Israel set up troll farms years ago to attack, debate, downvote and report opposing content. It's the front channel.
https://electronicintifada.net/content/inside-israels-millio...
https://electronicintifada.net/content/inside-israels-millio...
This is a grassroots organization doing this and in fact its funding and support mostly comes from Americans, such as casino magnate Sheldon Adelson and the Israeli-American Council.
James Bamford has written at least 3 good articles about Israeli government influence of US civil society (social media) and elections (the leak of the DNC hack materials), all in the last year or so, at The Nation: https://www.thenation.com/authors/james-bamford/
And until extremely recently, the IDF and associated arms of the state have been engaging in even more deceptive actions, such as creating sock-puppet accounts to bolster support for government policy, targeting Israelis themselves: https://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-admits-psychological-warfa...
It's impossible to be certain of anything related to these highly unaccountable and secret operations, but the "grain" of truth runs very much in the direction of Israeli state interference, with quite wide scope -- but effectiveness unknown.
Please stop spreading misinformation.
https://archive.is/ERHPN#selection-2055.97-2055.288 https://archive.is/BR10K
The very link you present even states that the army and Shin Bet do not request help from act.il.
It's in the very next sentence from the one you chose to highlight.
And it links to an article at https://www.972mag.com/the-israeli-government-is-paying-for-... "Another large sum (from the Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs), around NIS 2 million ($570,000), was budgeted for building the Act.il website and producing multi-media content for it."
You're strangely confident that act.il getting government funding is "simply false" when you're simply wrong.
So explain just how the post was misleading.
> Watchdog The Seventh Eye revealed that Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs spent almost $2 million on one propaganda campaign in 2017 – part of which was allocated to Act.IL.
> A global influence campaign funded by the Israeli government had a $1.1 million budget last year, a document obtained by The Electronic Intifada shows.
> In its annual report, from January, Act.IL says its goal is to “influence foreign publics” and “battle” BDS – the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement for Palestinian rights.
I think that's a reasonably credible source, but you may disagree. The EI piece is a compilation of other people's work, in particular, The Seventh Eye, affiliated with +972.
On your point about "affiliation", that is clearly false, based on the OP article, and numerous other (more universally credible) sources, such as Forward[1], and Haaretz[2].
[1] https://forward.com/news/388259/shadowy-israeli-app-turns-am...
> The Herzliya headquarters is the base of Act.il, a hybrid Israel advocacy effort and online information operation. A joint project of two Israeli not-for-profits, it is led by former Israeli intelligence officers and has close ties to Israel’s intelligence services, its Ministry of Strategic Affairs and American Jewish casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson. Act.il’s leaders frame the program as an effort to counterbalance anti-Israel attitudes online.
> “We know each other,” he said of his group’s relationship with members of Israel’s intelligence community. “You don’t get [sent] a link to [a specific video]. We talk with each other. We work together.”
[2] https://archive.md/newest/https://www.haaretz.com/israel-new...
> A pro-Israel social media advocacy app that partners with the Israeli Strategic Affairs Ministry is asking activists to influence Googles search results for the term BDS.
> Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan (Likud) told the plenum that “boycott organizations are spread out geographically and act in different areas. The organizations built a network of activity and act in coordination with the Palestinian Authority. There is a campaign of falsehoods fueling hate.”
> ”Since this is a battlefront like any other, the ministry put together a strategy for running the campaign against this phenomenon,” Minister Erdan stated.
> ”One of the principles for success is keeping our methods of action secret…Since most of the ministry’s actions are not of the ministry, but through bodies around the world who do not want to expose their connection with the state, we must protect the information whose exposure could harm the battle.”
The fact of the affiliation and funding being somewhat opaque in official records must also be balanced against the fact that it is government policy to enforce this opacity: https://archive.md/20190611095349/https://main.knesset.gov.i...
> Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan (Likud) told the plenum that “boycott organizations are spread out geographically and act in different areas. The organizations built a network of activity and act in coordination with the Palestinian Authority. There is a campaign of falsehoods fueling hate.”
> ”Since this is a battlefront like any other, the ministry put together a strategy for running the campaign against this phenomenon,” Minister Erdan stated.
> ”One of the principles for success is keeping our methods of action secret…Since most of the ministry’s actions are not of the ministry, but through bodies around the world who do not want to expose their connection with the state, we must protect the information whose exposure could harm the battle.”
I don't know whether the specific legislation went into effect. Regardless, it clearly states that "actions [...] not of the ministry, but through bodies around the world" is an ongoing strategy for their success (in their view).
Who gives a damn about affiliation? What matters is the material effect on the world, and it's hard to find a more notorious propaganda movement in the world than hasbara
Because it does. https://archive.is/ERHPN#selection-2055.97-2055.288 https://www.mintpressnews.com/israels-teen-troll-army-hasbar...
You are right about anti-semitic tropes, and it's a serious accusation, but if it's happening it's a problem. Not that official endorsement should be the standard to follow. Crowdsourcing a troll army for positive coverage is deceptive, regardless of whether support is official or shadier.
Your second source has nothing to do with act.il
The second link is also about a crowdsourced online influence program affiliated with the Israeli government. I never restricted my concern to just one program. Care to claim Hasbara is not affiliated either?
Have a nice day.
Maybe flagging reasonable comments is what winning looks like to you. Given your defence of an organization crowdsourcing coverage manipulation that's not so surprising. But it is how you know you're on the wrong side. I'm embarrassed for you.