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After reviewing more than 38 million Twitter posts about the Syrian conflict, a team of Middle East scholars from The George Washington University and American University concluded that rather than an objective account of what’s taken place, social media posts have been carefully curated to represent a specific view of the war. It said the skewing of the social media view of the conflict has been amplified by the way more traditional news outlets make use of the postings – for example, passing along social media posts written in English over those written in Arabic. The analysts studied tweets that mentioned Syria in English or Arabic from the start of 2011 through April 2013. They then analyzed how “traditional” forms of media, such as newspapers, used social media to supplement their coverage of the conflict.

Because journalists were largely unable to get direct access to the events in Syria at the start of the conflict, many relied on “citizen journalism,” or accounts from Syrians who said they’d witnessed events firsthand, often posted on social media, said Marc Lynch

as the uprising continued, tweets in Arabic began to dramatically outpace tweets in English. From January 2011 to June 2011, English-language tweets were most common, but Arabic tweets made up almost 75 percent of all tweets about Syria just a year later.

As we can see from these estimates below, the volume of Syria-related tweets (as a percentage of overall tweets) appears considerably lower than the volume related to the uprisings in Egypt and Iran. The estimates were constructed using multiple published Web sources reporting on number of tweets for the observed events as well as total Twitter traffic over time, including Twitter's blog, Customer Insight Group, Mashable, the Sysomos blog, and a dataset acquired via Twapperkeeper.

The Iranian protests in 2009 marked the first time that social media let us witness this kind of protest in a closed society from the citizens' point of view. The world watched, transfixed, as the death of protester Neda Agha-Soltan was caught on video. Now, these kinds of horrifying images have become alarmingly common.

The revolution in Egypt was relatively short, fast, and explosive. The Syrian uprising, by contrast, has been going on for 11 long months. Certain moments have refocused the world's attention, such as the siege of Homs in early February or the deaths of journalists Anthony Shadid, Marie Colvin, and Rémi Ochlik. Otherwise, much of the Syrian uprising has tragically resembled, as NPR's Andy Carvin puts it, "the proverbial boiling of the frog." While Carvin and others have been devotedly tweeting about Syria, he acknowledges that the length of the uprising might deter some news coverage. "I could imagine editors saying, what's the new angle here?" he says.

The Saudi woman who was sentenced to 34 years in prison for using Twitter appears to have been denounced to Saudi authorities through a crime-reporting app that users in the kingdom can download to Apple and Android phones.

The user told Shehab that he had reported her on the Saudi app, which is called Kollona Amn, or All Are Safe. It is not clear whether the Saudi officials responded directly to the report, but the 34-year-old mother was arrested two months later.

Her alleged crimes including using a website to “cause public unrest” and “assisting those who seek to cause public unrest and destabilise civil and national security by following their Twitter accounts” and by retweeting their tweets.

you must admit that he got the highest viewership in Egypt tonight. Everybody was waiting for the show. Now there is viral status on the Facebook that the number of Youssef’s viewers tonight was more than the number of those participated in the latest constitutional referendum.

you must admit that he got the highest viewership in Egypt tonight. Everybody was waiting for the show. Now there is viral status on the Facebook that the number of Youssef’s viewers tonight was more than the number of those participated in the latest constitutional referendum.

Now speaking about the numbers  , you must know that both Bassem Youssef and “ElBernmag” hashtags as well “MBC Masr” have been trending for hours now in Arabic and English in Egypt. Here is map of the trends from Trends Map showing Egypt and its most popular twitter hashtags now.

Since 2011, I’ve noticed anti-Semitic books, eg Protocols of the elders of Zion etc have greatly decreased in popularity among Cairo’s book sellers. This is not to mention anti-Jewish conspiracies significantly declining in everyday discourse. A big contrast with the 1990s/2000s.

The Mubarak regime banked on keeping the population focussed on external matters (and imaginary threats), to distract them from internal failings. If it meant the conflation of Zionism with Judaism, then so be it. The 2011 Arab uprisings were a watershed moment because it turned Arab heads from the direction of the external to the internal. The Arab tyrant was now seen as the worst conspiracy imposed on the population.

On the cultural level, Egypt underwent a reconciliation with its Jewish past, which spawned films and an unusual but welcome enthusiasm with Egyptian Jewry.

Saudi Arabia has sentenced a journalist to five years in prison and a fine of 50,000 riyals (around $13,300) after being charged for “insulting the rulers (and) inciting public opinion”, said Amnesty International on Friday.Alaa Brinji was also found guilty on 24 March of “accusing security officers of killing protesters in Awamiyya” – a Shia town in Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province.He was also slapped with an eight-year travel ban. Brinji, who worked for Saudi newspapers Al-Bilad, Okaz and Al-Sharq, has already spent two years behind bars since May 2014, including a period of incommunicado solitary confinement.

