Israel-Gaza war: Chinese social media erupts in war of words as Palestine crisis divides opinion
- Deadly Israel-Gaza conflict in the Gaza Strip has sparked fierce debate on Chinese social media, with even embassies caught up in the storm
- Shared sense of victimhood as well as national pride is driving support for the Palestinian cause among Chinese web users, analysts say
As with the war in Europe, a sense of victimhood as well as national pride was driving support for the Palestinian cause among Chinese net users, apart from personal political leanings, analysts said.
“Some of us should not be influenced by public opinion dominated by Jews and Americans,” Hu Xijin, former editor-in-chief of the nationalist tabloid Global Times, posted on Weibo, a Chinese microblogging site akin to X, formerly Twitter.
Hu has been among the most vocal high-profile commentators on the conflict since Hamas’ surprise cross-border assault at daybreak on Saturday sparked a massive Israeli counteroffensive on Gaza, controlled by the Palestinian militant group.
“It is true that Israeli civilians are dying pitifully. But is it not true that Palestinians who are cut off from water and electricity, bombed and attacked are also pitiful?” Hu wrote in an earlier post on Weibo, where he has more than 24 million followers.
Shen Yi, a highly influential nationalistic voice and a professor of international politics at Shanghai’s prestigious Fudan University, has also weighed in on the matter, blaming the Western-led global order as the root cause of the conflict.