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Hamas, Hasbara and Hyperlinks: Internet Use and the 2008-2009 Israel-Hamas Conflict

Tim Stevens, King’s College London (unpublished essay, 2009)

Abstract

The events of the Israel-Hamas conflict in Gaza over the New Year of 2008-2009 sparked a mass of

discussion, protest and activism on the internet during that period. This paper describes internet

activities undertaken by the political authorities (Israel, Hamas), contrasting them with grassroots

actions of non-state concerned parties to the conflict. Israel’s use of the internet was superior to

that of Hamas, but ‘bottom-up’ protests against Israeli actions were of greater utility in influencing

international opinion. Ultimately, very little of the internet activity was of strategic utility in

effecting offline change, although this may well change in the future.

Introduction

On 27 December 2008, the Israel Air Force launched a barrage of air strikes against pre-planned

targets in the Gaza Strip, thus heralding the beginning of Operation Cast Lead. Air operations

were augmented with a ground incursion beginning 3 January 2009. Two weeks later, Israel

declared a unilateral ceasefire, with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declaring that Israel’s

mission objectives were “obtained in full”.1 Ostensibly, the Israeli operations were intended to

stem Hamas rocket attacks against Israeli settlements, but also to draw international attention

to the smuggling of arms into Gaza from Egypt and elsewhere. The latter was successfully

achieved, although whether Operation Cast Lead had any lasting effect on Hamas’ military

capabilities or international resourcing is doubtful.2

What was clear to much of the outside world was that―despite its stated modus operandi of

precision strikes and intelligence-led assassinations―Israel had also prosecuted a campaign in

1 Ha’aretz, “Israel Declares Victory in Gaza, But at What Cost?,” 18 January 2009. 2 See Anthony Cordesman, The “Gaza War”: A Strategic Analysis (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and

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which many hundreds of Palestinians died. Although the exact figures and disposition of the

killed and wounded continue to be disputed―as are the responsibilities of both Israel and

Hamas for these casualties―Gazan civilians bore the greater burden of the stress and

disjuncture of warfare in a heavily-urbanised battlespace. For all concerned parties to the

dispute, casualties became an important driver in the creation and sustenance of narratives

propagated through multiple communications channels to local, regional and global audiences.

This article does not deal specifically with the issue of casualties; rather, it focuses on the use of

the internet by multiple actors during the period of Operation Cast Lead for the purposes of

information-sharing, propaganda, operational advantage and political mobilisation. In 2001,

Manuel Castells wrote that, due to the critical role of the internet in global communications,

“cyberspace becomes a contested terrain.”3 The internet is, like the rest of cyberspace,

constructed, used, and inhabited by human actors, and is, again in the words of Castells, “a

global electronic agora where the diversity of human disaffection explodes in a cacophony of

accents.”4 Operation Cast Lead spurred various actors to employ the internet as a medium for

their multiple voices, and offers the opportunity to examine how the internet can be used as a

tool of political influence.

The first section of the paper describes how the internet was utilised by Israel―the state―and

Hamas, the de facto authority in Gaza; we may characterise these operations, crudely, as ‘top-

down’. The second section describes the contrasting ‘bottom-up’ activities of internet users,

organised at grassroots level in support of Israel and Hamas/Gaza/Palestine.5 The final section

International Studies, 2009) 3 Manuel Castells, The Internet Galaxy: Reflections on the Internet, Business, and Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), p.137. 4 Castells, The Internet Galaxy, p.138. 5 The author has drawn principally on press reports and other open source information in the absence of available official documents. Most are available online, and every care has been taken to interpret and qualify these texts as appropriate. For an overview of this web-related methodology, see Ananda Mitra and Elisia Cohen, “Analyzing the Web: Directions and Challenges,” in Steve Jones, ed., Doing Internet Research: Critical Issues and Methods for Examining the Net (London: Sage Publications, 1999), pp.179-202.

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evaluates the relative utility of these types of activity, and assesses how these forms of

politicised internet activity are located within broader discussions of the political uses of

communications technologies.

‘Top-down’

The timing of the Israeli attack on Gaza will continue to be disputed, although reports from

within Israel suggest planning occurred at least six months before the offensive began.6 It is

clear that Israel was better prepared in military terms for Operation Cast Lead than it had been

for the Lebanon War.7 This incorporated an improved communications strategy including, in the

context of the current enquiry, the leveraging of the internet for Israel’s own ends.

