Noam Tirosh

Social Media New and Old in the Al-’Arakeeb Conflict: A Case Study

This article on the civic struggles of residents of the demolished Bedouin village of Al-’Arakeeb in Israel demonstrates how social media have helped marginalized communities acquire a voice. It is based on site visits to the village over the course of a year beginning in July 2010, and on interviews with residents, Bedouin and Jewish activists, and journalists covering the conflict. Media strategies of villagers and activists are described and analyzed, and use of new and old media by people with limited access to telecommunications infrastructure is explored. Subsequent news accounts of the struggle and the journalist interviews point to a multifaceted role social media play in progressive social change for the Bedouin.

Reconsidering the ‘Right to be Forgotten’ – memory rights and the right to memory in the new media era

In 2014, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) established the ‘Right to be Forgotten’ (RtbF). Since its establishment, more than 500,000 people filed requests with Google to be ‘de-listed’ from its search. At the same time, the Court’s decision has stirred debates focused on the tension the decision raised between a person’s right to privacy and freedom of expression. This study offers, yet, a different reading of the decision and its meaning. It first outlines the theoretical foundations of the concept of memory and its relation to rights. Then, it focuses on media, memory, and the RtbF. Afterward, the study discusses the legal origins of the RtbF and claims that the right is actually a right to construct one’s narrative. Therefore, in order to analyze the RtbF, this study places it within memory studies and analyzes it through its tools. From this perspective, this study criticizes the emphasis placed on forgetting in the definition of the right and problematizes its focus on individuals. Eventually, this study uses the legitimization the RtbF gives to a new discourse about memory in relation to rights in order to suggest an extended ‘right to memory’ that will answer the memory needs of our time.

The Effect of the Transformation in Digital Media on the Digital Divide

The digital divide policy conversation focuses on connectivity and access to information and communication technologies as well as on the ability to use them in pre-prescribed ways and on the utility that their usage provides according to preset categories.However, the dynamics offered by van Dijk (2005) demonstrate that categorical inequalities permeate over time and lead to an ongoing divide that never closes. A shift in policy thinking is needed. Applying a philosophy rooted in the writings of John Rawls to replace the current utilitarian framework, we suggest to focus remedial policies on the least advantaged members of society, those whose positional categorization led to the lowest levels of digital participation. We then propose to measure success of the policy by its responsiveness to the needs of the excluded citizens as they themselves define them. Adopting Amartya Sens “capabilities approach,” we posit that an effective policy should focus on a person’s actual capability to make use of the goods, services and opportunities available to them, rather than on the mere access to or ownership of those goods.

iNakba, mobile media and society’s memory

The iNakba is a new mobile application that allows users to locate, and learn about, Palestinian villages that were destroyed during and after the Nakba, the consequences of the war between Jewish forces and local and external Arab forces following the withdrawal of British Mandate from the colony of Palestine in 1948. As such, the iNakba, as a new mobile application, is a mnemonic device utilized in a heated memory contestation that exemplifies how contemporary technological capabilities operate as a reminder for a society that seeks to forget. This study reveals that when marginalized groups struggle for recognition in society’s memory sphere, while capitalizing on contemporary media’s unique characteristics, they benefit from the blurring of the familiar distinction between communicative and cultural memory (Assmann & Czaplicka, 1995). The unique characteristics of new media create a new opportunity to make many more narratives and group memories known, officially organized, and mediated for mass audiences. These new memory affordances may contribute to establishing a culture of just memory that takes into consideration memory ethics and promotes the “duty to remember” the stories of the oppressed and marginalized.

Dominant News Frames, Society’s Memory, and the African Asylum Seekers’ Protest in Israel

This study questions the role of media in the formation of society’s memory regarding the asylum seeker struggle in Israel. Through analyzing 180 news articles published during the daily coverage of the refugees’ protest in Israel between December 2013 and January 2014, this study offers an opportunity to explore the mediated environment that also shapes the refugees’ situation in Israel and the role of the printed press in a memory contestation. The study demonstrates that while traditional media are a site in which different versions of the past, even including the refugees’ own version, are being contested and evaluated, they are not enough to guarantee that refugees will gain recognition as such, because traditional media maintain the power to shape and construct the debate in ways that do not always support the refugees’ claims.

Alone in Berlin? Israeli media and the German resistance to Nazism

ABSTRACT The commercially successful Hebrew translation of Alone in Berlin (Fallada, 2010) stirred a conversation regarding the German resistance to Nazism, until then a rarely discussed phenomenon in Israel. The analysis of media items dealing with the book revealed that different memory frameworks shaped the discussion about it. Thus, this study contributes to contemporary discussion about the role of “old” and “new” media in the reconstruction of society’s memory.

iNakba and Realizing the Potential of New Media

iNakba is a trilingual—Arabic, Hebrew, and English—application based on global positioning system navigation technology. It was launched in 2014 by Zochrot (remembering in Hebrew), an Israeli nongovernmental organization, and it allows users to locate Palestinian villages that were destroyed during and after the 1948 war between Jewish forces and local and external Arab forces. Using the app, users can learn about a forgotten and denied event in Israeli collective memory. The analysis of iNakba, in line with the four unique characteristics of new media, demonstrates the potential effects of these media on the political struggles of suppressed groups, such as Palestinians living in Israel.

The Novelty and Utility in New Media

What differentiates contemporary media from their predecessors is not that they are social, as would seem to be the case owing to their common descriptor as “social media,” but that they create an opportunity for a new type of mediated sociability. They differ from the traditional media that dominated the twentieth century in four aspects: they provide an abundance of available information, channels over which this information can travel, and storage space in which information can be retained; they are mobile; they are interactive; and they allow multimediated messages to be conveyed by users. These characteristics allow those that have the opportunity to use them the capability to communicate on richer levels that allow more presence. These features are at the heart of their democratic potential.

Competing Theories of Justice

We describe three philosophies of justice: (a) the utilitarian, which says that decisions should be made with the aim of producing the greatest good for the greatest number; (b) John Rawls’s theory of justice, which contends that social and economic inequalities should be rearranged so that they provide the greatest advantage to the least advantaged; and (c) Amartya Sen’s capability approach, which focuses on a people’s actual ability to make use of the opportunities available to them. Utilitarian foundations support mostly negative justifications for freedom of expression, the basic substantive right that humans should justly enjoy. Rawlsian philosophy ensures a minimal level of free expression. The capability approach focuses on people’s ability to put speech to use in ways they themselves see fit.

Al ‘Arakeeb (aka Al ‘Araqib) and Uses of the New Media

The indigenous Israeli Bedouins are systematically marginalized. Within this population, the people of Al-‘Arakeeb, a small “unrecognized” village located near the main road to Beer Sheva, which was demolished in 2010 and has since been repeatedly rebuilt and demolished, are perhaps the most oppressed. The story of the people in Al-‘Arakeeb demonstrates an act of resistance by a technologically inferior and isolated community that was empowered by the new capabilities offered by the Internet and associated technologies