Popular Social Media App TikTok Removes Video Glorifying Palestinian Terrorism
A still image from a video glorifying Palestinian terrorism that was uploaded to the popular social app TikTok. Photo: Palestinian Media Watch.
The popular social media app TikTok has removed a video glorifying Palestinian terrorism following protests.
The video was discovered by Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), which requested it be taken down. The group said on Monday that it was “pleased to report that TikTok responded immediately and removed the terror-glorifying video.”
Popular among children, TikTok allows users to share short videos with each other. With massive global reach, it was listed by CNet as the seventh-most downloaded app of the 2010s and the fourth-most downloaded of 2019 worldwide.
The video in question shows a computer-animated eagle flying from place to place, where Palestinian terror attacks are then depicted in explicit detail.
The first is a 2014 car ramming attack in which two Israelis were killed, including a 17-year-old, and 13 were wounded. The second is a 2015 stabbing attack that killed two and wounded two, among them a two-year-old child.
The third is a 2016 drive-by shooting of Israelis at a Jerusalem light rail stop that killed two and wounded five. The final scene shows a 2015 stabbing attack on Israeli police officers that wounded three at the Damascus Gate of Jerusalem’s Old City.
The killings are shown in considerable detail, certainly unsuitable for children, depicting knives being stabbed into people’s throats, people flying through the air after being struck by cars and explicit depiction of bullet wounds.
Text accompanying the video reads in Arabic, “Jerusalem is the dread of the Jews.”
PMW’s senior analyst, Nan Jacques Zilberdik, said of the clip: “This animation is utterly shocking. The graphic content aims to incite violence and glorify murder.”
“TikTok is a social network popular among children, so there is no doubting the target audience for this is Palestinian youngsters,” Zilberdik added. “Its goal is to indoctrinate and the message is clear — whatever your chosen method, if you kill an Israeli you too can become a hero.”