Young or old. TikTok or X. Pro-Israeli or pro-Palestinian. Your social media feeds are unique to you. Could they be shaping how you view the Israel-Gaza war?
When I open up my TikTok feed, two videos play one after the other. The first shows four Israeli soldiers dancing with guns, set against a blue sky. The other is a young woman speaking from her bedroom, with a prominent pro-Palestinian caption.
TikTok’s algorithm will determine what kind of videos I want to see and recommend similar content, based on which of the two videos I watch until the end.
The algorithms work in a similar way for other social media platforms too and it means some users are being driven towards increasingly divisive content about Israel and Gaza that only entrench their existing views and biases.
It matters because conversations on social media can shape public opinion – and normalise rhetoric that spills offline, at protests and beyond.
That includes the UK, where social media seems to have encouraged many people who are not normally politically active, to take action.
Liberal Democrat MP Layla Moran, whose mother is Palestinian, tells me she and other politicians are receiving a “huge influx” of messages including from young people urging a ceasefire. They seem to have been inspired to act because of “TikTok videos and Instagram reels shared around over WhatsApp”.
“Anything that is too slick, their initial instinct seems to be – don’t trust it. They expect it to be disinformation,” the MP for Oxford West and Abingdon says.
Conservative MP Andrew Percy, the vice chair of the Conservative Friends of Israel group, says the war has “garnered less engagement and communication from residents” in his constituency than other issues.
However, he says: “Much of the content being shared is problematically antisemitic. That’s been a real problem long before this conflict – and this time, social media has made that happen at speed.”
So what is getting the most traction on TikTok, and with whom?
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