hamas – Techdirt (original) (raw)

No, Trademark Squatting On Anti-Israel Phrase Won’t Keep It From Use

from the not-gonna-work dept

For some reason, there are enough people who are ignorant enough about trademark law such that every once in a while you get people who don’t like a thing trying to trademark that thing thinking they can prevent that thing from being done or used. It’s a form of trademark squatting. Confused? An example would be one man who thought he could keep the NFL’s Raiders in Oakland merely by applying for a trademark on “San Antonio Raiders,” where the team was rumored to relocate to. Stuff like that doesn’t work, primarily because you have to actually show a use of the trademark in commerce, or at least a valid intent to use it. You don’t get to go out and trademark something merely to sit on it and prevent someone else from using it.

Which brings us to the war between Israel and Hamas. The brutal conflict is raging once more, as are various political discussions around it. One phrase you are likely to have heard at some point is: “From the river to the sea, Palestine shall be free.” To be clear, that phrase is a hateful, anti-Israel rallying cry that calls for the abolition of the state of Israel. That isn’t to say that there shouldn’t be a Palestinian state, of course, but to pretend like that statement calls for anything less than the destruction of Israel as a state is silly.

Equally silly is two Jewish men in America somehow thinking that they’re going to control the use of the phrase merely by trying to trademark it.

Two Jewish American men have submitted separate trademark applications for the expression “from the river to the sea,” triggering a flurry of reactions. A prominent legal expert has cautioned that the move might have unintended consequences for both the Jewish community and Israel.

Joel Ackerman and Oron Rosenkrantz filed trademark applications for the phrase that refers to the geographic area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, encompassing Israel and the Palestinian territories.

This is pointless at best, and potentially counterproductive to the goal at worst. It’s pointless for a number of reasons. For starters, it’s very unlikely that either trademark application will be approved at all. It’s a widely used political phrase that does nothing to serve as a source identifier of a good. But even if it were granted, it would be for an extremely limited type of goods, such as t-shirts and hats. No such mark would prevent the phrase from being said, chanted, written, nor used on all sorts of other products. It’s simply not going to stifle any real use of the phrase, so what’s the point?

“We don’t know for sure what the outcome will be, but the chances [of their receiving these trademarks] is not that good,” Katzenelson said. “Since it only applies to hats and shirts, stopping its use on other services and goods would be very difficult.”

The counterproductive piece is somewhat akin to the Streisand Effect. Whatever contact the general public has had with this anti-Israel message, now that message is being written and talked about all the more thanks to this attempt to trademark it. And there’s certainly no guarantee that those who come across the message, thanks to all of this, will take the same view of it as these two gentlemen.

Now, again, I don’t expect that these applications will be approved at all. But the point is that there was no reason to attempt any of this to begin with.

Filed Under: from the river to the sea, hamas, israel, palestine, trademark, trademark abuse, trademark squatting

New Israeli Law Makes Consuming ‘Terrorist’ Content A Criminal Offense

from the well-that's-a-mess dept

It’s amazing just how much war and conflict can change a country. On October 7th, Hamas blitzed Israel with an attack that was plainly barbaric. Yes, this is a conflict that has been simmering with occasional flashpoints for decades. No, neither side can even begin to claim it has entirely clean hands as a result of those decades of conflict. We can get the equivocating out of the way. October 7th was different, the worst single day of murder of the Jewish community since the Holocaust. And even in the immediate aftermath, those outside of Israel and those within knew that the attack was going to result in both an immediate reaction from Israel and longstanding changes within its borders. And those of us from America, or those that witnessed how our country reacted to 9/11, knew precisely how much danger this period of change represented.

It’s already started. First, Israel loosened the reins to allow once-blacklisted spyware companies to use their tools to help Israel find the hundreds of hostages Hamas claims to have taken. While that goal is perfectly noble, of course, the willingness to engage with more nefarious tools to achieve that end had begun. And now we learn that Israel’s government has taken the next step in amending its counterterrorism laws to make the consumption of “terrorist” content a criminal offense, punishable with jail time.

The bill, which was approved by a 13-4 majority in the Knesset, is a temporary two-year measure that amends Article 24 of the counterterrorism law to ban the “systematic and continuous consumption of publications of a terrorist organization under circumstances that indicate identification with the terrorist organization”.

