“If we allow hoaxes and other forms of digital crimes, such as online gambling and pornography, to spread unchecked, people will become unaccustomed to seeking information from credible media sources,” stated the Minister of Communication and Digital (Komdigi), Meutya Hafid, while encouraging stronger collaboration in safeguarding Indonesia’s digital sphere (Kementerian Komunikasi dan Digital, 2025). Her statement is understandable, as hoaxes are among the most significant digital challenges that have the potential to erode national values and exacerbate social disintegration (Afiah, 2025).

Hoaxes pose not only a threat to Indonesia’s cyberspace but also a global challenge to the international community. The World Economic Forum (2025), in its latest report, predicts that misinformation and disinformation, forms of hoaxes, will remain among the most significant global risks over the next two years. Furthermore, in the longer term, up to the next decade, these issues are projected to become the most critical risks after environmental and energy concerns (World Economic Forum, 2025). McGonagle (2017) explains that false information has a long history, consistently emerging across different human civilizations. In Indonesia, hoaxes are identified as the most frequently encountered type of negative content among netizens (Wendratama et al., 2023).

The significant influence exerted by hoax content in its various forms, such as fake news, false information, and misinformation/disinformation, has drawn considerable attention from various stakeholders seeking to explore the issues it raises more deeply. Technological developments, while bringing immense benefits to humanity, have also contributed to the emergence of new problems previously unseen. Social media algorithms often play a role in amplifying low quality content, allowing it to spread easily across multiple platforms (Vosoughi et al., 2018). Frequently, the content that circulates most widely relates to issues that resonate deeply with society, such as politics, religion, disasters, humanitarian concerns, and the economy (Sonni, 2025; Safitri et al., 2021; Yudarwati et al., 2022).

A humanitarian issue that has recently gained significant public attention is the Palestine–Israel conflict, which has become a widely discussed topic among Indonesian netizens. Historically, Indonesia has consistently supported Palestine’s independence and strongly condemned Israel’s brutal actions against civilians. The most recent event that further escalated the tension between the two countries was triggered by an armed attack launched by the Palestinian resistance group Hamas from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory on October 7, 2023. This attack was condemned by many countries as an act of terrorism; however, numerous Muslim majority nations, including Indonesia, viewed Israel’s occupation as the root cause of the incident (Setiawan & Nainggolan, 2024). Since then, Israel’s military assaults on the Gaza Strip have continued, justified as acts of retaliation against Hamas (Aidini & Hidayatullah, 2025), even though evidence indicates that a large number of casualties have been civilians. Both mainstream and independent media have responded to this conflict differently, showing tendencies toward either pro-Palestinian or pro-Israeli perspectives. Based on this historical stance, it is understandable that content related to Palestine receives substantial attention from Indonesian society.

Digital content related to the Palestine–Israel conflict has attracted considerable attention from Indonesian audiences, particularly concerning humanitarian issues such as genocide (Faaizati & Aprilia, 2025). This response is understandable, as the relationship between Indonesia and Palestine is rooted in a unique historical context. Palestine was among the first countries to recognize Indonesia’s independence and shares a common experience of colonialism (Suara Muhammadiyah, 2021). However, such historical ties raise concerns that they may be exploited to create hoax content related to the Palestine–Israel conflict, especially content that appears to support Palestine, given its potential to generate a high number of engagements.

Several studies have examined social media content related to the Palestine–Israel conflict. Elhosary (2023) investigated the motivations of social media users in verifying news about the conflict, revealing that beliefs regarding who is “right” or “wrong” influence their evaluation of such content. Taufiq et al. (2025) explored the factors shaping narrative formation in both mainstream and social media regarding the Palestine–Israel conflict. Their findings indicate that mainstream media tend to exhibit bias and framing, whereas social media facilitate more diverse narratives. Similarly, Shomron and Schejter (2019) analyzed media representations of the Palestine–Israel conflict across broadcast media and their associated social networking sites, concluding that social media plays a more significant role in representing the conflict than the broadcast outlets themselves.

Social media enables the public to act as both producers and consumers of content, allowing for more active participation than traditional media. Through social media, scholars can analyze the characteristics of various types of content, such as cultural content (Putri & Putri, 2023) and political content (Alfredo & Sopacua, 2024). With the ease of participation, the public has become more active and selective in choosing information from multiple sources. Smartphones, along with the wide range of applications they host, have made it easier for people to access social media and integrate it into their daily lives. Information dissemination has thus become faster, especially during major events such as those occurring in Gaza, evoking broad empathy from the international community (Nasereddin, 2023).

