GAZA — In a move that would delight domestic moralists, 400,000 Gaza residents who previously had enjoyed full access to the internet are now unable to access websites and services deemed morally offensive by the government. According to a government official, Hamas, the democratically-elected Sunni Islamist political and militant organization currently controlling the Palestinian Authority, has ordered the area’s telecoms to make it impossible for subscribers to access pornographic sites.
A statement from Gaza’s Ministry of Communications indicated that telecom PALTEL had agreed to comply with the orders and would block users attempting to access adult websites from within the Hamas-controlled coastal region beginning this month.
Unsurprisingly, the government insists that the ban is necessary in order to protect children and maintain cultural purity.
“The aim of the move is to protect the Palestinian community from cultural pollution and to protect the young generations from the misuse of the internet through viewing pornographic sites,” Hamas representative Taher al-Nono explained.
Palestinian youths survived the June seizure of the Gaza Strip in an election that saw the secular Fatah party lose power and the Islamic group, which is considered a terrorist organization by Israel, Japan, Canada, and the United States, gain control of the region.
It is believed that approximately 400,000 internet users, with nearly half between the age of 18 – 35, get online in the region on a regular basis. This latest roll-back of rights comes after increased attacks against video stores and internet cafes during the past two years. In some cases, violence has been justified as necessary in order to squash behavior and philosophies at odds with radical Muslim values.
Censorship of erotic content is not unusual in Muslim countries, with Iran, Syria, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia all maintaining firm control of their national Web-waves on topics related to politics, society, and sexuality.