It identifies the Palestinian group Hamas and the ISIL (ISIS) group as the “terrorist” organisations to which the offence applies. It grants the justice minister the authority to add more organisations to the list, in agreement with the Ministry of Defence and with the approval of the Knesset’s Constitution, Law, and Justice Committee.

Make no mistake, this is the institution of thought crime. Read those two paragraphs one more time and realize just how much the criminalization of consumption of materials relies on the judgement and interpretation of those enforcing it. What is systematic in terms of this law? What is a publication? What constitutes a “terrorist organization,” not in the case of Hamas and ISIL, but in that ominous bit at the end of the second paragraph, where more organizations can — and will — be added to this list?

And most importantly, how in the world is the Israeli government going to determine “circumstances that indicate identification with the terrorist organization?”

“This law is one of the most intrusive and draconian legislative measures ever passed by the Israeli Knesset since it makes thoughts subject to criminal punishment,” said Adalah, the Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel. It warned that the amendment would criminalise “even passive social media use” amid a climate of surveillance and curtailment of free speech targeting Palestinian citizens of Israel.

“This legislation encroaches upon the sacred realm of an individual’s personal thoughts and beliefs and significantly amplifies state surveillance of social media use,” the statement added. Adalah is sending a petition to the Supreme Court to challenge the bill.

This has all the hallmarks of America’s overreaction to the 9/11 attacks. We still haven’t unwound, not even close, all of the harm that was done in the aftermath of those attacks, all in the name of safety. We are still at a net-negative value in terms of our civil liberties due to that overreaction. President Biden even reportedly warned Israel not to ignore our own mistakes, but they’re doing it anyway.

And circling back to the first quotation and the claim that this law is temporary over a 2 year period, that’s just not how this works. If this law is allowed to continue to exist, it will be extended, and then extended again. The United States is still operating under the Authorization for Use of Military Force of 2001 and used it in order to conduct strikes in Somalia under the Biden administration, two decades later.

The right to speech and thought is as bedrock a thing as exists for a democracy. If we accept that premise, then it is simply impossible to “protect a democracy” by limiting the rights of speech and thought. And that’s precisely what this new law in Israel does: it chips away at the democracy of the state in order to protect it.

That’s not how Israel wins this war, if that is in fact the goal.

Filed Under: hamas, israel, palestine, terrorism, terrorist content

Starbucks Joins The List Of Companies Using Trademark Law To Bully Its Own Union

from the not-how-that-works dept

The trend continues. One of the things we’ve noticed more frequently as of late has been larger companies attempting to use trademark law as some kind of cudgel against employee unions. This has taken several forms, from Wal-Mart attempting to shut down a union website for accurately calling itself a union of Wal-Mart employees, Medieval Times trying to shutter a website and merch for its performers’ union for the same reason, and Trader Joes attacking its employees’ union ostensibly for similar reasons, but really it just wanted to cause as much trouble and pain for the union as possible.

This case is admittedly different and, arguably, worse. In this case, Starbucks has threatened Starbucks Workers United with a trademark lawsuit principally, it appears, because the union started tweeting things the company doesn’t like about Gaza.

Starbucks is threatening to sue Starbucks Workers United, the union that represents employees of the coffee conglomerate, for trademark infringement following the union’s ‘Solidarity with Palestine!’ tweet.

Last week, a letter was sent to the president of the union demanding that the union ‘immediately cease and desist’ from using the company’s name and logo or the company will pursue legal action ‘including without limitation monetary damages.’

The tweet has since been deleted, but it read “Solidarity with Palestine!” and was sent in the midst of Israel’s response to a horrific terror attack launched by Hamas out of the Gaza Strip. Now, there is a lot to discuss about the history leading up to this conflict, actions that have been taken on both sides of the equation here, and all the rest. But this is not the forum for that discussion. Nor is the union’s opinion on matters of geo-politics in any way trespassing into the realm of trademark law. In other words, the union’s activities don’t suddenly become trademark infringement simply because it tweeted out something Starbucks doesn’t like, even if you don’t like it either.

It appears the lawyers for Starbucks don’t understand that.

The lawyers wrote that because the union had made ‘statements advocating for violence in the Middle East,’ they must change their name, website address, social media accounts, merchandise, and anything else the features their logo.

The union president Lynne Fox wrote in a response that the company had not managed to ‘identify any such statement.’ She added that Starbucks Workers United is affiliated with SEIU, the president of which issued a statement that read:

‘The violence in Israel and Palestine is unconscionable. @SEIU stands with all who are suffering, while strongly condemning anti-Semitism, Islamophobia & hate in all forms.’