If we accept that cyberspace incorporates not just the internet but the wider terrain of

technology-mediated communications, Israel tried to shape this environment prior to the air

strikes. They deployed traditional psychological operations (psyops) in the form of leaflet drops,

as well as more innovative communicative devices such as threatening phone calls and text

messages (short message service, SMS) to Gaza residents, insisting among other things that they

leave their homes or risk being killed in airstrikes.8 The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) continued

this “scare tactic” by making hostile phone calls to Gazans throughout the conflict. Hamas later

also later claimed a similar capacity, with Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) spokesman

Muhammad Abd al-A'al (Abu Abir) stating, “Telephone messages and breaching the enemy's

radio frequencies are just some of the surprises we have for the Israeli side. You will be very

surprised by our military and technological capabilities.”9 Their ability to deploy such measures

6 Ha’aretz, “Disinformation, Secrecy and Lies: How the Gaza Offensive Came About,” 31 December 2008. 7 For a critique of Israel’s communications policy during the 2006 Lebanon War, see Thomas Rid and Marc Hecker, War 2.0: Irregular Warfare in the Information Age (Westport, CN and London: Praeger Security International), pp.114-122. 8 The Times, “’Prepare to Be Bombed’: Calls Mark the Start of Psychological Campaign in Gaza,” 30 December 2008. 9 YNet News, “Hamas Sends Text Messages to Israeli Cell Phones,” 1 January 2009, available at http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3648799,00.html. Hamas and the Popular Resistance

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was questioned by the IDF, whose spokesman suggested that these claims were themselves

psyops, “whether they are sending the messages or not.”10 It is likely that Hamas and the PRCs

were reminding Israel of Hezbollah’s alleged electronic warfare (EW) capabilities in 200611, but

Hamas’ attempts to use text messages and cellphone calls were reportedly crude, poorly

targeted, and in “terrible” Hebrew.12 Israel was undoubtedly superior to Hamas and other Gazan

groups in both psyops and electronic warfare, with Hamas accusing Israel of disrupting its al-

Aqsa radio and television transmissions, for example.13

The IDF followed Hezbollah’s 2006 lead in effectively controlling the mass media element of its

campaign by denying foreign journalists physical access to Gaza. This restriction remained in

place until after Israel’s unilateral ceasefire declaration and was a mainstay of their campaign,

allowing them to shape significantly what foreign news agencies were able to report from

within Gaza itself. Organisations like the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), whose senior

journalists were forced to camp out on the borders of Gaza (although one cameraman was

briefly embedded with the IDF in northern Gaza),14 relied on local producers and agency

stringers to file reports from within Gaza, most of which were understandably critical of Israel.

They were briefed regularly by IDF and government spokespersons, of whom it was suggested

were frequently women because of their “supposed softer image”.15 This tactic was replicated

on the English language version of the IDF website during the offensive, whereby images of

female soldiers were substituted for the male soldiers seen on the Hebrew site.16

Committees are by no means identical, with the cross-factional PRC originally identified more with Fatah. In recent years, though, Hamas and the PRCs have often co-operated for operational purposes, with Hamas very much the senior partner. See Jonathan D. Halevi, “The Popular Resistance Committees: Hamas' New Partners?,” Jerusalem Issue Brief, Vol.5, No.24, 17 May 2006. 10 The Guardian, “Text Messages and Phone Calls Add Psychological Aspect to Warfare in Gaza,” 3 January 2009. 11 David A. Acosta, The Makara of Hizballah: Deception in the 2006 Summer War, masters thesis (Monterey, CA: Naval Postgraduate School, 2007), pp.45-49. 12 USA Today, “Cellphones Put to ‘Unnerving’ Use in Gaza,” 13 January 2009. 13 Agence France Presse, “Israel Interrupts Its Radio, TV Broadcasts in Gaza: Hamas,” 3 January 2009. 14 BBC News, “Covering Gaza,” 15 January 2009. 15 Radio Netherlands Worldwide, “Gaza War Also Waged Online,” 6 January 2009. 16 The New York Times, “Online, Two Pictures of the Israeli Military,” 6 January 2009.

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The media blackout backfired somewhat as global news audiences turned to Al Jazeera, the only

international news agency with a significant presence in Gaza. Al Jazeera even garnered

significant viewing figures in the United States for its streaming web video.17 Within hours of

the Israeli air strikes beginning on Gaza on 27 December 2008, video footage was “broadcast

repeatedly in all of its chaotic intensity across the Arab world and around the globe.”18 More

importantly, Al Jazeera, MSNBC, CBS News, Sky News and IDF combat footage, amongst others,

was released onto user-generated video-sharing sites like YouTube and LiveLeak. In turn, these

were linked to and further disseminated on a wide variety of blogs, chatrooms, forums,

newsgroups and social networking sites.

