Israeli influencers are mocking Palestinians suffering in Gaza

A number of Israeli TikTok influencers have been criticized on social media after releasing videos that appear to mock the plight of Palestinians.

The conflict has escalated after an unprecedented attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants on southern Israel on October 7. As of Monday, over 1,400 people had been killed in Israel, the Associated Press reported, citing the Israeli military. More than 8,000 people had been killed in Gaza, according to authorities there, the AP said.

Hamas said the attack was retribution for worsening conditions for Palestinians under Israeli occupation. Hamas is estimated to have taken more than 200 hostages from 25 countries and has threatened to kill some of them.

Amid the subsequent military strikes over the past several days, ground units of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have been expanding operations in Gaza.

With propaganda and claims and counterclaims from both sides playing a role in the conflict, the situation has become a heated talking point across social media.

Last week, an Israeli special effects influencer was highlighted on X, formerly Twitter, for sharing a TikTok video in which she appeared to mock Palestinians.

In the clip, the woman is seen with her head wrapped in a Palestinian keffiyeh as she holds what appears to be a grapefruit, in a manner as if it were her baby. A sad face is drawn on the fruit.

After the woman, who is sporting makeup to look bruised, speaks dramatically to the camera, a voice yells, “cut,” prompting her to toss the fruit aside as canned applause plays.

The clip then moves onto a new scene, in which she is seen applying the makeup to make her face look bloodied and bruised, before putting black makeup on some of her teeth. She also covers herself in white powder.

Sharing the clip on X, radio host Rafael Shimunov, a Jewish activist, criticized the influencer for taking to TikTok “in Arab face to claim Palestinian mothers are faking their deaths.”

In recent days, Israel has been attacking the sealed-off and densely populated Gaza Strip with airstrikes and later with ground forces. Israel also stopped the entry of food, fuel, electricity and medicine into Gaza, worsening the humanitarian conditions in the territory of 2.3 million people.

However, on October 16, Israel and the U.S. agreed to create a plan to allow Palestinian citizens to receive humanitarian aid, with President Joe Biden visiting the country on October 18.

As people in Gaza continued to live without electricity and water, a number of other videos surfaced on social media that showed other influencers mocking their plight by excessively using water in their kitchens and bathrooms.

In the seconds-long clips, they are also doing such things as repeatedly switching their lights on and off and posing with extension cords, in an apparent move to emphasize their own access to electricity.

Other clips see social media users applying black makeup to thicken their eyebrows and blacken their teeth while wearing hijabs.

One clip shows an Israeli makeup artist applying heavy makeup while covered in powder, apparently to look as though she’s covered in debris. While she is getting ready, a mock explosion is heard in the background of the video.

“What sort of sadist racism is this?” asked one X user, who added that they “have so much anger from watching this.”

“You don’t need to understand what she’s saying to know the gist of the video” they added. “She chucks the phone wire, she’s making fun out of how Arab women sound and look, wears a fake hijab with debris from bombed buildings.”

“This is just heartless,” another X user commented. “I know that many will lament what they have said and done.”

A third wrote: “This is exactly how Nazis dehumanized Jews during WW2, just in a different format (posters, etc.)”

Amid the backlash online, some of the videos appear to have since been deleted. At least two of the social media accounts connected to the clips have been set to private. Newsweek has reached out to a number of the video uploaders for comment.

Earlier this month, the Israeli Foreign Ministry announced that it was seeking to use prominent social media influencers in an advocacy campaign, The Jerusalem Post reported.

“Fighting on social networks and influencing international public opinion is critical during wartime,” a Foreign Ministry spokesperson told the outlet. “The world must understand that Israel’s struggle is one of light against darkness, a life-loving culture vs lowly terrorists.”

Pro-Hamas or antisemitic posts have also proliferated on social media since the conflict began. In the aftermath of the October 7 attack, X removed hundreds of pro-Hamas accounts.

“X is committed to serving the public conversation, especially in critical moments like this and understands the importance of addressing any illegal content that may be disseminated through the platform,” said Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X.

“There is no place on X for terrorist organisations or violent extremists groups and we continue to remove such accounts in real time, including proactive groups.”

There have been particularly high tensions at U.S. universities. On Monday New York Attorney General Letitia James described antisemitic messages about Jewish students at Cornell University and threats made against a Jewish center on campus as “absolutely horrific.”

In an online student forum, one post read: “If you see a Jewish ‘person’ on campus follow them home and slit their throats. Rats need to be eliminated from Cornell.”

Martha E. Pollack, Cornell’s president, said: “Threats of violence are absolutely intolerable, and we will work to ensure that the person or people who posted them are punished to the full extent of the law.”