Trolls go to town on #AskNetanyahu Twitter campaign

A Twitter campaign inviting questions for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has drawn a barrage of negative reactions online, with thousands of people posting indignant and mocking responses just hours after it was launched.

The online Q&A was announced via Netanyahu’s Twitter account Tuesday, inviting people to take part in a “Special Independence Day live chat” to be held on Thursday as Israel celebrates 68 years since its founding in 1948.

The invitation asked people to “tweet your questions now at: #AskNetanyahu,” and attached a photo saying, “Ever wanted to ask me a question? Now’s your chance!”

Within hours the original message received hundreds of replies and the #AskNetanyahu hashtag made it onto Twitter’s “trending topics” list in Israel.

While some initial responses offered praise of Netanyahu and the initiative, as the hashtag picked up traction it was quickly flooded with negative comments that fired questions at the prime minister about Israel’s treatment of Palestinians and his perceived lack of interest in reaching a two-state solution.

Other users took a more humorous tone, mocking the initiative as well as poking fun at previous controversial statements by Netanyahu, including comments made by last October suggesting that Hitler had not initially intended to annihilate the Jews but only to expel them from Europe and that the idea of extermination came from Jerusalem’s grand mufti, Haj Amin al-Husseini, a Palestinian nationalist widely acknowledged as a fervent Jew-hater.

Some have likened the responses to online reactions mocking Hamas, the Islamic terror group that rules Gaza, when it launched the #AskHamas hashtag in March 2015.

Despite the reaction to #AskNetanyahu, a spokesman for the prime minister confirmed to The Times of Israel that the Q&A session would go ahead as planned.

“Tough questions aren’t a reason not to engage people. The prime minister is looking forward to engaging the public and spreading the truth in new mediums,” David Keyes said.

“This is an opportunity for normal people to ask whatever they want of the prime minister of Israel. It’s opportunity to engage and challenge him in a respectful way. Such engagement is exciting and refreshing for the leader of a country.”

In one response, Al Jazeera journalist Mehdi Hasan took the invitation for open debate literally, inviting Netanyahu onto his show “Up Front.”

According to Keyes, Netanyahu is the first Middle Eastern leader to invite this sort of public discourse using the Twitter social media platform and among Western premiers follows only US President Barack Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who have both launched similar initiatives.