seven days, your Facebook feed has most likely mainly consisted of two topical items: the FIFA World Cup - which you can now expect to dwindle after Germany's well deserved victory over Argentina yesterday - and the ongoing crisis in the Middle East.

 

It seems people, particularly in the United States and Canada, are far more interested in the conflict between the Israelis and Hamas than say the conquering of cities in Syria and Iraq by members of ISIS.

 

Here in the West, we have to consider ourselves pretty lucky. We are in no real threat or danger, and while it pains us and hurts us to hear of our friends and loved ones facing rocket attacks on a daily basis, we are not the ones facing war, at least, in the military sense of the word.

 

We are, however, fully engaged in another type of war, one that sees two sides hurling hatred-filled rhetoric at one another, cursing each other to the death: the War on Social Media, specifically, the war on Facebook and Twitter. It's an angry, arduous and painful one.

 

(Snip)