Israeli military spokeswoman Major Avital Leibovich stated, “The blogosphere and new media

are another war zone and we have to be relevant there.”19 Israeli media explained the internet

engagement with reference to its inability to put across its “party line” in Lebanon 2006, and

because many international media outlets were inherently “unsympathetic” to the regime, if not

outright “anti-Semitic”.20 It has also been claimed that Israel’s predominance over Hamas on the

internet afforded Israel “vital breathing space” in which to keep international public opinion at

bay until Israel had finished their offensive.21 This is somewhat disingenuous given bipartisan

support for Israel’s offensive in Washington, described by television satirist Jon Stewart as “the

Möbius strip of issues – there’s only one side”.22 Former Israeli Ambassador to the United

17 Associated Press, “Al-Jazeera Drew US Viewers on Web During Gaza War,” 24 January 2009. For an alternative interpretation, see The New York Times, “Few in U.S. See Jazeera’s Coverage of Gaza War,” 12 January 2009. 18 Los Angeles Times, “Gaza’s Desperate Hospitals Overwhelmed By Casualties,” 28 December 2008. 19 The Jerusalem Post, “IDF Launches YouTube Gaza Channel,” 30 December 2008. 20 The Jerusalem Post, “World Media: Israel ‘Endangers Roots of Our Civilization’,” 12 January 2009. 21 Bloomberg, “Israel Drafts YouTube, Netanyahu to Woo World Opinion on Gaza,” 1 January 2009, available at http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601102&sid=afyZaL6zcjhY&refer=uk. 22 The Daily Show, 5 January 2009.

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Nations Dan Gillerman was also quoted as saying that Israeli actions were largely approved of

by the international community, although he did not know “how long it will last.”23

Time was evidently of the essence though, the IDF being quick to use its website as a multi-

media vehicle. It also established a YouTube channel, providing “documentation of the IDF's

humane action and operational success in Operation Cast Lead”, 24 which rapidly became the

“most subscribed” Israeli site ever, attracting over 1.5 million views25. It was meant, as

expressed by an IDF spokesman, to get the message “to as many as we can”.26 Some of the IDF

videos were criticised by, amongst others, the BBC, on the basis of being inaccurate and

fabricated.27 On 30 December 2008, YouTube briefly removed some IDF footage, labelling it

inappropriate for minors, and therefore breaching community guidelines. The IDF claimed to be

“saddened” by YouTube’s actions, but “due to blogger and viewer support, YouTube has

returned the footage they removed.”28 The IDF’s public diplomacy also included a blog, which

attracted several hundred thousand visitors.29 Hamas retaliated by launching video-sharing site

PaluTube, whose traffic peaked shortly after its launch in mid-January.30

Within hours of the first Israeli strikes on Gaza, the Israel News Agency and public relations

professionals started a Facebook group, “I Support the Israel Defense Forces in Preventing

Terror Attacks from Gaza”, which claimed 66,000 members as of early January 2009, and was

aimed at Israelis and Gazans, whether Arab, Jewish or Christian.31

23 The Jerusalem Post, “Coordination Is Putting Israel Ahead In the Media War”, The Jerusalem Post, 30 December 2008. 24 http://www.youtube.com/idfnadesk 25 As of mid-January 2009. See, Time, “Fighting the Media War in Gaza,” 14 January 2009. 26 CNN, “Israel Uses YouTube, Twitter to Share Its Point of View,” 31 December 2008. 27 BBC News, “Propaganda War: Trusting What We See?,” 5 January 2009. 28 The Independent, “Social Networking Sites Enter Gaza Conflict,” 2 January 2009. 29 http://idfspokesperson.com/ 30 http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details/palutube.com. See also, “The Internet and Terrorism: Hamas Has Recently Launched Palutube, Its New File Sharing Website,” Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center Newsletter, 26 January 2009.

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On 30 December 2008, the Israeli Consulate in New York held a “Citizen’s ‘Press Conference’”,

reportedly the world’s first such event using micro-blogging application Twitter.32 This allowed

internet users to submit questions to consulate staff using the 140-character limit afforded by

the Twitter platform. This led to some slightly bizarre exchanges. For example, when asked why

Gaza was “different”, given that 40 years of military action had failed to bring peace to the

region, the response was “We hav 2 prtct R ctzens 2, only way fwd through negotiations, & left

Gaza in 05. y Hamas launch missiles not peace?”33 David Saranga, head of consular media

relations, said, “Since the definition of war has changed, the definition of public diplomacy has to

change as well.”34 Whilst this is true, the choice of platform was widely criticised as

inappropriate, not least by communications professor Dawn Gilpin, who wrote that Israel

misunderstood the “symmetry, culture, and structure” of Twitter, and therefore failed to

present themselves in the positive and transparent manner they intended.35

As well as the state’s own activities in cyberspace, Israel’s Immigration Absorption Ministry

claimed to be creating an “army of bloggers” by attempting to mobilise over a million Israelis

with second languages to propagandise on their behalf on “anti-Zionist blogs” written in major

