Thirty years ago, people would never have imagined that we would have such a heavy connection to the Internet and its many orifices. Indeed, wars have been waged over public announcements, denouncements and acts of physical warfare for millennia. The never-ending hostilities between Israel and Hamas have led the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to launch an offensive over Twitter as @IDFSpokesperson, marking the first time such a major act of hostility has been announced using a social media platform, stating “The IDF has begun a widespread campaign on terror sites & operatives in the #Gaza Strip, chief among them #Hamas & Islamic Jihad targets.”
The IDF had been posting to the account before their declaration, regularly announcing death toll numbers and operations it was undertaking, as well as commenting on trending Western topics using strangely casual terminology to attract attention to their own military goals. One example reflected the recent release of Skyfall, stating “Think #Skyfall was a wow? These IDF gadgets will make Q eat his heart out.”
After declaring its intent to attack sites in the Gaza Strip, the IDF began posting more aggressive statuses, eventually threatening “We recommend that no Hamas operatives, whether low level or senior leaders, show their faces above ground in the days ahead,” to which Hamas’s armed wing (@AlqassamBrigade) replied “Our blessed hands will reach your leaders and soldiers wherever they are (You Opened Hell Gates on Yourselves).” Since then, hundreds of updates have been posted to both accounts, effectively giving a direct narrative of the entire conflict with timestamps and extended details, albeit biased towards their respective goals.
Reading through either account’s updates reads very strangely. You see them discuss very serious topics with the usual jovial tone someone would use to describe a cute face their baby is making or a puppy they passed by on the sidewalk. Even in the aforementioned Skyfall tweet, a seemingly harmless ad-like message is juxtaposed with a link to the advanced weapons the IDF used in its conflict. One of the most disturbing series of posts is not on their Twitter accounts but on the IDF’s Instagram account, where they posted images of soldiers looking happy and casual, with captions such as “We’re coming for you gaza! #idf #igers #israel #igdaily #ig_israel #instagood #instamood #iphonesia #iphoneonly #picoftheday #ohb #all_shots #sexy #follow #gmy #gang_family #jj #cute #beautiful #me #webstagram #tbt.” After a ceasefire was placed eight days after the commencement of the operation, the torrent of updates ground to a sudden halt, ending the strange series of updates from both sides.
The bizarre glorification of their military forces and accomplishments, placed in a setting normally reserved for harmless rivalry in a worst case scenario, appears to be setting a different tone for social media services, and is perhaps showing a sign of the maturing nature of the Internet. Instead of being asked to share or retweet how much you like One Direction’s new album, you are now being asked to share “if you agree that Israel has the right to defend itself.”
While the Gaza skirmish is over for the time being, this method to drumming up public support is only beginning. If anything, the social media campaign was a success for both opponents, since it managed to bring their affairs and concerns into the minds and daily conversations of others around the world. Israel’s success at being the first of the two to successfully market its view on the war persuaded some European leaders to throw their support behind Israel alongside the United States. This is an interesting move considering Europe typically is more comfortable with Palestinian groups than North America.
The presidential election in the United States in early November, although it involved a less acute situation than the battles in the Middle East, was another recent example of the power of good social networking. Obama’s campaign, since its inception in 2008, has made exceptional use of the tools available to them online, which arguably helped boost his popularity among younger voters. Notably, in August, he opened an Ask Me Anything (AMA) thread on Reddit, where he answered select questions from users who posted, varying from light-hearted topics like the recipe for the White House beer, to more serious discussions such as how he would help students manage their heavy debt loads. He then came back to Reddit right before the election to request that people vote for their candidates. Obama’s “Four more years” tweet also became the most retweeted entry on Twitter of all time after only a couple hours of being posted.
Corporations have already made huge inroads in understanding the nuances of social networking and advertising. One could argue that they have defined how people share and receive consumer information. While governments have taken time to follow their lead, we are entering an age where not only the people selling you iPods are connected to you on Facebook, but so too are the people who collect your taxes.
In the next few years, we could see an explosion in how many people connections people have to governmental entities. Already, people primarily connect to their political candidates, who rely on social media as a marketing tool to get themselves elected. But, following the example of the White House, Hamas and the IDF, we could see the Ontario government using Facebook polls to gauge interest in public transit funding, or something more playful such as the German government using Pinterest to allow people to repin which parts of legislation they prefer (is that what people use it for?).
The Internet, that most people hadn’t even dreamed about, would connect us so strongly is truly reaching a new age of its life. If we have been doing our banking, shopping, reading and socializing online, it is only a matter of time before the other parts of our life make it there too.
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