At a glance
- Google Maps does not include the "Palestine" tab. In 2016, Zach Martin launched a joint petition campaign demanding that Google Maps "recognize Palestine," and in the same year, the Palestinian Journalists Forum denounced Google Maps for "falsifying history."
- Google issued a statement in 2016 saying it had never used the "Palestinian" tag on Google Maps and had always used the terms "West Bank" and "Gaza" to refer to it.
Event background
Recently, a screenshot circulated in the WeChat group said, "It was found that Palestine has been erased on Google Maps and replaced by the West Bank and Gaza Strip." ”
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Search for "Palestine" on Google Maps and Google Earth to automatically locate the area shown.
The area covers the Gaza Strip and the Two Areas of De facto Palestinian control in the West Bank, as well as the blurred border, but does not include Israeli territory such as the southern Negev Desert. The downscaling reveals that the "Gaza Strip" and "West Bank" have the same font and style as the major cities in The Territory, such as Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
By zooming in and out of the map, it was found that the word "Palestine" did not exist on Google Maps.
After searching for "" (Google Maps Palestine) in Arabic on Twitter, it was found that a large number of users shared the signature website change.org a joint campaign launched by Zak Martin "Google: Put Palestine on Your Map!" Some of these users attached the hashtag "Palestine here" (#PalestineIsHere).
"Google: Put Palestine on your map!" Screenshot of the petition page
By looking at the source code of the webpage, the petition was published in March 2016. As of December 20, 2021, more than 2.25 million people have signed it.
The "missing" Palestine has thus received widespread attention. In August of that year, the Forum of Palestinian Journalists published an article harshly condemning Google Maps for "falsifying history, geography, and the rights of the Palestinian people over the land" and accusing it of being influenced by Zionist lobbying groups.
Screenshot of the Palestinian Journalists Forum condemns 'Google' for removing Palestinian names
In August of the same year, the New York Times quoted Google as saying that "there was never a 'Palestinian' label on Google Maps." Therefore, the statement that "Palestine has been erased" is inaccurate.
Following the United Nations' recognition of Palestine as a "non-member observer State" in 2012, Google replaced "Palestinian territories" with "Palestine" on its search engine homepage the following year, Fox News reported.
Screenshot of the home page of the "Google Palestine" (google.ps) search engine on April 24, 2013
Screenshot of the homepage of the "Google Palestine" search engine on May 3, 2013
Notably, the move does not serve as evidence of Google's recognition of the status of a sovereign Palestinian state. Locations on search engine pages only reflect the location of the domain name — for example, in 2013 google.com.hk showed targeting as Hong Kong.
Google spokeswoman Elizabeth Davidoff confirmed that the "Palestine" positioning was indeed removed from the "Google Palestine" homepage at one point, but that the move was "more for aesthetic purposes than for political reasons — to make room for Olympic-themed Google doodles."
To sum up, Google Maps does not show "Palestine". The controversy fermented in 2016. But according to Google's official account, the company has never used the "Palestinian" tag on Google Maps, and has always used the "West Bank" and "Gaza" references.
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