News- Middle East: The Israeli cabinet is paying social media influencers up to $7,000 per post as part of a coordinated online propaganda campaign aimed at shaping public opinion.

In a meeting on mobilizing pro-Israel media support, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu alluded to a cohort of Israel’s influencers, claiming, “we have to fight back. How do we fight back? Our influencers. I think you should also talk to them if you have a chance, to that community, they are very important.”

Being paid by the Israeli regime to post on social media is also very lucrative. According to online magazine Responsible Statecraft, previously unreported recent documents show that these influencers are likely being paid around $7,000 per post on social media such as TikTok and Instagram on behalf of the regime.

Bridge Partners, an American firm working for the Israeli foreign ministry, sent a series of invoices for its “Influencer Campaign” to Havas Media Group Germany, an international media group working for Israel.

The invoices detailed a sum of $900,000, starting in June and slated to end in November, for a cohort of 14-18 influencers to create content.

The document, which was filed under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, notes that the funding is for both “payments for influencers and production,” but does not provide a breakdown between the two.

When taking into account the administrative production costs through September 16, it leaves an estimated sum of $552,946 for the influencers between June and September of this year.

The firm estimated that the cohort was expected to produce 75-90 posts in that time. Doing the math, that would be $6,143 per post on the low end. On the high end, each influencer could be making as much as $7,372 per post.

Bridge Partners describes its work as assisting with “promoting cultural interchange between the United States and Israel.”

The firm has also enlisted the help of a former major in Israel’s ministry of military affairs spokesperson unit, Nadav Shtrauchler.

The Bridge Partners campaign is titled “Esther Project.” It is unclear if the campaign bears any association with “Project Esther,” the Heritage Foundation’s campaign to fight anti-Semitism by branding critics of Israel as part of a so-called terrorist support network.

Meanwhile, Google is executing a $45-million advertising contract with Netanyahu’s office to spread pro-Israel propaganda denying famine in Gaza.

The campaign, launched in June, is run through Google’s YouTube and its Display & Video 360 service.

Source: Press TV