Propaganda in the Middle East

Researched by Abigail Armour

As cyber-based usage of propaganda has globally expanded in the past few decades, many nations within the Middle East have made extensive investments in the practice of online influence. A report by the Global Disinformation Order found that, of the twelve nations with high cyber-troop capacity–or a large number of political or governmental actors who specialize in the online manipulation of public opinion–six were based in the Middle East, specifically Egypt, Iran, Israel, Saudi Arabia, The United Arab Emirates, and Syria (18). These nations’ reliance on online propaganda as a response to conflicts from within and outside the region is in direct relation to their substantial investments in cyberwarfare. 

Usage of the digital domain, or cyberspace, to engage in international conflicts often has the propagandic purpose of influencing public perception towards an issue. The Intelligence, an Economist Podcast, describes how the ongoing cyberwar between Iran and Israel, specifically in the wake of the October 7th attacks, consists of attacks on software that are more so meant to manipulate civilians than cause genuine harm: “Iran hasn’t succeeded in seriously penetrating or disrupting critical infrastructure like power or water facilities…this is a kind of information warfare. A lot of what Iranian hackers are trying to do is not so much turn the lights out or poisoning water supplies, which they have tried in the past. A lot of this is psychological. It’s intimidating Israelis” (Byte By Byte: Iran And Israel's Escalating Cyberwar, 00:02:39). In instances where important infrastructure within either nation is hacked, the attack is more often meant to develop the attacker’s global image than to cause actual harm. The Intelligence highlights how, when Israeli hackers successfully shut down about seventy percent of Iran’s petrol stations in response to the October 7 attacks, they did so in an attempt to depict Israel as a responsible nation that would defend itself in a way that minimized civilian casualties (Byte By Byte: Iran And Israel's Escalating Cyberwar, 00:05:42).  It is not unlikely that this effort to influence their global image was in relation to major criticisms they had received during their siege of Gaza, specifically that they had caused mass casualties with little justification or clear plan for a resolution of the conflict.

Image by the Social Policy Association

Alongside the utilization of cyberattacks, many nations also use social media to promote propagandic messaging. Iran, Egypt, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia have all developed particularly active information campaigns, most of which are through social media because such operations are cheap, allow a degree of deniability, and enable regimes to access large audiences while tailoring their message to specific populations (Byman, 450). Propaganda campaigns can be used for several purposes, but two remain the most popular: to control a nation’s domestic population or to influence a foreign one. Iran, currently the sixth largest cyber superpower in the world (Breene, as cited by Martins, 33), uses social media for the purpose of the former, the reasoning for which has a basis in the Iranian revolution of 1979. Ralph Peter Martins explains: “The Iranian revolution of 1979 wasn’t simply about the transfer of political power from one form of government to another. It was the replacement of a dynasty with a unique mixture of a theocracy and a democratically elected republic. It also represented a fundamental shift in the basic values, authority, and responsibility of the government of Iran” (33). The post-revolution Iranian government uses social media-based propaganda to fulfill its newfound responsibilities, specifically to market a specific set of ideas and values deemed acceptable for Iranians to view, while tightly restricting information that may not align with their rendering of Islamic law. Martins reinforces this point when he explains that “the Iranian government is developing cyber capabilities specifically to fight a cultural war. This has come in the form of a national network designed to replace the Internet and restrict the flow of information in and out of Iran” (38). Influence on foreign populations, the second main purpose for the use of social media to spread propaganda, often manifests itself in the mass spread of threats or disinformation. From 2018 to 2020, for instance, Egypt ran an expansive operation meant to manipulate information online to promote anti-Qatar sentiment in countries around the Persian Gulf and the Horn of Africa (Byman, 451). While many of these offensive campaigns often remain within the realm of the Middle East–acting as a pragmatic method of warfare, it is important to note that social media manipulation, or any form of cyberwarfare perpetrated by a government or organization, is by no means limited to the region, but is also present in nations like China, Russia, The United States, and The United Kingdom.

There have been several historical instances where propaganda conflicts have shaped the Middle East’s current condition and societal structures. In the years following the Arab Spring protests of 2010 and early 2011, widespread revolts against well-established dictators left several regimes shaken and led to the mass manipulation of information. Emile Nakleh, in a piece written during the protests, explains: “Violent regimes like Syria and human rights violators like Saudi Arabia and Bahrain… have courted and manipulated foreign media in an attempt to spread the implausible argument that their authoritarianism offers a guarantee of regional stability” (356). Many nations within the Middle East utilize propaganda against foreign and domestic populations due to their authoritarian system of government, which must consistently justify its existence to the democratic Western world as well as its own people. The more unstable Middle Eastern regimes become, or fear they will become, the greater amount of propagandic messaging will be used.

Resources/References Used

Bradshaw, Samatha and Philip N. Howard. “2019 Global Inventory of Organised Social Media Manipulation.” Global Disinformation Order. https://demtech.oii.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/12/2019/09/CyberTroop-Report19.pdf 

Byman, Daniel. "The Social Media War in the Middle East." The Middle East Journal, vol. 75, no. 3, 2021, pp. 449-468. ProQuest, http://proxy154.nclive.org/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/social-media-war-middle-east/docview/2599945624/se-2, doi:https://doi.org/10.3751/75.3.2  

"Byte By Byte: Iran And Israel's Escalating Cyberwar." , directed by Anonymous , The Economist Intelligence Unit N.A., Incorporated, 2024. ProQuest, http://proxy154.nclive.org/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/audio-video-works/byte-iran-israels-escalating-cyberwar/docview/3094684475/se-2.

"Global Voices: Information Warfare - COVID-19's Other Battleground in the Middle East." Targeted News Service, 11 June, 2020. ProQuest, http://proxy154.nclive.org/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/wire-feeds/global-voices-information-warfare-covid-19s-other/docview/2411496382/se-2.

Martins, Ralph. "Punching Above Their Digital Weight: Why Iran is Developing Cyberwarfare Capabilities Far Beyond Expectations." International Journal of Cyber Warfare and Terrorism, vol. 8, no. 2, 2018, pp. 32-46. ProQuest, http://proxy154.nclive.org/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/punching-above-their-digital-weight-why-iran-is/docview/2931888445/se-2, doi:https://doi.org/10.4018/IJCWT.2018040103.

Nakhleh, Emile. “Propaganda and Power in the Middle East.” Current History, vol. 112, no. 758, 2013, pp. 356–63. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/45319260.