European languages.36 This was endorsed by the Israeli foreign ministry, who emailed likely

volunteers on 3 January 2009 with their version of Operation Cast Lead thus far and a plan for

action.37 Targets for engagement reportedly included The Guardian, BBC, The Times, Sky News

and the influential blog, The Huffington Post, as well as lists of pro-Israeli material on CNN and

31 Israel News Agency, “Israel PR Reaches Gaza Arabs Through Facebook, YouTube,” 9 January 2009. 32 Israeli Consulate website, http://www.israelpolitik.org/citizens-press-conference/. 33 The New York Times, “The Toughest Q’s Answered in the Briefest Tweets,” 4 January 2009. 34 Ibid.; also, The Jewish Chronicle, “Meet David Saranga, The Man Whose Campaigns Are Rebranding Israel,” 22 May 2008. 35 Dawn R. Gilpin, “Why Israel’s Twitter Experiment Flopped,” COMOPS Journal, 12 January 2009, available at http://comops.org/journal/2009/01/12/why-israels-twitter-experiment-flopped/. 36 Ha’aretz, “Israel Recruits ‘Army of Bloggers’ to Combat Anti-Zionist Web Sites,” 19 January 2009. 37 Israel Foreign Ministry, “The Next Stage of Operation Cast Lead,” 3 January 2009, available at http://www.richardsilverstein.com/tikun_olam/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/israeli-foreign-ministry-hasbara-memo.pdf.

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YouTube for bloggers and internet users to promote.38 Israeli blogs largely backed Israel’s right

to self-defence and the Gaza campaign, as well as accusing the international media of bias.39 A

counter-operation was suggested by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)’s “action

alert” to all Muslims to engage with traditional and new media outlets in order to balance both

media representations of the conflict and Israel’s propaganda program.40

It would be inaccurate however to attribute a causal link between Israeli or Hamas themselves

and most Gaza-related internet activity during the period in question. The role of nationalist

sentiment in engagement in cyberspace is not new but the conflict inadvertently mobilised

significant support for both sides from regular internet users.

‘Bottom-up’

Hacking―the use of computers and computing networks for the purpose of disrupting or

accessing the data and systems of a chosen target―was deployed by those sympathetic to both

Israel and Gaza/Palestine. Over the first weekend of the conflict, for example, it was reported

that pro-Palestinian hackers defaced or took down 300 Israeli-run websites.41 These activities

persisted and expanded over the course of the war. The hacker groups responsible were from

North Africa, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Lebanon and Iran, as well as Palestine, with names like

RitualistaS GrouP, Team Evil, Tw!$3r and KaSPeRs HaCKeR CreW. The global character of these

actors is further shown by the fact that websites associated with these groups were registered

and hosted in a variety of countries, including Denmark, Saudi Arabia, the United States and

Belgium.42

38 The Guardian, “Hasbara Spam Alert,” 9 January 2009. 39 BBC News, “Israeli Blogs Back Gaza Operation,” 6 January 2009. 40 Reuters, “CAIR: U.S. Muslims Urged to Speak Out on Gaza Crisis,” 28 December 2008. 41 The Times, “Gaza: Secondary War Being Fought On the Internet,” 31 December 2008. See also http://www.arabic-m.com/index.php?page=mirror&id=23550. 42 Jart Armin, “Battle for Gaza Fought on the Web, Too,” Internet Evolution, 5 January 2009, available at http://www.internetevolution.com/author.asp?section_id=717&doc_id=169872. Robert McMillan, “With

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Targets were not restricted to Israel either. On 7 January 2009, pro-Palestinian Turkish hackers

“Agd_Scorp/Peace Crew” defaced the NATO Parliamentary website, and websites of the United

States Army Military District of Washington and the Joint Force Headquarters of the National

Capital Region. A typical message read, “Stop attacks u israel and usa ! you cursed nations ! one

day muslims will clean the world from you!”43 They also defaced the website of Israeli

Ynetnews.com and the Israel Discount Bank, rerouting web visitors to a page displaying anti-

Israel messages and images of prisoner abuse in Abu Ghraib prison, Iraq.44 In a somewhat more

banal action in the UK, the Radio Basingstoke website was reported hacked, by persons

purporting to be the “Soldiers of Allah”.45

A pro-Israeli group, Help Israel Win, created and distributed a software program called “Patriot”

which helped turn users’ computers into externally-controlled “zombies”. When interlinked, a

zombie network’s collective computing power is harnessed in a “botnet”, then used to

overwhelm “enemy” servers with communication requests, usually resulting in dependent

websites being unable to function. Although a Help Israel Win spokesperson initially stated that

Patriot would not be used for nefarious purposes,46 the group later claimed to have seriously

disrupted four Hamas news websites, assisted by over 8000 volunteers.47 In the UK, the pro-

