PETALING JAYA: Computer science graduate Muadz Halim normally tweets about football and Japanese manga, but when Israel attacked Palestine earlier this month, his focus expanded.
The 23-year-old from Perak began to retweet and use pro-Palestine hashtags from early May, at a rate of 80 to 120 times each day.
“I hope that by doing this, I can at least raise awareness among my social media followers that the Palestinians are suffering and that we need to always support and show them solidarity.
“My greatest hope is that Palestine will be free and that there will be no more suffering,” said Muadz, who has racked up a total of 2,707 mentions and retweets on the topic.
He is one of an army of local social media users actively spreading awareness on the topic, making Malaysians among the most prolific in the world in terms of expressing support for and solidarity with Palestine online, especially on Twitter.
This is among the findings of an analysis by The Star which tracked the popularity of pro-Palestine hashtags among users of the social networking service.
Social media monitoring software was used to search for 92 chosen keywords including popular hashtags and phrases that express support for and solidarity with Palestinians or which condemn Israel over its attacks.
Most of the keywords were in English, and the majority of the social media posts tracked were on Twitter.
The search found 31.26 million mentions by social media users from 193 countries over a one-month period from April 19 to May 19.
Of the total, 1.18 million mentions came from Malaysians, making us the second most prolific, behind US-based social media users with 1.24 million mentions.
Social media users in Pakistan came in third with 979,175 mentions, followed by people in Egypt (926,593) and India (858,704).
Among the most popular hashtags mentioned or retweeted by Malaysians were #freepalestine, #savepalestine, #savesheikhjarrah, #gazaunderattack, #Israelterrorist and #Israelkoyak.
Twenty-nine-year-old Syahmi Nazir, who has also been actively supporting Palestine on Twitter, expressed hope that it would help lead to action.
Syahmi, who is known as @syahminamon on Twitter, posts five to seven tweets an hour on the issue in his free time, racking up a total 1,874 mentions on the topic since April 19.
The 29-year-old entrepreneur who lives in Subang Jaya, Selangor, felt many people still lack an understanding of the extent of suffering in Palestine.
“We need to keep applying pressure and raise awareness until the people in power give Palestinians the basic rights they deserve, and uphold justice.”
Student Nurul Aina Zulkarnaen from Terengganu said she spends her free time during the movement control order spreading awareness on the situation in Palestine in the hope that it might bring about positive change.
Using the Twitter handle @callmeeyna, the 20-year-old has 1,041 pro-Palestine posts and hashtag retweets over the past month.
“I wish that the Palestinians will get freedom like what we have.
“Their children have the right to a bright future and a peaceful life,” she said.
Student Farah Aleeysha, who goes by @borahaedef7 on Twitter, said she retweets and posts 200 messages a day to show her support for Palestine, which she says is a sacred land for Muslims.
“Israel is showing its true colours but only a few countries are brave enough to stand up to it.
“By using my voice collectively with others, I can help create awareness on the atrocities and cruelty committed by Israel, and social media is helping us to achieve that,” said the 19-year-old.