This is a complete non-starter and I’ll be surprised if any lawsuit is actually filed. That being said, executives at the company are insisting a lawsuit will be filed in federal court over all of this. If it does, it will clearly be a lawsuit designed to stop the speech rights of the union through punitive action.

And all the same arguments as to why the union is not infringing simply by calling itself a union for laborers of the company, nor is the branding it chose for itself that has some similarity to the corporate branding, because nobody will be mislead or confused as to the affiliation of a big company and the union it desperately wishes didn’t exist.

Filed Under: bullying, free speech, gaza, hamas, israel, palestine, trademark, unions
Companies: starbucks, starbucks workers united

Sure, There’s Disinfo On ExTwitter, But The EU Should Not Be Demanding Censorship

from the eu-censors-take-over dept

Some of us have been warning about the dangers of the Digital Services Act (DSA) in the EU for quite some time, and pointed out that Elon Musk was effectively endorsing censorship in May of 2022 (after announcing his plans to purchase then-Twitter) by meeting with the EU’s Thierry Breton and saying that the DSA was “exactly aligned” with his thinking about his plans for Twitter content moderation. As we pointed out at the time, this was crazy, because the DSA is set up to position the EU government as ultimate censors.

Nearly a year ago, I got to moderate a panel at the EU’s brand new offices in San Francisco (set up for the new EU censors to be closer to the internet platforms), where I was told repeatedly by the top EU official in that office, Gerard de Graaf, that there was no way that the DSA would be used for censorship, and that it was only about “best practices,” (while then admitting that if bad content was still online, they’d have to crack down on companies). It was clear that the EU officials were doing a nonsense two-step in these discussions. They will insist up and down that the DSA isn’t about censorship, but then immediately point out that if you leave up content they don’t want, it will violate the DSA.

Indeed, as the DSA has now gone into effect, last month EU officials released a document that reveals the DSA is very much about censorship. The boring sounding “Application of the risk management framework to Russian disinformation campaigns” basically says that failing to delete Kremlin disinformation likely violates the DSA.

No matter what you think of Russian disinformation tactics, we should be very, very concerned when governments step in and tell companies how they must moderate, with threats of massive fines. That never ends well. And the EU is already making it clear that they view the DSA as a weapon to hold over the heads of websites.

On Tuesday, the very same Thierry Breton who Elon Musk insisted he was “aligned” with tweeted a letter addressed to Musk (notably not company “CEO” Linda Yaccarino) basically telling him that exTwitter needs to remove disinformation about the Hamas attacks in Israel.

Now, there’s no doubt that there have been tremendous amounts of disinformation about the attacks flooding across exTwitter (and if I can find the time to finish it, I have another article about it coming). But no matter what you think of that, it should never be the job of the government to step in and threaten websites over their moderation practices. That never leads to good results, and always (always, always) leads to abuse of power by the governments to silence dissent and marginalized voices.

So, this kind of language from Breton’s letter is dangerous nonsense:

Following the terrorist attacks carried out by Hamas against Israel, we have indications that your platform is being used to disseminate illegal content and disinformation in the EU.

If the content is illegal, then show which laws are being broken, and have law enforcement go after the perpetrators. If it’s disinformation, which is not illegal, then the government can respond to the disinformation and seek to debunk it. But this letter is very clearly threatening Musk, telling him that he has “very precise obligations regarding content moderation.”

And while Breton (like de Graaf) then tapdances around the issue by talking about “transparency” and “effective mitigation,” the throughline is clear: if you allow disinformation about topics that the EU government doesn’t want spoken about, it will accuse you of violating the DSA.

I’m all for websites figuring out the best way to deal with disinformation on their own platforms. That can include a variety of responses such as responding to and debunking the misinformation, making it less visible, or any number of other measures up to and including removing the content or banning accounts. But it should be up to the sites themselves, and not the government.

In response to Breton’s tweet, Musk did some tap dancing himself, saying:

Our policy is that everything is open source and transparent, an approach that I know the EU supports. Please list the violations you allude to on 𝕏, so that that the public can see them.

Breton responded:

You are well aware of your users’ — and authorities’— reports on fake content and glorification of violence. Up to you to demonstrate that you walk the talk. My team remains at your disposal to ensure DSA compliance, which the EU will continue to enforce rigorously.