Palestine Stop the War Coalition website was reputedly hacked, by persons unknown.48

Gaza Conflict, Cyberattacks Come Too,” PC World, 1 January 2009, available at http://www.pcworld.com/article/156246/with_gaza_conflict_cyberattacks_come_too.html?tk=rss_news. 43 Robert McMillan, “Hackers Deface NATO, US Army Web Sites”, TechWorld, 12 January 2009, available at http://www.techworld.com.au/article/272635/hackers_deface_nato_us_army_web_sites. 44 BBC News, “Gaza Crisis Spills Onto the Web,” 14 January 2009. 45 Daily Telegraph, “Radio Basingstoke Hacked By ‘Soldiers of Allah’,” 8 January 2009. 46 Noah Schachtman, “Wage Cyberwar Against Hamas, Surrender Your PC,” Wired, 8 January 2009, available at http://blog.wired.com/defense/2009/01/israel-dns-hack.html. 47 The Guardian, “Israel-Palestine Conflict Spills Into Cyberspace,” 15 January 2009. 48 Daily Telegraph, “Stop the War’s Website ‘Disabled By Pro-Israeli Hackers’,” 13 January 2009.

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Social networking site Facebook which, among other functionality, allows for the formation of

interest groups, was the locus of a great deal of politically-motivated activity.49 Some of the most

effective Facebook use was in Egypt where many groups, mostly supporting Palestine,

translated online interest and activism into physical demonstrations and dissent. A distributed

platform like Facebook enabled Egyptians to organise online without fear of the whole platform

being shut down by government censors, often ruthless in their suppression of internet users

critical of the Mubarak regime and its policies. Although involvement and levels of commitment

were high, police actions meant that dissent did not translate into change in the physical world,

with street protests broken up and several people arrested. Admitting this, one young activist

tellingly stated, “It’s a rehearsal for a bigger thing … Right now, we are just testing the power of

each other.”50

One group, the Jewish Internet Defence Force (JIDF), a pro-Israeli advocacy group which also

maintains a website outside Facebook,51 is alleged to have hijacked several Facebook groups

expressing support for IDF operations in Gaza. Using a range of methods, they gained access to

group administrator accounts and replaced content with material critical of Hamas and overtly

pro-Israeli.52 In response, users formed groups critical of JIDF behaviour. The JIDF denied

involvement in criminal activities but would not confirm or deny a role in the disruption of pro-

Palestinian Facebook groups. They did, however, criticise Facebook for allowing “hateful, anti-

Semitic, racist material and material which promotes Islamic terrorism and violence” to remain

on the site.53

49 It is worth noting that Israeli-Palestinian Facebook ‘conflict’ was reported throughout 2008; see The Guardian, “Israel-Palestine Dispute Moves On to Facebook,” 20 March 2008. 50 The New York Times, “Revolution, Facebook-Style,” 22 January 2009. 51 http://www.thejidf.org/ 52 BBC, “Gaza Crisis Spills Onto the Web”. The JIDF carried out similar activities throughout 2008; see Daily Telegraph, “Facebook: ‘Anti-Semitic’ Group Hijacked By Jewish Force,” 31 July 2008. 53 BBC, “Gaza Crisis Spills Onto the Web”

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Facebook has internal mechanisms through which users flag and report inappropriate or

offensive material. A spokesperson said, “We are just a platform and the discussions that are

taking place online are also taking place offline … We are not taking sides.”54 Much Facebook

activity was described as “virulent”, with substantial hostility emanating from both sides.55

Participants on both sides claimed to have received death threats on account of views

expressed.56 This concerned the French government enough that Prime Minister François Fillon

announced that authorities would increase monitoring of the internet for hate speech of

“incredible violence”.57

Blogs were set up by Gazans, publishing real-time news and opinion from within the territory.

These faced significant difficulties from within Gaza due to electricity blackouts and the conflict

environment.58 One of the most active countries in support of Palestine was Saudi Arabia, whose

internet users ignored the repressive media regime to run blogs as alternative news sources,

and started online petitions condemning Israel which gathered hundreds of thousands of

signatures. These were determinedly multi-lingual, with 13 different interfaces including

Spanish, French, Chinese and Russian.59 A campaign to boycott US firms also became part of a

very active internet-using population.60

Within days of the Israeli incursion, Muslim website IslamOnline.net created a Palestinian

Holocaust Memorial Museum in virtual world Second Life. This became the venue for daily anti-

Israel demonstrations and protests, as well as fundraising activities. Although its utility may be

54 Ibid. 55 Agence France Presse, “Gaza War Sparks Torrent of Fiery Comment On the Internet,” 8 January 2009. 56 Time, “Facebook Users Go to War Over Gaza,” 13 January 2009. 57 Reuters, “France On Alert For Gaza Hate Messages,” 16 January 2009. 58 For example, Sameh A. Habeeb, “A War on Gaza and a War On My Blog!,” Al Arabiya, 18 January 2009, available at http://www.alarabiya.net/views/2009/01/18/64451.html. 59 Muslim Media Network, “A United Front: Bloggers for Gaza,” 22 January 2009, available at http://muslimmedianetwork.com/mmn/?p=3521; Middle East Online, “Barrage of Fire in Gaza, Online ‘Intifada’ in Saudi,” 18 January 2009, available at http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=29856.