Social media plays two contrasting roles. It creates a public space that connects numerous users, yet at the same time it also poses digital threats such as fraud and information bias (Huda et al., 2022). In addition, social media facilitates public engagement in activism and opinion exchange. Social media platforms enable the decentralization of information and participation, allowing pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli viewpoints to spread more easily compared to traditional media (Nasereddin, 2023).

Previous studies have shown that pro-Palestinian groups have effectively used social media for advocacy and to report on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza (Nasereddin, 2023). They visualize the destruction in the region and attract significant global sympathy. In contrast, pro-Israel groups use social media to display attacks from Gaza, aiming to legitimize Israel’s long-standing position as a form of self-defense and national security (Yarchi & Ayalon, 2023). Depictions of devastation, bombings, missiles, civilian deaths, and protests have heightened global attention toward the conflict (Alsaba, 2023). The influence of user-generated content (UGC) has created significant dynamics, although the quality of such content is often questioned and has the potential to become deceptive material.

Syah et al. (2025) found that social media is the main tool for spreading hoaxes related to Indonesia’s general elections. Hoaxes influence the public opinion of political contestants because of the lack of strict regulations governing social media. In addition, social media algorithms play a significant role in amplifying content with high engagement potential among netizens, further increasing the circulation of hoaxes (Fatih et al., 2024).

These studies demonstrate that the conflict between the two nations encompasses a wide range of perspectives that can be explored by researchers, particularly in relation to public communication within digital media. However, research specifically addressing hoaxes about the Palestine–Israel conflict on social media remains limited. Moreover, several aspects identified in previous studies have yet to be fully addressed, providing further grounds for investigation in this area.

First, it is essential to identify the platforms on which such content is most frequently disseminated. Examining which social media platforms serve as the main channels for distribution is crucial, as, directly or indirectly, these platforms benefit from the high engagement generated by hoax-related content. Ideally, social media companies should be responsible for limiting the circulation of harmful or misleading information. Second, it is important to determine the main themes of hoax content related to the Palestine–Israel conflict in Indonesia’s digital media sphere. This mapping is necessary to understand which topics are most frequently produced, shared, and perceived as engaging by netizens. Third, this study analyzes how hoax content constructs a false reality, specifically what forms of manipulation are employed in creating such deceptive narratives. These research gaps will be addressed in the present study.

The construction of hoax content based on the Information Manipulation Theory (IMT) remains underexplored, particularly in the context of the Palestine–Israel conflict. This theory, introduced by McCornack (1992), explains that a message is considered deceptive when it violates four principles of cooperative communication. First, quantity violations, which occur when a message is incomplete, leading to potentially distorted or partial information. Second, quality violations, in which the message contains false information that is presented as truth. Third, manner violations, referring to how the message is delivered. Often characterized by ambiguity, lack of clarity, or non-transparency. Fourth, relevance violations, when the message is irrelevant to the conversational context (McCornack, 1992).

Therefore, this study aims to address the three research problems mentioned above and conduct an analysis based on the IMT. The primary data source is derived from news reports published by Komdigi, which routinely publishes verified information on hoax content through its official website www.komdigi.go.id. As the government’s official fact-checker, Komdigi regularly combats negative content, receives public reports, and disseminates verified findings of hoax information.

This study seeks to map the platforms most frequently used, dominant themes, and construction of hoax content concerning the Palestine–Israel conflict in Indonesian social media. The findings are expected to serve as a reference for policymakers and social media practitioners to identify the characteristics, distribution patterns, and manipulative constructions of hoax content, thereby enabling the development of more effective strategies to mitigate the spread and influence of hoaxes in Indonesia.

This study employs content analysis and semiotic analysis methods. The data were obtained from verified hoax information reports published on the official website of the Ministry of Communication and Digital (www.komdigi.go.id) concerning the Palestine–Israel conflict. The collection of hoax data is limited to the period from October 2023 to September 2025, as the armed attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, 2023, marked a critical escalation in the conflict between the two countries. The categorization consists of two dimensions: social media platform and thematic content (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. Komdigi Official Website

Source: https://www.komdigi.go.id/berita/berita-hoaks

Table 1. Categories of Platforms Used

Source: Author’s analysis (2025) 

Table 2. Categories of Hoax Content Themes

Source: Author’s analysis (2025) 

The unit of analysis used in this study was the thematic unit. This study employed two coders to test reliability. Inter-coder reliability (R) testing was conducted using Holsti’s formula, as follows:
R=2M/((N_1+N_2))
Where M represents the number of coding decisions agreed upon by both coders, N1 is the total number of coding decisions made by coder 1, and N2 is the total number of coding decisions made by coder 2. The minimum acceptable reliability threshold was set at 0.7 (70%), with a sample of ten hoax contents. Based on the calculation results, the inter-rater reliability value was 0.8 (80%), which exceeded the threshold. Therefore, the coding process could be continued using Table 1 and Table 2 coding categories. The categorization results were analyzed using descriptive statistics to map the characteristics of hoax content related to the Palestine–Israel conflict on Indonesian social media.

