Wonder women is most famous for her brightly coloured outfit and superhero moves, not to forget her lasso of truth. Yet when Gal Gadot, the actress that plays the DC character on screen voiced her own truth on the Israel and Palestinian conflict she came under fire online. On her social media accounts, she spoke out about the violence in the middle east and came out in support of Israel, her native country where she served in the armed forces before rocketing to Hollywood fame. Both fans and critics joined forces to condemn her statements, as she refused to acknowledge the Palestinian people by name simply alluding to them as “Israel’s neighbours.” She was also adamant not to castigate or denounce the Israeli army for its barraging of Gaza and its citizens thus taking a strong opinion in a very polarising issue.
This can of course be a problem for her managing team, after all she did just alienate a significant chunk of her audience. Brands that shy away from political stances, or simply share an opposite view, will back away from promotion deals, movie studios may look for alternate actresses and she has lost a large part of her following online. And she wasn’t the only one.
Other celebrities such as Bella Hadid have been outspoken about their stance. The Hadid sisters share a Palestinian heritage and Bella in particular has attended protests in which she rallied against the Jewish state of Israel and has been vocal about her support for the Palestinian long before tensions flared up again this year. While she has gleamed in praise, she has also faced significant outrage, being accused on anti-Semitism online and having had to remove some of her more aggravating posts from her social media accounts.
Yet while all this may appear to be trivial, the role that social media plays in a scenario like this stretches far beyond celebrity virtue signalling. Many were appalled when Israel bombed down a building in Gaza that was known to house media on ground. Israel justified this action with reports that the derelict structure housed Hamas strategic equipment and weapons, and is said to have given an evacuation warning an hour before as a result of which no known journalists have died of this attack.
However, many online have speculated that the attack was an attempt to silence the media and cover up atrocities on ground by the Israeli state to avoid international backlash for its “war crimes” as many have dubbed it. If that was Israel’s intentions then it appeared to have taken a futile shot as countless images of the situation on ground are still circulated online by Palestinians on social media.
Tiktok is a platform that has served as an avid battle ground for supporters of both sides to fight it out. People on ground both in Israel and Palestine posts video clips showing the devastation (or in the case of Israel more often the threat of devastation) that they are being inflicted with. The iron dome lights up the night sky in videos shared by Israelis and buildings like in rubble in Gaza. An Israeli shared a video clip of orthodox Jewish boys being attacked on public transport, it went viral and led to the arrest of men in relation to the case. While a young girl’s cries of feeling helpless in the face of conflict wretched hearts all over.
The platform has also been utilised by people situated all around the world that want their views on the scenario heard and to spread awareness about the qualms of the side they support. A sea shanty has been adapted by one women who spreads the history of Palestine and how Jewish settlers took over a land rightfully belonging to the native Palestinians. This wave hasn’t sustained only on Tiktok, but has taken over Instagram and twitter too, with people sharing feeds filled with their own history lessons and links that help out those on ground.
As appreciable it may be that social media has no broken the barrier to entrance in media, to the extent that a supposed state wishing to stifle dialogue is unable to do so, it also comes with complaints and dangers. Many have complained across Facebook and (Facebook owned) Instagram that their posts in support of Palestine have been censored without due process. Whilst anti-Semitic hate, pro-violence content has proliferated along with calls for peace on most platforms.
Ultimately the true of the matter relies on the people that utilise these platforms. Various parties may attempt to manipulate the use to make it a heightened toxic zone of hate, but it is up to the readers to decide which content to digest and which to discard.
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