In an extensive study of the role played by social media in fomenting and abetting the ongoing wave of deadly attacks on Israeli citizens, Gilad Gamlieli draws some important conclusions:
[Disinformation about] Israel’s measures on the Temple Mount [in September 2015, a few weeks before the attacks began,] generated numerous presentations in [Palestinian] social networks, . . . which did much to provoke the outbreak and incite whole sectors. This incitement was not confined to claims that Israel was changing the status quo on the Mount.
As it evolved, [the incitement] dealt more and more with . . . the increasing glorification and commemoration of the perpetrators of attacks, the legitimization of these attacks, and the portrayal of details of the attacks—[sometimes, paradoxically,] denying that they were being committed at all. This content was disseminated by Palestinians across the political spectrum, from pages identified with Hamas to those identified with Fatah. It is also clear that much of the incitement issued from pages originating in Gaza.
An important element of these incendiary contents is how the Israeli “aggressor” is portrayed. In many of the presentations, the Palestinians view their enemies on the Temple Mount compound as IDF soldiers (or other security forces) and ultra-Orthodox Jews, who are quite often depicted with the use of [classic anti-Semitic tropes]. . . . It is no surprise, then, that large percentages of the victims of the stabbing attacks are soldiers or ultra-Orthodox Jews. This is clear testimony to the fact that these incendiary presentations, which have spread throughout the social networks, have influenced the perpetrators’ perceptions and shaped their actions.
Read more on Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs: http://jcpa.org/the-knife-and-the-message-the-roots-of-the-new-palestinian-uprising/incitement-on-social-media-the-fuel-and-detonator-of-palestinian-violence/