Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Photo: AP
Did Facebook close Netanyahu's page?
Users trying to post on prime minister's personal page find it closed to posts, comments, most likely in response to slew of negative posts. Spokesman: Facebook behind glitch
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's
Facebook
page has been filling up with angry comments from citizens protesting over the planned budget cuts.
The person behind the virtual struggle is Tali Oz-Albo who posted a status on his Facebook page that has already received over 42,000 likes.
Her status update led dozens of Facebook users to post statuses in which they expressed their disappointment with the economic policy, and used Netanyahu's page to tell their personal stories.
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Meanwhile, Oz-Albo has opened a Facebook group called "The Man on the Street". She writes that the purpose of the group is to "include the opinions of all citizens who feel hurt as a result of the new budget cuts. Let's discuss here as citizens what needs to be our next move so that we can live here like human beings."
The group already includes 1,500 members.
The page - with comments
Yet on Monday morning, people who tried to post on the prime minister's page noticed that the area on the page where follower posts were shown was missing. Some claimed that following the massive outpouring of comments criticizing the prime minister, the administrators decided to close the page to user comments, or at least hide all comments.The option to post comments became available on Monday afternoon, a move which the Facebook group Social Justice – Situation Room took credit for after they had published a statement on the inability to post on Netanyahu's page.
Likud Spokeswoman Noga Katz who is responsible for the administration of Netanyahu's personal Facebook page (which is separate from the official page) said that the changes were not carried out by the administrators and that they were actually surprised to receive messages from followers claiming the page was closed to comments.
She noted that they sent Facebook a query over the matter and that they are still waiting for an explanation for the hitch. The posts have since been reopened to comments.
Katz added that "The prime minister is kept updated on post and comments and encourages citizens to continue to express their opinions. We have no wish to erase posts…and have no ambitions to be the most popular (page) online. As I've said in the past, so long as no abuse is involved – we do not remove follower statuses."
