Israel creates special Facebook page targeting Iraqis
ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Israel’s Foreign Ministry on Sunday launched a Facebook page designed specifically to reach out to Iraqis and develop ties with the country.
According to the Times of Israel, the Arabic-language page will “serve as some sort of digital embassy to the war-torn country” which has no diplomatic ties with Jerusalem. The Jewish state still formally considers Iraq an “enemy state,” but has recently stepped up efforts to establish a dialogue.
The page, the first of its kind, is geared towards Iraqis because of the shared history between some of Iraq’s Jews living in Israel and the land they left behind, the Foreign Ministry asserted.
“The digital embassy is intended to provide a response to the growing interest that the Arab world is showing in Israel,” the Foreign Ministry’s director-general, Yuval Rotem, told the Times of Israel. “Social networks allow us to reach this audience — our neighbors — and present the true face of Israel, in a way that was not possible before.”
There is “great interest that the local [Iraqi] population has shown in Israel, especially in recent years,” Rotem said. The Foreign Ministry’s social media team started targeting Iraqis several months ago.
Excited to launch @IsraelMFA's new #Facebook page to build our conversation with the people of #Iraq.
— Yuval Rotem ?? (@Yuval_Rotem) May 6, 2018
We are convinced that direct communication & dialogue through #socialmedia can bring better understanding between our peoples.
Please visit the page ? https://t.co/4xEjgd2sL0 pic.twitter.com/8QqWDiFbC6
The Arabic-language page, called “Israel in the Iraqi dialect,” has some 1.5 followers and has promoted stories of Jewish Israelis with Iraqi backgrounds. In the 1940s, Iraq experienced a mass exodus of Jewish Iraqis following government-sponsored persecution, with incidents such as the infamous Farhud, a pogrom that killed over 700 Baghdadi Jews.
Ties between Baghdad and Jerusalem are strained, notably as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was the only head of state to support the historic referendum on independence for the Kurdistan Region, which the Iraqi government strongly opposed. Late last year, the Iraqi Parliament’s Council of Representative criminalized raising the Israeli flag and “promoting Zionist principles” in the country as people in the Kurdistan Region were seen waving Israel’s flag as a thank you for the Jewish state’s support.
Israel’s new strategy comes as the US ramps up its rhetoric against Iranian designs in the region and Iraqis head to the polls on May 12. Tehran exerts a significant amount of influence in Baghdad, which has some experts and officials worried.
“The situation in the Middle East is shaky, and this is largely because of the attempts made by Iran to penetrate and cooperate together with Hezbollah and the continued terrorist operations of Hamas,” Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Kurdistan 24 last week.
Israel, the US, and their allies have expressed concerns about Iran’s stronghold in embattled Syria, where Iranian militias are fighting alongside Damascus, and have warned against the creation of an “Iranian corridor to the Mediterranean,” which would lead Tehran through Iraq and Syria and into Lebanon.