A total of 52 hoax reports were identified on the official website www.komdigi.go.id from October 2023 to September 2025. The platforms used for the dissemination of hoax content are as follows (see Table 3).

Table 3. Platforms Used

Source: Study results (2025)

Facebook was the most frequently used social media platform for the dissemination of hoax content. It is important to note that some content appeared across multiple platforms. Therefore, the total count reflects all recorded occurrences.

According to the coding results, the hoax content was categorized into the following themes:

Table 4. Hoax Content Themes

Source: Study results (2025)

As shown in Table 4, the military theme appears most frequently, whereas the pro-Israel theme does not appear at all.

This study selected five hoax contents for semiotic analysis.  Since several original sources of hoax content on social media have been deleted or blocked, the analysis was conducted only on content that was still accessible. For more details, see Table 5, Table 6, Table 7, Table 8, and Table 9.

The study findings indicate that Facebook is the platform with the highest prevalence of hoax content, followed by TikTok and Instagram. Although both Facebook and Instagram operate under Meta’s ownership, their characteristics differ significantly. Facebook tends to be a more “open” platform, where various types of content, both positive and negative, circulate widely. As noted by Affan (2024), numerous comments expressing support for LGBTQ communities can be found on Facebook.

Facebook provides a wide range of features, making it suitable for long-form text accompanied by images or videos. Although Instagram also allows textual elements (captions), it is more powerful as an audiovisual platform. Historically, Facebook was one of the earliest social media platforms to emerge in Indonesia, making it more familiar and widely adopted across generations. In contrast, Instagram is predominantly used by younger audiences. Although the number of Facebook users has declined, its user base in Indonesia remains relatively large. Its open nature, integration of text and visuals, familiarity, and cross-generational accessibility have contributed to the wider spread of hoax content on Facebook compared to Instagram.

TikTok has only gained widespread popularity in Indonesia in recent years. Hoax content circulating on this platform generally takes an audiovisual form, which is characteristic of TikTok. Since audiences or netizens tend to prefer “instant” content that requires minimal cognitive effort, what McLuhan (1994) refers to as a hot media, it is unsurprising that hoax content also proliferates on TikTok. Wider spread of hoax content on Facebook may be attributed to its more diverse user demographics, compared to TikTok, which is more commonly associated with younger audiences, hence the colloquial expression “TikTok standards.” However, the reasons why hoaxes are more prevalent on Facebook than on TikTok warrant further investigation. Twitter/X and WhatsApp are platforms where hoax content is also prevalent. X is widely known for hosting a significant amount of negative content, including pornography. The platform’s owner, Elon Musk, has explicitly permitted such content under specific regulations (Rakhmayanti, 2024). However, the number of X users is considerably lower than that of Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok (Haryanto, 2025). WhatsApp primarily functions as an instant messaging application among users. The dissemination of hoax content on WhatsApp relies on the consent and actions of individual users. Moreover, WhatsApp is relatively more private than other social media platforms. When a user receives a hoax message on WhatsApp, only that user can view it. If a user chooses not to forward or share it, the spread of the content stops. In contrast, on other social media platforms, as long as user accounts or groups are set to public, anyone can freely access and redistribute hoax content.

As shown in Table 2, the military theme appears most frequently in hoax content. Military-related content generally portrays the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI) as “strong” and “heroic,” although such representations tend to be exaggerated. This may be due to the fact that Indonesian society tends to hold greater admiration and trust toward the TNI compared to other institutions such as the National Police (Polri) (Antara News, 2022). In addition, Indonesia’s elite military units, such as Kopassus, are well known for their strength and discipline. This existing public perception is often exploited by hoax creators to incorporate military themes into misleading content.

