Twitter has become flooded with Israel-related hashtags as followers of opposition and government parties are blaming each other’s leadership of befriending with Israel.
The supporters of the ruling party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf has made a top-trend with a hashtag campaign #MaryamExposedNawaz on Twitter. There is a screen-recording of a video retweeted by the official account of PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz in which an analyst named Noor Dahri claimed that Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had sent two delegations to Israel for normalising relations. The Tweet has ‘assumingly’ been deleted now.
The online backlash has intensified since there are reports that Pakistani authorities have also shown interest in developing diplomatic relations with Israel as several Arab countries have formally welcomed the development.
Israeli media have also reported that a PM advisor had secretly visited Tel Aviv in November for the purpose of normalising ties between the two countries. However, the report has been dismissed by the government officials.
Sympathisers of the opposition parties have responded with اسرائیلکونغدارگیاتھا# (which traitor went to Israel?) alleging that it is actually Khan’s administration that is going to recognise Isreal. The other two top trending hashtags are اسرائیلکایار_نوازشریف# and #IsraeliAgentImranKhan
Pakistani Twitteratis are famous for such types of trends especially when it comes to challenging political opponents.