Facebook removed a popular pro-Israel Christian prayer page on May 18; the founder of the page claims that they were the targets of a cyberterrorism campaign.
The Jerusalem Prayer Team (JPT) page, which led followers in daily prayers for Israel’s safety during the recent conflict with Hamas, had 77 million Facebook followers prior to being shut down. Dr. Mike Evans, who heads the page as well as the Friends of Zion Association, has claimed that “a Jordanian-based cyber-terrorist organization flooded our page with comments like ‘Jews are pigs,’ we’ve never seen anything like it in our lives,” Arutz Sheva reported. Other comments included Adolf Hitler pictures and quotes. The organization allegedly behind the comments then reported those comments to Facebook, Evans claimed.
Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) reported that various YouTube channels and Facebook pages were urging people to target the page in order to get Facebook to remove it, with some claiming that Facebook was “forcing people to like” the page, per CBN.
“It was a very clever, deceptive plan by Islamic radicals,” Evans told CBN.
According to CBN, when JPT appealed the verdict, Facebook responded by saying: “We can’t review appeals at this time due to a shortage of reviewers caused by the Coronavirus (Covid-19) outbreak. Since you are unable to access the page, this means that appealing is no longer an option.” Evans also claimed that he can no longer access his personal Facebook page.
“America is a democracy, in the United States you are innocent until proven otherwise,” Evans said. “What did we do? What was our crime?”
A spokesperson from Facebook told the New York Post, “We removed Jerusalem Prayer Team’s Facebook Page for violating our rules against spam and inauthentic behavior.” The Journal’s request for comment to Facebook’s press team was not returned.
Writer Jazz Shaw wrote in a May 19 post for the conservative website Hot Air, “Facebook and Twitter have been on a hot streak ever since Hamas resumed its rocket attacks on Israel. Anyone who wants to publicly vent their hatred of Israel, accusing them of ‘war crimes’ or whatever the flavor of the week might be is welcome to do so. That’s just an exercise in ‘free speech,’ you see. But if you’re defending Israel–or perhaps even just praying for the safety of the Jews–your page is engaging in ‘inauthentic behavior’ so you’re violating their terms of service.”
More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.