Volodymyr Zelensky’s five-year term ends on May 20th The Economist
Day: June 2, 2024
Dozens of images related to the war in the Gaza Strip that appear to have been made using artificial intelligence have spread across Instagram in recent days following the viral success of a post calling for “All Eyes on Rafah,” which has now been shared more than 47 million times.
The images, a mix of pro-Irsael and pro-Palestinian posts, include imitations of the original Rafah post as well as more graphic depictions, including a bloodied Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and an Israeli child confronted by a Hamas fighter. One seemingly AI-generated image shows a large crowd gathered in a town square with giant block letters spelling out “bring them home now,” a reference to the 125 Israeli hostages who remain in captivity in Gaza. It’s been shared over 134,000 times on Instagram.
A seemingly AI-generated pro-Israel image responding to the viral
The sudden and rapid spread of the images comes as international attention has been refocused on Israel’s push into Rafah following an Israeli airstrike that local officials said killed at least 45 civilians Sunday.
The proliferation of the images adds to what has been an ongoing battle for attention on social media between voices supporting Israel and its campaign in Gaza and those supporting Palestinians. And while AI images have increasingly become common across the internet, their use on Instagram — a platform that has at times eschewed news while remaining a crucial outlet for Palestinian journalists — underscores how the technology is already beginning to influence political speech online.
Shortly after the “All Eyes on Rafah” image began to go viral, pro-Israel images began to circulate. The images bear many of the hallmarks of AI-created content, including repeated or blurred visual elements. Some accounts and people who have posted the images have been explicit about their use of AI to create them.
The images have posed a challenge for Meta, particularly around how to enforce its policies against AI-generated content and depictions of violence.
On Wednesday, several Israeli media outlets reported that a pro-Israel Instagram template responding to the “Rafah” image was removed from Instagram by the platform. The AI-generated image showed a Hamas gunman standing over a baby in a puddle of blood and a burning Israeli flag with text reading, “Where were your eyes on October 7?”
An AI-generated image posted to Instagram imitating the style of the original
Israel’s official Instagram account published several responses about the removal of the image, complaining in one now-deleted post, “Instagram decided to take down the template, intentionally silencing people from sharing what happened on October 7th.”
The Times of Israel has reported that the original post had been reinstated. Meta said that the image did not violate its terms of use and was mistakenly removed.
Many of the images have been uploaded to Instagram’s “template” feature that lets users quickly share posts to their own accounts.
Some viral templates show graphic images that appear to be made by AI, including one that falsely depicts Netanyahu in different contexts, including with blood on his hands and body. One image, which was shared 5 million times on Instagram, depicted Netanyahu in a waist-high pool of blood, with accompanying text saying “terrorist baby killer!”
Meta has said that it hopes to not amplify political content heading into the 2024 presidential election, but the spread of such images suggests that the platform may be struggling to accomplish that goal in the age of AI.
Despite a new initiative from Meta to more strictly label AI-generated content on its platforms, none of the templates seen by NBC News contained clarifications that the images were made with AI.
Following the virality of the original “Rafah” image, many pro-Palestinian activists criticized the use of AI in sharing their message, arguing that it was sanitizing the real horrors of the war.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
Hundreds attend funeral of Iryna Tsybukh, who was killed in action last week in Kharkiv. What we know on day 831
Almost 1,000 mourners gathered in central Kyiv on Sunday for the funeral of a high-profile journalist and volunteer combat medic who was killed in action last week. Iryna Tsybukh, known as Cheka, was a 25-year-old paramedic who was on rotation in Kharkiv. Last year while serving on the front lines in the eastern Donetsk region, she wrote a farewell letter to be published in the case of her death. “I am not sorry to die, because I am finally living the life I would like,” it read in part.
Donald Trump risks being a “loser president” if he wins November’s election and imposes a bad peace deal on Ukraine, Zelenskiy has said, saying it would mean the end of the US as a global “player”. In an interview with the Guardian in Kyiv, Zelenskiy said he had “no strategy yet” for what to do if Trump returned to the White House, and that the former British prime minister Boris Johnson had approached him on his behalf.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged world leaders to come to a peace conference in Switzerland this month, and accused China of discouraging attendance at the meeting. “We are disappointed that some world leaders have not yet confirmed their participation in the peace summit,” Zelenskiy told delegates on the last day of the Shangri-La Dialogue forum in Singapore during an unscheduled appearance. US President Joe Biden has as yet given no indication he will attend the summit. Zelenskiy added: “Regrettably, Russia, using Chinese influence on the region, using Chinese diplomats also, does everything to disrupt the peace summit. It is unfortunate that such a big, independent, powerful country as China is an instrument in the hands of Putin.”
Zelenskiy meanwhile said he had a “very good” meeting with US defence secretary Lloyd Austin in Singapore. The meeting came after Washington decided to partially lift restrictions on using US-provided weapons to strike inside Russia, which Zelensky has hailed as a “step forward”. Austin made no comment.
After the Singapore conference, Zelenskiy was set to visit Manila and was scheduled to arrive late on Sunday, Rappler news site reported, quoting diplomatic sources. There was no immediate confirmation from the Philippine president’s office or the Philippine foreign ministry.
Ukraine imposed emergency power shutdowns in most of the country on Sunday, a day after Russia unleashed large-scale attacks on energy infrastructure. The shutdowns were in place in all but three regions of Ukraine following Saturday’s drone and missile attack on energy targets that injured at least 19 people. Ukraine’s state-owned power grid operator Ukrenergo said the shutdowns affected both industrial and household consumers.
Russian forces had taken over the village of Umanske in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, the Russian defence ministry said on Sunday. The claim could not be independently verified.
A local official in Belgorod died when some ammunition detonated, while six people were injured in Ukrainian shelling of the southern Russian region, Belgorod’s governor said on Sunday. Igor Nechiporenko, deputy head of Korochansky district administration, was killed as a result of ammunition detonating, said Belgorod governor Vyacheslav Gladkov on Telegram.
Former world chess champion Garry Kasparov, who fled Russia a decade ago for fear of persecution, may face a criminal case in Moscow for violating the Kremlin’s “foreign agent” law, Tass news agency reported on Sunday. Russian law enforcement officials, the state news agency reported, said there is “every reason” to charge Kasparov, without providing further details. Russia added Kasparov to the list of individuals acting as foreign agents, which includes dozens of critics of Vladimir Putin, soon after the Russian president launched his full-scale invasion on Ukraine in 2022.