Which is… nonsense. Again, this is basically the way the Great Firewall in China originally was set up. Officials would tell ISPs “don’t let anything bad through… or else” without ever defining what was bad and what wasn’t allowed. The end result was that ISPs in China went aggressively towards overblocking content to avoid potential liability.

That doesn’t mean Musk’s response is great either. Directly asking EU officials to publicly post what disinfo they find problematic directly to Musk himself is… not a reasonable process. The DSA actually has requirements for a process enabling governments to flag content as “trusted flaggers.” Under such a program, exTwitter should then be able to evaluate the content and determine how to deal with it, and then be transparent about what it’s doing (including if it decides the content is fine and should be left alone). But, having an EU official tag Elon in a tweet is… um… not that at all. It’s just all silly posturing by both sides.

Again, I think that Musk could have done many, many things to better deal with disinformation on exTwitter. But it’s not the government’s place to step in and threaten him over speech.

Filed Under: censorship, content moderation, disinformation, dsa, elon musk, free speech, hamas, israel, russia, thierry breton
Companies: twitter, x

Facebook Sued Again For 'Material Support' Of Terrorism, Because Hamas Uses Facebook

from the not-how-it-works dept

This is becoming quite the stupid trend: people who are true victims of terrorist attacks suing internet platforms because terror-associated groups are using those platforms generally. It began back in January, when a woman sued Twitter after her husband was apparently killed in an ISIS attack. The lawsuit made no connection between the use of Twitter and the attack. It’s just “husband died in ISIS attack” and “ISIS people use Twitter.” The judge in that case is not at all impressed and it seems likely to dismiss the case shortly. In the meantime, another similar case was filed against Twitter, Facebook and Google.

And now… we’ve got a third such case filed against Facebook and asking for a billion dollars. A billion dollars. The lawsuit was filed by the families of some people who were killed in a Hamas attack. And the entire complaint is basically “Hamas killed these guys, Hamas uses Facebook, give us a billion dollars.” It goes through a variety of stories, each involving Hamas or Hamas-affiliated attacks, without any actual connection to Facebook, other than “and they also used Facebook to celebrate.” Here’s just one example of a bunch:

Yes, the situation is horrifying and awful. No doubt about that. But _blaming Facebook for it is idiotic_… and also likely to go absolutely nowhere. Facebook is clearly protected by Section 230 of the CDA and it would be amazing if a court didn’t toss this lawsuit very quickly. And, yes, obviously it’s absolutely horrible if your family member is killed in a terrorist event. I’m sure I’d be distraught and angry and many other feelings that I can’t begin to imagine. But lashing out at various neutral social media platforms is just ridiculous. It stinks of being a Steve Dallas lawsuit in which lawyers decide to sue tangentially related companies because that’s where the money is.

Meanwhile, Hamas is already claiming that this lawsuit is proof that the US is fighting against “freedom of the press and expression.” Of course, that assumes that the lawsuit will actually go anywhere, which seems ridiculously unlikely. Terrorist attacks are a real problem. Suing Facebook or other social media platforms isn’t going to help one bit.

Filed Under: blame, hamas, material support, platforms, section 230, terrorism
Companies: facebook

Opportunistic Politicians Lean On The FBI And Twitter To Shut Down Terrorist Accounts

from the and-then-what?-linkedin? dept

I have no idea what it is with certain politicians that makes them believe they can somehow “curb” violence by cordoning off a section of the internet. They don't seem to realize that determined individuals will simply route around their half-assed roadblock without breaking a sweat. Even worse, they don't seem to realize that useful information on violent groups and individuals can often be gleaned from the very same lines of communication they're trying to cut.

In this case, it’s very much like grandstanding politicians trying to shut down “human traffickers” like Backpages and Craigslist, failing to understand that law enforcement can use the same services to track down offenders. Rather than look for the upside of having a live feed from the enemy front (or realize the ultimate futility of their efforts), these lawmakers have chosen to throw a bunch of effort (or at least, words) behind a bad idea.

Seven House Republicans asked the FBI in September to demand that Twitter take down the accounts of U.S.-designated terrorist groups, such as Hamas, Hezbollah and Somalia's al Shabaab. The letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller was spearheaded by Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas), who said Wednesday that the recent events vindicated the request.

“Allowing foreign terrorist organizations like Hamas to operate on Twitter is enabling the enemy,” Poe said in an e-mailed statement to The Hill. “Failure to block access arms them with the ability to freely spread their violent propaganda and mobilize in their War on Israel.

