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Netanyahu's strategy of silence

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went silent on social media during the recent conflict with Hamas, trying to keep from the public that he is engaged in negotiations with the terrorist organization.
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A careful look at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s popular and otherwise active Facebook and Twitter accounts during the last round of fighting in Gaza gives no indication of what was actually happening on Israel’s southern front. Netanyahu effectively silenced his accounts from Aug. 8 to 10, for a total of three days. At the time, Hamas was firing rockets at Jewish localities in the western Negev; the Israeli air force was bombing targets in the Gaza Strip; the Cabinet had met for a lengthy emergency session; and the overall feeling across the country was that all-out war was just short of inevitable.

Even in the days leading up to his “net silence,” Netanyahu did not mention the tensions in the south. His posts and tweets focused on how vital the Nationality Law is to the country, and he directed readers to an article in his home paper, Israel Hayom, which reported on Aug. 6 that he chastised the Norwegian Foreign Minister Ine Marie Eriksen Soreide over allowing money from her country to fund left-wing groups, which, he claimed, attempt to delegitimize Israel.

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