News
Antisemitism researcher locked out of Twitter
David Collier slams 'deliberate attempt to silence a voice of a Jewish campaigner'
November 12, 2021 13:37
David Collier slams 'deliberate attempt to silence a voice of a Jewish campaigner'
November 12, 2021 13:37A leading antisemitism researcher has locked out of Twitter after posting photos from the social media account of a Hezbollah supporter.
David Collier, who has produced extensive reports on Jew hate in the Labour Party, used publicly available photos from the personal Facebook account of Hadi Nasrallah after Mr Nasrallah’s video of Israeli ambassador Tzipi Hotovely being chased from the LSE campus went viral.
Mr Collier told the JC he had used a “publicly posted image of someone proudly sitting on a Syrian tank” to reveal Mr Nasrallah’s support for Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad.
Mr Nasrallah, an alumnus of London’s SOAS university who describes himself as a “researcher focused on Syria, Lebanon and Global Jihadist Terrorism,” has previously expressed his support for the “armed resistance in Palestine.”
In March of 2019 he slammed London mayor Sadiq Khan as a “sellout Muslim” after he spoke out against the open show of support for Hezbollah at the city’s annual Al-Quds march.
Mr Nasrallah said Mr Khan was: “trying way too hard to appeal to the Zionist powers in Britain to secure your seat.”
In May of the same year Mr Nasrallah said he took a stand against “anti-Syria” propaganda by holding the Syrian flag and a picture of al-Assad.
Mr Collier said the move from Twitter was: “potentially very damaging for anyone involved in the fight against extremism and antisemitism.
“If we are restricted from using publicly available images that are clearly covered as being in the public interest - then we go into the battle with our hands tied behind our backs.”
It is “truly worrying” how easy it is to abuse on the platform, the campaigner added.
“This is a deliberate attempt to silence a voice of a Jewish campaigner against antisemitism and it needed nothing more than a mouse click to succeed,” he said.
In a statement, Twitter told the JC: “The account referenced has been temporarily locked for violating our private information policy.
“The account owner is required to delete the violative Tweet before regaining access to their account.”