opponent for advertising, therefore crushing the opponent’s advertising budget (Goichman 2018). The network of fake accounts created during the 2019 national elections also appeared to tweet in a coordinated manner while using messages taken from the Likud party’s campaign. For example, many tweets mentioned the Likud slogan “will fall like a house of cards”, referencing the campaign’s slogan used to downplay the indictments against Netanyahu. Other messages used were mostly misinformation and attacks on Netanyahu’s opponent, Benyamin Gantz (N12 News, 2019). Hasbara/Diplomacy: The main strategy of the act.il Hasbara app, deployed by the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, is to promote the spread of pro-Israel messages on social media. Users receive a list of tasks and receive points when they are completed. The app searches the social media network for negative, anti-Semitic, and anti-Israel online content, and notify its users who are then prompted to comment on the post and try to change the narrative. Users with the most points at the end of each month are recognized and virtually decorated. The main point of the app is to build an online community of Israel supporters (Bz, 2017). Facebook takedowns: There have been a number of takedowns relating to Israel-based activity in the past year. On May 2019, Facebook took down 265 Facebook and Instagram accounts involved in coordinated inauthentic behavior. The activity originated in Israel and focused on Nigeria, Senegal, Togo, Angola, Niger, and Tunisia. The network used fake accounts to run pages to distribute their content and artificially increase engagement. The administrators frequently posted about local politicians, political news, elections, candidate views, and criticism of opponents. The investigation found that the activity was linked to an Israeli commercial entity, Archimedes Group. No direct relationship with the government has been evidenced (Facebook 2019). In 2019 Facebook took down more than 82 accounts it suspected were fake and which were attempting to discourage Israeli-Arabs from voting. According to an investigation undertaken by Democratic Bloc, the suspected profiles encouraged an election boycott. The accounts were suspected of actively commenting on pages in order to undermine Israeli-Arab politicians and their parliamentary work (Yaron, 2019). In 2020 Facebook removed a number of fake accounts that were promoting incitement against Prime Minister Netanyahu. Posts being uploaded by these accounts included pictures of Netanyahu next to pictures of Hitler and various threats on his life (ynet, 2020). Table 2: Observed Strategies, Tools and Techniques of Social Media Manipulation in Israel Account Types Messaging and Valence Content and Platforms Communication Strategies Fake accounts, real Pro Netanyahu messages, Coordinated behaviour, Twitter, Facebook accounts misinformation on opposition, disinformation, amplification Pro-Israel messages, of likes, organized online spreading dirt on political Hasbara, creating infoopponents, supressing voting graphs, targeting social media users. Source: Authors’ evaluations based on data collected. Blank spaces indicate no evidence was found. 212