#ViolentRiotsNotPeacefulProtests: How the Israel Defense Forces Legitimize Its Military Actions against Palestinian protesters on Twitter
Abstract
The increasing role of social networks has become a powerful tool in the crafting of narratives. Disseminating state narratives directly to international audiences without relying on traditional press elites has become a distinctive feature of state PR and digital diplomacy.
The crafting of convenient narratives for foreign audiences plays a crucial role in times of political disruption when states seek to legitimize their own policies. This article explores how the military of the state of Israel legitimizes its violent actions against protesters by employing de-legitimizing devices of the protest paradigm.
Although the concept of a protest paradigm has been applied primarily to news coverage, this article suggests that it may be a valuable framework for analyzing military communication on social networks when justifying violence against protesters. The analysis focuses specifically on the Twitter communication of Israel's Defense Forces (IDF) in the context of the Palestinian series of protests, also known as the Great March of Return (GMR).
By analyzing 934 tweets published by the IDF over a period of exactly one year (30 March 2018 - 30 March 2019), the author argues that the IDF constructed five overarching narratives. Furthermore, these narratives were used to legitimize the disproportionate use of force against the protesters.
Since social networks are inherently visual platforms, the analysis also focuses on how narratives resonate with images in the IDF's communication on Twitter.