Facebook ‘blocks accounts’ of Palestinian journalists

Account suspensions come on heels of agreement between social media giant and Israel to team up against “incitement”.

By Sophia Hyatt

Editors from two Palestinian news publications based in the occupied West Bank say their Facebook accounts were suspended last week and that no reason was provided, alleging their pages may have been censored because of a recent agreement between the US social media giant and the Israeli government aimed at tackling “incitement”.

Last week, four editors from the Shehab News Agency, which has more than 6.3 million likes on Facebook, and three executives from the Quds News Network, with about 5.1 million likes, reported that they could not access their personal accounts.

Both agencies cover daily news in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Nisreen al-Khatib, a translator and journalist at the Quds News Network, told Al Jazeera that the publication believes the account suspensions were triggered by an agreement between Facebook and Israel earlier this month, in which they agreed to jointly combat what Israeli claims is “incitement” by Palestinians on social media.

Read the full article on Aljazeera