Displaying items by tag: Social media

A man from the predominantly Bedouin southern city of Rahat has been arrested for posting a video on his Facebook page that called for people to carry out car-ramming attacks, Israeli police said in a statement on Wednesday. The video featured footage from last Sunday’s terror attack, in which an East Jerusalem man drove his truck into a group of Israeli soldiers, then backed up and ran over them again, killing four and injuring dozens. In the background of the video a voice, speaking in Arabic, encouraged people to carry out similar attacks. Police said the suspect, a thirty-year-old Rahat resident, was first detained on Tuesday and would remain in jail at least until  Sunday. ‘While protecting free speech, we cannot allow incitement and threats on Facebook’, the statement said. Earlier in the week, police arrested four residents of the Old City in Jerusalem for spray-painting graffiti praising Fadi al-Qunbar, the driver in Sunday’s attack.

Mark Zuckerberg, who founded Facebook, has announced he is no longer an atheist, but in fact sees religion as ‘very important’. Zuckerberg posted a ‘Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah’ message from his family to his followers on Facebook. After he posted the comment, a user asked, ‘But aren't you an atheist?’ In response, the 32-year-old billionaire replied, ‘No. I was raised Jewish and went through a period of questioning things, but now I believe religion is very important.’ When another user asked, ‘But why doesn’t Facebook notify us that it is Jesus’ birthday today?’, Zuckerberg joked, ‘You're not friends with Jesus on Facebook?’ adding a smiling emoji with a halo. Earlier in 2016, he and his wife met Pope Francis to discuss ways in which technology could help the poor.

The son of a murdered Pakistani politician is facing death threats from Islamists because he supported an imprisoned Christian woman who is on death row. Human rights activist Shan Taseer asked for people to support Mrs Asia Bibi, over Twitter this week. Bibi has been sentenced to death, accused of "insulting" Islam after she defended her Christian faith. Muslims in Pakistan are now accusing Taseer of blasphemy against Islam. His father, Salman Taseer, was a Pakistani politician who was killed by one of his own bodyguards for opposing the country's blasphemy laws in January 2011. Shan Taseer's Twitter account can no longer be seen, but tweets with hashtags supporting him are spreading from different accounts.