Now, I'm not going to claim to be smarter than these politicians (although you're certainly welcome to make that claim for me in the comment threads), but I'm curious as to how they arrived at the conclusion that blocking Twitter accounts would somehow result in less violence committed by terrorists. One could argue that breaking down a line of communication might result in some temporary disruption, but I've got to believe that Twitter isn't the only line of communication Hamas has.

Shutting down these accounts would do little more than a) make these politicians feel better about having done something, b) annoy (and possibly provoke) already irritable and violent groups, and c) move communication anti-terrorist entities rely on to a new channel possibly unavailable to them. The downside easily outweighs the upside, because the “upside” only benefits these seven lawmakers, giving them a feeling of power and self-righteousness, which will be cold comfort to those who might actually be using these feeds to glean intelligence and help defend themselves.

Then there's this amazing sentence, which must have been composed by Poe at a cost of one IQ point per letter:

The FBI and Twitter must recognize sooner rather than later that social media is a tool for the terrorists.

Any form of information dissemination can be considered a “tool” for terrorists. Imbuing Twitter with some sort of terrorist-defeating powers is ridiculous. Berating the FBI and Twitter for aiding and abetting terrorism through inaction is even more so. This is merely a continuation of Poe's anti-Twitter obsession, which began back in September when he first penned a letter to the FBI requesting the takedown of these “terrorist” accounts, citing (of all things), Twitter's decision to block a neo-Nazi account in Germany. (The account could still be read anywhere else in the world, or even in Germany with minimal effort.)

Poe is once again attempting to use Twitter's own statement against it, but the FBI just isn't giving this group of lawmakers the one thing they need to get their way:

“Twitter maintains that it will take down any account requested by the FBI,” seven Republican members of Congress wrote to the FBI last month. “As of this writing, the FBI has not made a single request to Twitter to take an account down.”

And (once again), Poe and his co-signers are using recent events to further their own agenda.

“Not one account has been shut down, unlike on YouTube and Facebook,” Poe told the Free Beacon.

“Twitter is not going to take it upon themselves to shut them down,” which is why the FBI needs to take action, Poe said.

The FBI isn't buying it, however.

FBI Special Agent Jason Pack told the Free Beacon, “The FBI received the Congressman’s letter and will respond to it appropriately.”

One assumes Pack “responded” by tossing the angry letter into the nearest trash can, possibly running it through the shredder first. The latest missive means someone at the FBI will need to empty the trash can, but given the results of Poe's previous demands, I highly doubt Twitter will be shuttering any accounts.

Poe has also expressed his disappointment in the Obama administration for not pushing for more Twitter shutdowns.

Poe speculated that one reason the Obama administration has not pursued the issue is because terrorists’ Twitter pages are a rich vein for the intelligence community to mine.

Poe, however, said that this is not a good enough reason to give these radical actors free rein on the Internet.

“If that’s [the administration’s] only way of knowing” what terrorists are up to, “we’ve got some serious problems with our intelligence service,” Poe said.

There's Poe's problem. He views Twitter as the only thing. In his mind, it's the only source of communication for terrorists and it's the only source of intel for the intelligence community. Poe has seized on Twitter as the only problem and won't be dissuaded easily, no matter how often the FBI refuses to indulge his “social media = terror” hobby horse.

The Free Beacon's Republican slant inadvertently suggests that Poe may just be kicking around Twitter because its “best friends” with Obama.

Twitter’s Washington D.C. lobbying team is comprised of several Obama administration confidants and former Democratic Hill staffers. Adam Sharp, the site’s top government liaison, formerly served as deputy chief of staff for Sen. Mary Landrieu (D., La.). Its global public policy official, Colin Crowell, was a senior aide to Rep. Ed Markey (D., Mass.), while Twitter’s head of international strategy, Katie Jacobs Stanton, once worked with the Obama administration on new media strategies.

Since 2011, several individuals who list their employer as Twitter have donated primarily to Democrats, including the Obama campaign and Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren.

So… maybe it's not really about terrorism. Maybe it's just good, old fashioned partisanship sporting War on Terror clothing. No matter how you slice it, though, there's only one thing it truly is: stupid.

Filed Under: al shabaab, congress, fbi, free speech, hamas, hezbollah, ted poe, terrorism
Companies: twitter