Joumblatt joined Twitter just three weeks ago and already has more than 25,000 followers, many of whom he answers directly with the same candor and wit that has helped make the 65-year-old an unlikely giant in Lebanese politics

Lebanon, a small, religiously diverse country, is home to a tense alignment of Christians, Sunnis, Shia Muslims, and Druze — communities mostly represented by an old guard of politicians who keep the majority of political discourse behind closed doors. On social media, used broadly by Lebanese across the country, the political rhetoric is open and fierce, albeit rarely constructive. While most of the country’s political elite hold social media accounts, few directly engage.

That’s what sets Joumblatt apart. His political flexibility gives him the unique ability as a politician to voice unpopular criticism. Following clashes in Lebanon’s second-largest city of Tripoli last month, Joumblatt called out former Prime Minister Najib Mikati, now a parliamentarian representing the city of Tripoli

Today, Twitter has a different story, and it is not one of speaking truth to power. Twitter is no longer empowering its users. Its platform cannot be considered neutral. Twitter’s actions suggest it is systematically suppressing voices in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.

What started out as an investigation into the mass suspension of accounts of Egyptian dissidents, uncovered a mass censorship algorithm that targeted users who use Arabic flagging their text as hateful conduct. This story is still unfolding. As you read this, mass and unjustified systemic locking and suspension of Twitter Arabic accounts continues. Users are angry and bewildered.

draconian yet lazy algorithms have systematically shut down voices of dissent – and pulled unsuspecting social media users down with them

The Saudi government has sentenced a 72-year-old U.S. citizen to 16 years in prison for tweets he posted while inside the United States, some of which were critical of the Saudi regime. His son, speaking publicly for the first time, alleges that the Saudi government has tortured his father in prison and says that the State Department mishandled the case.

On Oct. 3, Almadi was sentenced to 16 years in prison. He also received a 16-year travel ban on top of that. If he serves his whole sentence, he will leave prison at age 87 — and would have to live to 104 before he could return to the United States.

Almadi was charged with harboring a terrorist ideology, trying to destabilize the kingdom, as well as supporting and funding terrorism.

Over the last year, the Bahraini government has been scaling up its information control apparatus and media access to the country is rigorously monitored and managed by the government and its team of Western PR advisors.

'Social media' conjures up thoughts of instant internet communication, global chatter over the web, computers, mobiles, tweets, posts etc. But there is a communication form that predates these modern tools - political street art. Street art can be dated back to ancient Egypt and throughout history it has been employed by those with a political point to make. From the outset of the Arab uprisings, people from Egypt to Libya have been enjoying their newfound freedom of expression, taking to the walls to say what they want to say. In this week's feature, Listening Post's Meenakshi Ravi looks at a communication form that is for the people, by the people.

“The conditions that they are being held in now is much better than before. Definitely a result of foreign media pressure,” tweeted the family members of Greste’s detained colleague, Mohamed Fahmy, from his Twitter account on Feb. 5.

A campaign first begun in Kenya to support Greste and other detained journalists in Egypt is growing daily, expounding the message that “journalism is not terrorism.” Supporters across the world are sharing photos with their mouths taped shut, holding handwritten signs with the hashtag #FreeAJStaff.

Fahmy’s family members also tweeted from his account on Feb. 5 that the three journalists are being held in the same cell. The news comes as a great relief to supporters who have been worriedly reporting on their ill treatment in prison — including the detention of Fahmy and Mohamed in insect-infested solitary confinement cells in a maximum security wing of Tora prison, 24 hours a day, for more than a month without beds or sunlight, sometimes without blankets.

the Egyptian government issuing a press release on Sunday saying that the army has "achieved a scientific breakthrough by inventing systems for diagnosing hepatitis and AIDS without any need to take a sample of blood from the patient". The claims went further, with the C-Fast device supposedly capable not just of diagnosing, but also treating the diseases

Egypt has the highest rate of hepatitis C in the world, with around 20% of people either suffering or having recovered from the disease according to the World Health Organisation. Sunday's announcement has caused a stir, with a video of the inventor being shared 12,000 times on Facebook and an ongoing Twitter discussion under the hashtag "Virus C miracle". A few of the tweets were supportive of the government, but what is striking is that the majority were satirical and questioned the science. "There is no such thing as secret military reports in medicine," TV presenter Khalid Muntasir told his 20,000 Twitter followers. "For a medical discovery to be recognized and be declared as such, it must be revealed to the public."

One user tweeted: "I suggest you inject Al-Sisi with the virus and then cure him using the army's invention as means to inaugurate it and prove its efficacy."