The independent Oversight Board for Instagram and Facebook ruled Wednesday that the phrase “from the river to the sea” is not necessarily hate speech when addressing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The ruling means that people on Meta-owned social media apps can continue to use the phrase in comments and posts, as long as there’s no overriding context that would otherwise be deemed problematic by Meta, such as violent language, legitimization of hate or calls for excluding others from territory, the board said.
The board’s ruling stemmed from three cases involving the phrase on Facebook. In each case, a user included the phrase in a post or comment, and someone else reported it as a violation of Facebook’s rules including its ban on hate speech, arguing that the phrase calls for the destruction of Israel.
Facebook did not remove the three posts, and some users appealed to the Oversight Board, a panel that arbitrates content-related disputes. Facebook was correct in not removing the posts, the board ruled.
“The Board finds there is no indication that the comment or the two posts broke Meta’s Hate Speech rules because they do not attack Jewish or Israeli people with calls for violence or exclusion, nor do they attack a concept or institution associated with a protected characteristic that could lead to imminent violence,” the board ruled in a 32-page decision.
“Instead, the three pieces of content contain contextual signals of solidarity with Palestinians,” it said.
The board’s rulings are generally binding on apps owned by Meta, including Facebook and Instagram. The latest ruling also includes recommendations for better tracking of hate speech and better data access to third-party researchers who study the platforms.
Meta said in a statement about the ruling: “We welcome the board’s review of our guidance on this matter. While all of our policies are developed with safety in mind, we know they come with global challenges and we regularly seek input from experts outside Meta, including the Oversight Board.”
The phrase “from the river to the sea” has been around for decades, but its use grew rapidly on social media and elsewhere during the past 11 months, since the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks on Israel by Hamas and the subsequent Israeli military campaign in Gaza.
Hamas leadership and some pro-Palestinian activists have used the phrase to call for the creation of a Palestinian state over the region between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, an area that covers Israel, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Hamas has long called for the destruction of Israel. Other pro-Palestinian activists say the phrase refers to general solidarity or to a proposed return to pre-1967 borders.
Of the three cases at hand, one involved a post with about 8 million views. It depicted the phrase made with a series of floating watermelon slices, a common pro-Palestinian symbol. That post was reported 951 times by 937 users, according to the Oversight Board.
The other two cases were viewed by far fewer people. One was a comment on a video encouraging others to “speak up” about the conflict, and another was a reshare of a post by a Canadian pro-Palestinian organization expressing solidarity with Palestinian families of all faiths, according to the board.
After the Oversight Board agreed to hear the three cases in May, more than 2,300 people and organizations submitted comments — the second-most the board has received on a matter, after the case related to former President Donald Trump’s suspension and the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
The board said that a minority of its 21 members dissented, arguing that after the Oct. 7 attacks, “its use in a post should be presumed to constitute glorification of” Hamas “unless there are clear signals to the contrary.” Meta’s rules ban glorification of terrorists and other “dangerous organizations.”
The board didn’t specify how many members were in the minority. The members originate from around the globe and include law professors, journalists, free expression advocates and a former prime minister of Denmark.
But a majority of the Oversight Board ruled that the phrase “has multiple meanings.” It noted that a variation appeared in the original 1977 platform of Israel’s Likud Party, which is in power today: “Between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty.” (That line is no longer in the platform, although Likud members continue to push for territorial expansion including the proposed annexation of the West Bank.)
“Because the phrase does not have a single meaning, a blanket ban on content that includes the phrase, a default rule towards removal of such content, or even using it as a signal to trigger enforcement or review, would hinder protected political speech in unacceptable ways,” the board ruled.
Facebook and Instagram have faced several controversies related to the Israel-Hamas war. Human Rights Watch has accused the company of censoring pro-Palestinian voices, while Instagram has been the preferred platform for some Palestinian journalists and photographers. Others have claimed that Meta has censored pro-Israel content.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg created the Oversight Board in 2019 as an outside check on the company’s growing influence on online speech.