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disputed, one of the organisers said, “Some may say that this is nonsense because this is “just”

Second Life. But in my opinion it's also one way of many to raise awareness and try to help.”61

Awareness was also high outside the region, of course, with social networking groups, blogs and

micro-blogging services very much related to the organisation of physical protests and

demonstrations in countries like the United Kingdom.62

Discussion

In 1997, David Resnick defined three types of internet politics. Those within the net, dealing

with internal politics of internet communities; those which impact the net, such as control,

regulation, and censorship; and political uses of the net, for the purposes of effecting social and

political change in the physical world.63 The actions and policies of both ‘sides’ in the Gaza

conflict fall into the third category. Stephen Marmura acknowledges that in the Middle East the

internet is a useful information resource and organisational tool, but indicates the lack of

evidence for its efficacy in effecting real change in state policies and actions.64 The principle

reason for this is the deeply-entrenched ideologies in Israel and Palestine – activist networks

face the same challenges in accessing political outlets as they did before the internet.65 This

would apply to the current analysis, for which there are few indicators of real and lasting

success of online activism in influencing the course of the war.

60 Agence France Presse, “Saudi Internet Campaign to Boycott US Firms Over Gaza Grows,” 12 January 2009. 61 IslamOnline, “Welcome to War 2.0,” 26 January 2009, available at http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1232976487373&pagename=Zone-English-HealthScience/HSELayout; New World Notes, “Disputed Territory: War in Gaza Provokes Protest (And Conversation) In Second Life Israel,” 7 January 2009, available at http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2009/01/israel-attack-o.html. 62 The Guardian, “Storm Of Student Protest Over Gaza Gathers Force,” 23 January 2009. 63 David Resnick, “Politics on the Internet: The Normalization of Cyberspace,” in Chris Toulouse and Timothy W. Luke, eds., The Politics of Cyberspace (New York & London: Routledge, 1997), pp.48-68. 64 Stephen Marmura, “A Net Advantage? The Internet, Grassroots Activism and American Middle-Eastern Policy,” New Media Society, Vol.10, No.2 (April 2008), pp.247-271. 65 Ibid.

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The manipulation of physical space is a matter of record in Israel’s domination of the Palestinian

territories since 1948.66 It seems likely therefore that Israel would also seek to exert control

over the less tangible information space of communications, especially having failed to do so in

Lebanon in 2006. The evidence from the Gaza war suggests they attempted to do this, through

the continuation of an international hasbara campaign (see below) but also as a direct

operational requirement of the conflict principally mediated by the IDF. Although Israel

attempted to enlist bloggers and social technologies to their advantage, it is difficult to assess

the success of these activities on the internet. What is clear is that most of their attempts were

definitively ‘top-down’, although a number of grassroots initiatives did also emerge.

In the summer of 2006, Israel pursued Hezbollah militants into southern Lebanon in Operation

Change of Direction, an exercise which many consider to have been a military failure.67 The

subsequent Winograd Commission concluded there were deep, systemic flaws in the Israeli

military.68 Israel also suffered a significant loss in the sphere of public relations and propaganda.

Despite the short time available for defensive preparations Hezbollah fought well but also

understood that manipulation of media space was an essential component of their overall

strategy. Their control of foreign journalists and therefore the stories emanating from Lebanon

– principally intended to portray Hezbollah as freedom fighters, and Israel as murderers of

civilians – allowed them to propagate their chosen narrative. By contrast, the Israeli media

strategy was – perhaps reflecting an overall confusion as to strategic ends – poorly managed

and ultimately counter-productive.69 Information leaks were endemic due to several factors,

66 Eyal Weizman, Hollow Land: Israel’s Architecture of Occupation (London & New York: Verso, 2007) 67 Matt M. Matthews, We Were Caught Unprepared: The 2006 Hezbollah-Israeli War, The Long War Series Occasional Paper 26 (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2008) 68 Winograd Commission, “Official English summary of the Winograd panel’s interim report”, press release, April 2007. 69 Marvin Kalb and Carol Saivetz, The Israeli-Hezbollah War of 2006: The Media as a Weapon in Asymmetrical Conflict, John F. Kennedy School of Government Research Working Papers Series (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 2007). The Winograd Commission also concluded that Israel’s media strategy was poor, although mainly due to its openness, rather than any other factor; see Ha’aretz, “The Committee Against Freedom of Expression,” 7 February 2008.

