Facebook to investigate ‘from the river to the sea’ posts
Mark Zuckerberg
Facebook’s “supreme court” is investigating the social media giant for allowing users to post the controversial pro-Palestinian slogan “from the river to the sea”.
The company’s Oversight Board, a panel of academics and campaigners who review moderation policies, said it would consider three posts where parent company Meta left the phrase online after appeals from users.
Hate speech campaigners have condemned chants of “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” as anti-Semitic and genocidal, arguing the words imply the destruction of the state of Israel and are used as a rallying cry by terror groups including Hamas.
The board – whose members include ex-Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger and Helle Thorning-Schmidt, the former prime minister of Denmark – will look at three posts that were viewed millions of times between them.
Meta’s Oversight Board includes Denmark’s former prime minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt – RITZAU SCANPIX/via REUTERS
All three posts were reported by multiple users and allowed to remain online by Meta. One post condemned “senseless slaughter” by “Zionist Israeli occupiers”.
The panel said it had picked the cases to determine how Meta should moderate the phrase “given the resurgence in its use after October 7, 2023, and the controversies surrounding the phrase’s meaning”. The board’s decisions are non-binding.
Meta told the board that the specific posts were not found to have violated its rules against violence, hate speech or support for dangerous groups.
The company said use of the slogan had already been reviewed, and that it was not necessarily a call for violence or linked exclusively to support for Hamas.
In January, the Oversight Board warned that Facebook and Instagram, which is also owned by Meta, were failing to remove Holocaust denial posts. One post, which questioned whether six million Jews had been killed by the Nazis, remained up for three years.
It said anti-Semites had been able to evade Meta’s detection tools using images, memes or code words and that Meta was overly reliant on automated systems to review posts.
In December, The Telegraph revealed that Meta had allowed adverts to be purchased on its social networks that included the phrase “from the river to the sea”. The company said at the time that the phrase could be blocked if it violated its policies.
A Meta spokesman said: “We welcome the board’s review of our guidance in this matter. While all of our policies are developed with safety in mind, we know they come with global challenges and we regularly seek input from experts outside Meta, including the Oversight Board.
“As we’ve said previously, we continually assess our policy guidance to better understand potential impacts on different communities. This work is ongoing, and we look forward to the board’s decision and recommendations.”
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