The digital battle for influence between activists supporting Palestinians and those backing Israel continues despite the ceasefire in Gaza.
The activist, non-profit and information organisations that have emerged in the two-year war show no sign of slowing down operations.
The battle spilt over to social media platforms that were accused of censorship, and even established technology companies such as Microsoft and Google found themselves on the defensive.
At one point, Google workers were fired by the company for protesting against the company's $1.2 billion deal with the Israeli government.
About the same time, a group called No Tech For Apartheid gained significant momentum, organising workers at Google and Amazon seeking to protest against both companies' contracts with Israel.
A subsidiary of NTFA, known as No Azure for Apartheid, consisted largely of current and former employees of Microsoft who accused it of providing AI tools and cloud-computing solutions to Israel's military.
Amid pressure from No Azure for Apartheid and media reports, in September Microsoft announced that, based on its own findings, it decided to disable a set of services to a unit in Israel's Ministry of Defence.
Even with the ceasefire announcement on October 11, No Azure for Apartheid kept pressure on Microsoft.
“We do not stop for a ceasefire or half-measures! We stop when Palestine is free,” the group posted on X one day after, revealing that another Microsoft employee, Scott Sutfin-Glowski, had resigned in protest.
Several days later, No Azure for Apartheid rallied protesters who rowed kayaks lose to the homes of Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella and president Brad Smith, accusing them of stalling in cutting some services to Israel's military.
No Azure for Apartheid did not respond to The National's requests for comment.
Along similar lines, 7amleh, more commonly known as the Arab Centre for the Advancement of Social Media, released a report several days after the ceasefire titled: “A War without Bullets: How Disinformation Reshapes the Reality of Palestinian Youth on the Backdrop of a Genocide”.
“The paper examines how disinformation has become one of the central tools of Israel’s war on Gaza – not only to justify genocide but also to re-engineer the collective consciousness of both Palestinians and the global public, particularly among youth,” reads a brief description.
More specifically in its report, 7amleh accused technology companies of algorithmic bias with social media platforms and even search engines.
“Tech companies manipulate the contents to which users are exposed through removal, Shadowbanning and automated visibility restrictions,” 7amleh claimed.
It said that the Palestinian situation was disproportionately affected and censored by the companies.
On the other side of the spectrum are organisations such as CyberWell, based in Tel Aviv, which describes itself as world’s first live database of online anti-Semitism.
“Over the last six months and more recently since the October ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, anti-Semitic and anti-Israel users have flooded social media with terms like 'Gaza Holocaust' and 'Gaza Holocaust survivor',” a news release from the group reads.
CyberWell's founder and chief executive, Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor, said the trend was an attempt to “blatantly trivialise the Holocaust, trying to equate its victims – the Jewish people – with its Nazi perpetrators".
Also showing no sign of winding down is Jewish Onliner, which uses artificial intelligence to show “anti-Israel movements".
In March, the site’s reporting on Helyeh Doutaghi, a scholar of international law at Yale University, led to Yale Law School severing ties with her.
She denied the accusations, and accused Jewish Onliner of deception, but the site did not back down.
Jewish Onliner still shows no indication of slowing down its output or winding down operations, with recent stories being posted on Monday.
“We’ll continue to refine and expand this model in the months ahead as the information space evolves,” it said in a statement. “We believe that the results of the responsible, AI-driven work that Jewish Onliner does speaks for itself.”
Episode list:
Ep1: A recovery like no other- the unevenness of the economic recovery
Ep2: PCR and jobs - the future of work - new trends and challenges
Ep3: The recovery and global trade disruptions - globalisation post-pandemic
Ep4: Inflation- services and goods - debt risks
Ep5: Travel and tourism
The National's picks
4.35pm: Tilal Al Khalediah
5.10pm: Continous
5.45pm: Raging Torrent
6.20pm: West Acre
7pm: Flood Zone
7.40pm: Straight No Chaser
8.15pm: Romantic Warrior
8.50pm: Calandogan
9.30pm: Forever Young
Getting there
The flights
Emirates and Etihad fly to Johannesburg or Cape Town daily. Flights cost from about Dh3,325, with a flying time of 8hours and 15 minutes. From there, fly South African Airlines or Air Namibia to Namibia’s Windhoek Hosea Kutako International Airport, for about Dh850. Flying time is 2 hours.
The stay
Wilderness Little Kulala offers stays from £460 (Dh2,135) per person, per night. It is one of seven Wilderness Safari lodges in Namibia; www.wilderness-safaris.com.
Skeleton Coast Safaris’ four-day adventure involves joining a very small group in a private plane, flying to some of the remotest areas in the world, with each night spent at a different camp. It costs from US$8,335.30 (Dh30,611); www.skeletoncoastsafaris.com
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Banned items
Dubai Police has also issued a list of banned items at the ground on Sunday. These include:
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Political flags or banners
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Bikes, skateboards or scooters
ICC Awards for 2021
MEN
Cricketer of the Year – Shaheen Afridi (Pakistan)
T20 Cricketer of the Year – Mohammad Rizwan (Pakistan)
ODI Cricketer of the Year – Babar Azam (Pakistan)
Test Cricketer of the Year – Joe Root (England)
WOMEN
Cricketer of the Year – Smriti Mandhana (India)
ODI Cricketer of the Year – Lizelle Lee (South Africa)
T20 Cricketer of the Year – Tammy Beaumont (England)
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
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French business
France has organised a delegation of leading businesses to travel to Syria. The group was led by French shipping giant CMA CGM, which struck a 30-year contract in May with the Syrian government to develop and run Latakia port. Also present were water and waste management company Suez, defence multinational Thales, and Ellipse Group, which is currently looking into rehabilitating Syrian hospitals.
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
How to wear a kandura
Dos
- Wear the right fabric for the right season and occasion
- Always ask for the dress code if you don’t know
- Wear a white kandura, white ghutra / shemagh (headwear) and black shoes for work
- Wear 100 per cent cotton under the kandura as most fabrics are polyester
Don’ts
- Wear hamdania for work, always wear a ghutra and agal
- Buy a kandura only based on how it feels; ask questions about the fabric and understand what you are buying
The specs
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Uefa Nations League: How it works
The Uefa Nations League, introduced last year, has reached its final stage, to be played over five days in northern Portugal. The format of its closing tournament is compact, spread over two semi-finals, with the first, Portugal versus Switzerland in Porto on Wednesday evening, and the second, England against the Netherlands, in Guimaraes, on Thursday.
The winners of each semi will then meet at Porto’s Dragao stadium on Sunday, with the losing semi-finalists contesting a third-place play-off in Guimaraes earlier that day.
Qualifying for the final stage was via League A of the inaugural Nations League, in which the top 12 European countries according to Uefa's co-efficient seeding system were divided into four groups, the teams playing each other twice between September and November. Portugal, who finished above Italy and Poland, successfully bid to host the finals.
Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere
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Rating: 4/5
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SPECS
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COMPANY%20PROFILE
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THE SPECS
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