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including the close familial ties between the IDF and Israeli citizens. This was exacerbated by

the simple fact that most serving military were within range of their home mobile telephony

networks, and images of soldiers and events quickly found their way onto blogs and social

networking sites.70 Of most concern to government and military was the leaking of operational

information by officers to journalists, which resulted in top-level enquiries and the curious use

of polygraphs to detect whether officers were telling the truth about their activities during the

conflict.71

Since 2006, Israel has invested more energy and resources in the communications components

of their military and state planning. It is hard to disassociate military activities from those of

Israel as a state, and the key concept to consider is that of hasbara. With its roots in the early

Israeli state, hasbara is a “propaganda of integration” program, intended to positively promote

the ends of the Israeli state by engaging with Jews in Israel and the diaspora, as well as non-Jews

globally.72 It is therefore a form of public diplomacy, defined by its reliance on ‘positive’

messaging and cohesive intent, rather than the more negative connotations of the term,

‘propaganda’.73 The office responsible for hasbara is located within the Israel Ministry of

Foreign Affairs, and is but one of several agencies tasked with communicating policy to the

media. Although Israel’s attempts to harness the potential of new media were criticised in some

quarters, it should be remembered that states worldwide are struggling to come to terms with

the same issue. It is nearly impossible to quantify how effective their efforts were, but they were

evidently well-received in some quarters, and less so in others. As with all attempts at public

diplomacy, one of the main barriers to ‘success’, howsoever understood, is the difficulty of

breaking into the “echo chambers” of opinion and self-reflexive dialogue that characterise much

70 Rid and Hecker, War 2.0, pp.119-120. 71 Ibid., pp.118-119. 72 Margalit Toledano and David McKie, “Social Integration and Public Relations: Global lessons From an Israeli Experience,” Public Relations Review, Vol.33, No.4 (November 2007), pp.387-397. 73 David Hoffman, “Beyond Public Diplomacy,” Foreign Affairs, Vol.81, No.2 (March/April 2002), pp.83-95.

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of online politicised discourse.74 The attitudes of Middle Eastern audiences, and many further

afield, towards Israel do not need to be rehearsed here, but any attempts by Israel to promote

its own interests through traditional or non-traditional means are likely to encounter significant

resistance. Despite this, Israel did succeed in using several different platforms as means of

message dissemination; the accuracy or otherwise of their messages is beyond the scope of this

analysis.

By contrast, Hamas were less proficient in controlling their own communications, let alone

propagating their message to the outside world, despite a long history of internet presence75

and access to Al Jazeera. Hamas had some success but were ultimately hampered by lack of

capacity. Also, some outlets, such as al-Aqsa television and radio, were compromised by Israeli

electronic warfare. However, pro-Palestinian, rather than pro-Hamas, efforts were many and

varied, and derived from a groundswell of support mediated by the internet.

Historically, the effective physical lockdown by Israel of Palestine at the beginning of the second

Intifada in September 2000 drove massive growth in Palestinian use of the internet as a vehicle

of protest and resistance, circumventing physical restrictions and curfews.76 Makram Khoury-

Machool describes the internet as “the only true boundary breaker under siege conditions in the

occupied territories.”77 This, combined with the Israel-imposed media blackout, made it all but

inevitable that the internet would become important during the conflict.

74 On the threat of such echo chambers to democratic discourse, see Cass R. Sunstein, “Democracy and Filtering,” Communications of the ACM, Vol.47, No.2 (December 2004), pp.57-59. 75 Henner Kirchner, “Martyrs, Victims, Friends and Foes: Internet Representations by Islamic Extremists,” in Aparna Rao, Michael Bollig and Monika Böck, eds., The Practice of War: Production, Reproduction and Communication of Armed Violence (New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2007), pp.285-304. 76 Makram Khoury-Machool, “Palestinian Youth and Political Activism: The Emerging Internet Culture and New Modes of Resistance,” Policy Futures in Education, Vol.5, No.1 (2007), pp.17-36. 77 Ibid., p.31.