Humanitarian issues rank second among the most frequently appearing themes in hoax content. Topics such as genocide, starvation, and refugees are widely covered by both mainstream and alternative media. Indeed, these issues are genuinely occurring in Palestine, particularly in Gaza, and have drawn significant empathy from various groups. A large number of User Generated Content (UGC) pieces have also emerged, expressing solidarity and compassion, in some cases even surpassing mainstream media coverage. This emotional appeal is often exploited to gain higher engagement by incorporating humanitarian themes into hoax content.

Religious and political themes appear in equal proportions within hoax content. One of the most widely circulated issues concerns the boycott of products affiliated with Israel. Calls for boycotts have been made by several religious leaders, each invoking various theological justifications. Consequently, numerous hoax contents have emerged featuring religious figures or institutions, such as the Majelis Ulama Indonesia (MUI), in association with this issue. This phenomenon may also be linked to the long-standing perception of enduring hostility between Islam and Judaism, as reflected in religious texts. Given that the majority of Indonesia’s population is Muslim, it is understandable that the plight of Palestinians, perceived as fellow Muslims, receives particular attention and sympathy from netizens. Meanwhile, political themed hoaxes generally feature prominent political figures, particularly presidents or globally recognized leaders such as Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump, and Xi Jinping. The Indonesian figure most frequently depicted is President Prabowo Subianto. By including such influential figures, content creators appear to seek legitimacy and to frame their narratives as important or authoritative information. Prabowo, often portrayed as Indonesia’s foremost leader and admired for his firmness and charisma, has become a symbolic focal point through which hoax producers exploit public admiration and national pride.

In Content 1, based on IMT, the identified violations pertain to quality and manner. The content depicts the TNI engaging in combat against the Israeli military, an event that has never occurred. To date, there has been no verified information indicating any physical contact between the two forces. From the perspective of manner, the content is excessively dramatized, portraying the TNI as extraordinarily powerful and fully equipped with advanced weaponry. Furthermore, the content creator appears to exploit the public’s admiration for the TNI by presenting exaggerated visuals designed to reinforce this sense of pride and heroism.

Content 2 also depicts the TNI engaging in warfare with the Israeli military, similar to Content 1. The visual elements include elite military units, emphasizing their strength and valor. Accordingly, the violations identified in this content involve quality and manner. Content 3 presents a narrative about an Indonesian humanitarian ship that allegedly failed to reach Palestine, with the Minister of Defense at the time, Prabowo, being portrayed as responsible for the incident. Violations in this content involve quality, quantity, and relevance. There is no verified report of an Indonesian humanitarian ship failing to reach Palestine, as the content claims. Moreover, the visuals shown are incomplete, and the video clip featuring volunteer Husein Gaza is presented out of context, thereby misleading the audience regarding the actual situation.

Content 4 demonstrates a violation of quality. The claim that Palestinian refugees were flown to Indonesia aboard an Iran Air aircraft is entirely unfounded. Furthermore, a closer examination reveals that the video is not an authentic recording but rather an artificially generated one, possibly a deepfake created using AI technology. Content 5 portrays Prabowo as declaring that he would wage war against Israel, although he never made such a statement. The video is selectively edited, presenting only a short excerpt that seems intended to depict Indonesia as an influential nation whose military and leadership command global respect. Therefore, this content involves violations of quality, manner, and quantity.

Overall, the analysis of these hoax contents reveals multiple instances of IMT violations, although not all types of violations occur simultaneously within a single piece of content. The application of IMT as an analytical framework has proven useful in deconstructing hoax materials. The construction of such content typically involves issues of quality, incomplete information, inappropriate presentation, and contextual distortion. Thus, this theory provides a valuable framework for analyzing other types of hoax content, whether related to the Israel–Palestine conflict or other thematic areas.

The study findings indicate that Facebook is the social media platform with the highest prevalence of hoax content related to the Palestine–Israel conflict, followed by TikTok, Instagram, X, WhatsApp, and YouTube. Among the various themes identified, the military theme dominated, followed by humanitarian, political, religious, and other themes. The construction of hoax content surrounding the Palestine–Israel conflict aligns with the typology of violations outlined in Information Manipulation Theory (IMT), encompassing quality, quantity, manner, and relevance. These findings contribute to a deeper understanding of how digital hoaxes operate in conflict-related contexts and provide valuable insights for policymakers, educators, and digital media practitioners in developing more effective hoax mitigation strategies. Future studies are recommended to explore audience reception, cross-platform dynamics, and the role of algorithmic amplification in shaping the spread of misinformation and disinformation, particularly within politically and emotionally charged issues such as the Palestine–Israel conflict.