More than a dozen member of the House Republican Israel Caucus penned a letter urging the Twitter CEO to ban the terrorist orgaization Hamas from its platform.
Yesterday, co-chairmen of the caucus, Reps. Lee Zeldin, Doug Lamborn, and Joe Wilson, submitted letter signed by 16 caucus members to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey asking for the removal of “all content promoting terrorist activity, including banning senior Hamas officials and associates who use the platform to radicalize individuals to incite violence against Israelis,” according to a press release on Zeldin’s website.
The letter states, “Over the past several years, Twitter has made some progress by removing terrorist content from groups such [as] ISIS and Hezbollah. However, more needs to be done to eradicate the spread of all terrorist activity by designated FTOs.”
“Congress has already determined that providing material support, resources, and intangible assistance to a FTO [foreign terrorist organization] is a federal crime. Furthermore, the Supreme Court has upheld that federal law prohibiting individuals and groups from providing material support to FTOs does not violate the First Amendment,” the letter continued.
Hamas is a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) & shouldn’t have accounts on Twitter; a US Co. Today I co-led a 16 Member letter to @jack calling for a ban of all FTOs from this platform, including Hamas. This is a valuable resource that should be denied to terrorists.
— Lee Zeldin (@RepLeeZeldin) June 12, 2019
According to the U.S. Department of State, Hamas was officially labeled a foreign terrorist organization on October 8, 1997. Several other countries around the world also recognize Hamas as a terrorist group, including Canada and the European Union.
Hamas is one of the top offenders of terrorist rhetoric on the platform. The organization frequently boasts on Twitter about their terror against Israel and uses the platform to recruit supporters.
In May, Hamas sent around 700 rockets into Israel where several innocent bystanders were killed. They then took to Twitter to announce their victory.
“Hamas follows a comprehensive charter that calls for the murder of every Jew and the destruction of the State of Israel through the covenant of Jihad,” the letter said.
“Hamas uses Twitter to gather mass participation for its ‘Days of Rage’ against Israel, to recruit members, and praise martyrs that kill innocent Americans and Israelis,” the letter went on to say.
The letter closed with, “Twitter has a responsibility to stop the spread of terrorism on its site. We hope Twitter will take action without the need for additional Congressional oversight and legislative action.”
In January 2018, the U.S. designated Ismail Haniyeh, president of Hamas, on its terrorist list as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) who holds a close connection with Hamas and has participated in Israeli attacks, VOA News reported.