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Many of the recorded pro-Palestinian actions were forms of “political cracking”, one of three

types of “hacktivism” theorised by Alexandra Samuel.78 Undertaken by non-state actors, this can

be an effective form of protest given minimal economic outlay and maximal media attention.79

Graham Meikle has further suggested that hacktivism is “an engaged politics which seeks

solutions in software, in the search for a specific technological fix to a social problem.”80 These

observations are bolstered by, for example, a Help Israel Win spokesperson, who stated, "We

started the group the day the war started in Gaza. We couldn't join the real combat, so we

decided to fight Hamas in the cyber-arena."81 Yoav Keren, chief executive of Israeli domain name

registry DomainTheNet, said of pro-Palestinian hacktivism, "It's clear that it is a result of what

[is] happening in Gaza … We see it as part of the war."82

However, the efficacy of the internet is open to question. Pro-Palestinian hackers would like to

have conducted more serious cyberattacks but lacked the capabilities to do so.83 Low- to

medium-level disruption occurred with denial of service attacks and website defacements that,

whilst inconvenient and embarrassing, were temporary disruptions.84 This may not always be

the case; if hacktivists can access critical national infrastructure networks and compromise

their operation, these might perhaps be used as tools of strategic influence. Presently, Israel’s

information warfare capabilities are limited to traditional propaganda and psyops, albeit

utilising some tools of internet and mobile telephony, as well as jamming technologies. Hamas

were also unable to utilise information technologies effectively, although this may be a function

of limited resource access. Israel’s cyberspace activities were more orientated to propaganda

78 Alexandra W. Samuel, Hacktivism and the Future of Political Participation, doctoral thesis (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, September 2004), p.51. 79 Ibid., p.52. 80 Graham Meikle, Future Active: Media Activism and the Internet (New York & London: Routledge, 2002), p.141. 81 The Guardian, “Israel-Palestine Conflict Spills Into Cyberspace” 82 BBC, “Gaza Crisis Spills Onto the Web” 83 Project Grey Goose II: The Evolving State of Cyber Warfare, March 2009, available at http://www.scribd.com/doc/13442963/Project-Grey-Goose-Phase-II-Report.

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operations than towards hacking and network disruption. What hacking did occur was

undertaken by nationalist grassroots activists, similar to a long Chinese tradition, for example,

and of Russian hackers in 2007-2008. Whilst Russia may have condoned, if not directly

supported, hacker attacks there is little suggestion either Israel or Hamas were involved in this

fashion. There is also no evidence of the cyber “kill-chain” and training procedures identified in

the Georgian example.85

Also, the utility of the internet to the organisation of real-world demonstrations is clear but

whether this activism translated into pressure on Israel to halt its operations seems unlikely.

Stephen Blank asserts that harnessing these different strands of “information war” may

constitute a new form of conflict in the case of Russia-Estonia86 but this was not the case with

Israel-Hamas. Although the strategic value of these quasi-military initiatives has been

questioned,87 there is little doubt that states and non-state actors increasingly view cyberspace

as a legitimate and significant arena of influence and conflict.

Ethan Zuckerman said of internet use during the Gaza conflict, “I think what has become really

interesting is that in an era when you have armed conflict between states, you now have people

online looking to see how [they] can become part of that conflict without leaving their

computers.”88 Israel partly succeeded in leveraging this through their hasbara and propaganda

operations; Hamas less so. In the final balance, pro-Palestinian participants may prove to have

been more successful in raising the profile of Gaza in global internet media, although these

efforts had little effect on the course of the war. These actors were more successful in

84 See Hyung-Jin Woo, “Propaganda Wars in Cyberspace: A Content Analysis of Web Defacement Strategies Among Politically Motivated Hacker Groups”, paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Communication Association, Marriott Hotel, San Diego, CA, May 27, 2003. 85 Russia/Georgia Cyber War – Findings and Analysis, Project Grey Goose Phase I Report, October 2008, available at http://www.scribd.com/doc/6967393/Project-Grey-Goose-Phase-I-Report. 86 Stephen Blank, “Web War I: Is Europe’s First Information War a New Kind of War?,” Comparative Strategy, Vol.27, No.3 (May/June 2008), pp.227-247. 87 Aaron Mannes and James Hendler, “The First Modern Cyberwar?,” The Guardian, 22 August 2008.

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developing solidarity networks, as part of what Douglas Kellner terms “globalisation from

below”.89

As Rebecca Grant has noted, “Cyberspace may be a single medium, but it has multiple theaters

of operation”,90 and the variety of methods utilised during the conflict supports this idea.

However, cyberspace as a landscape of perception produced no real winners, especially as

hacktivism most energetically undertaken by pro-Palestinian parties was of little strategic

effect. As battlespace in the Gaza conflict, cyberspace continued to be one of influence, rather

than concrete outcomes, although it might mark a significant step in its evolution as “contested

terrain”.

88 Christian Science Monitor, “Blogs, YouTube: The New Battleground of Gaza Conflict,” 23 January 2009. 89 Douglas Kellner, “New Technologies: Technocities and the Prospects for Democratisation,” in John Downey and Jim McGuigan, eds., Technocities: The Cultural and Political Economy of the Digital Revolution (London: Sage, 1999), pp.186-204. 90 Rebecca Grant, Victory in Cyberspace (Washington, DC: US Air Force Association, 2007), p.3.