The year 2019 witnessed a 14 percent increase in Israeli hate speech towards Arabs and Palestinians every 64 seconds, according to a report by the Arab Center for the Advancement of Social Media (7amleh).
The annual report, issued by the Center for the third year in a row, stated that out of the 5.4 million posts on Arabs, 495,000 were racist or insulting with severals inciting violence against Arab and Palestinian public.
This figure shows a 5 percent increase compared to 2018, during which 474,000 violent posts were published out of 4.7 million.
The results of the 2019 index showed that the last two parliamentary elections, in April and September, caused an 8 percent rise in violent discourse against the Palestinian public on political affairs.
Among violent posts against figures, 53,000 were directed at the Joint List of the Arab parties, followed by MK Ayman Odeh, who received 21,000 hostile posts, then head of the List’s parliamentary bloc Ahmed Tibi who had 14,510 posts attacking him.
The most frequently used word in the posts against Arabs was “terrorist”, which was used 188,580 times.
Facebook came in first as the most social media platform used with 41 percent of the posts on it, a 15 percent decrease from 2018, followed by Twitter with 30 percent violent discourse against Arabs, a 14 percent increase compared to last year.
