Hanan Aşravi’nin Filistin Mücadelesi ve Twitter Üzerinden Kamu Diplomasisi Faaliyetleri

Abstract

Hanan Ashrawi, the first female Executive Committee member of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), is an activist, politician and academic dedicated to making the voices of the Palestinian people heard. Ashrawi also served as the Head of the PLO's Department of Public Diplomacy and Policy. Ashrawi personally played a role in the establishment of non-governmental organizations that emphasize democratic values so that the Palestinian people can live a life based on human rights. Over the years, Ashrawi has become a globally famous Palestinian icon. For this reason, she has started to fight with similar tools as well as the official Palestinian institutions against Israel's activities with digital diplomacy. In the 2000s, Israel used both the international press and social media, especially Twitter, as a public diplomacy tool to justify itself.Public diplomacy is the image creation and perception activities on other countries for the national interests of states.Digital diplomacy is a tool of public diplomacy. As the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is frequently on the agenda of the international press, both sides want to create an international public perception in their favor.Both the state of Israel and the Palestinian Authority use the statement that it is not them who cause the conflict. Palestinians, who do not have equal opportunities with Israel, try to make their voices heard in an environment where information can be manipulated quickly.For this reason, public diplomacy activities carried out by not only official institutions but also by individuals are important for Palestinians. Ashrawi, who is also the spokesperson of the PLO, opened an official Twitter account in 2018 with her prominent activist identity since the Intifada process and started to carry out individual public diplomacy activities.Whenever there was an important development about the Palestinians, Ashrawi expressed her views on her Twitter account and tried to draw attention to the issues that Palestinians suffered the most. This study analyzes Hanan Ashrawi's political career, what she has done for the Palestinian people over the years, how she turned into a political icon and how she transformed her Twitter account in English into a digital diplomacy activity. © 2021, Muhammed Mustafa KULU. All rights reserved