Turkey blocks Instagram amid outrage over censorship of posts on Haniyeh
Turkey has blocked access to Instagram after a top government official criticized the platform for censoring posts about Israel’s assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.
Turkey's Information Technologies and Communication Authority (BTK) announced the decision on its website on Friday.
The BTK said "instagram.com has been blocked by a decision on the date of 02/08/2024", without elaborating on the reason or duration for the ban.
The ban comes after the Turkish presidency's communications director Fahrettin Altun on Wednesday slammed the US company for blocking condolence posts on the assassination of Haniyeh.
"This is censorship, pure and simple," Altun said on X, adding that Meta-owned Instagram had not cited any policy violations for its action.
Haniyeh, who was in the Iranian capital to attend the swearing-in ceremony of Iran's newly-elected President Masoud Pezeshkian, was assassinated along with his bodyguard, in an Israeli attack on his residence in northern Tehran early on Wednesday.
Meta-owned Facebook was also slammed by Malaysia Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim after his post on the assassination of Haniyeh was removed.
"Let this serve as a clear and unequivocal message to Meta: Cease this display of cowardice," Anwar posted on his Facebook page on Thursday.
The prime minister had posted a video recording of his phone call with a Hamas official to offer condolences over Haniyeh's killing, which was later removed.
The assassination of Haniyeh increased fears of the spillover of the war in Gaza into the region.
Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas waged the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupying entity in response to the Israeli regime's decades-long campaign of bloodletting and devastation against Palestinians.
The regime’s bloody onslaught on Gaza has so far killed 39,480 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured 91,128 others. Thousands more are also missing and presumed dead under rubble.
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