Israel Erased off Popular Maps App by Vandals Who Replace it with ‘Free Palestine’

A popular online geographic database has become the center of the latest protest from detractors of Israel, who repeatedly erased the nation from the website’s maps and replaced it with messages that read “Free Palestine.”

Users on OpenStreetMap have been dealing with the recent influx of malicious edits made to their online community map by constantly fixing what they call “vandalism,” including the deletion of map data for Israel along with editing comments like "Erase Israel" and "There is no country as Israel.”

The dissent on OpenStreetMap comes after Israel continues its war with the terror group Hamas. On October 7, Hamas terrorists launched a deadly surprise attack on Israel that killed thousands and led to thousands more being injured, raped, and kidnapped.

Corrections have been made, and the map is mostly intact, but as the open-source platform allows any user to make edits to the map, the battle between editors and saboteurs apparently continues.

When The Messenger checked Israel’s map data on OpenStreetMap’s website Monday, parts of the nation remained blank on some layers. This was corrected momentarily before again appearing deleted just minutes later.

The digital defacing may prove an issue for other applications, such as navigation apps like Tom Tom and fitness apps like Strava that rely upon OpenStreetMap’s data and platform. Even apps like Trip Advisor and games like Pokemon Go use the open-source platform’s data.

However, an expert in geographic information systems and remote sensing has told Haaretz that apps using OpenStreetMap usually employ a best practice of only taking snapshots of the application’s map and data to use with their own apps, which potentially prevents damage by ensuring a more sanitized data grab rather than automatically updating.

"The biggest effect is felt on the background map that many websites and services use," Harel Dan, Head of GIS and Remote Sensing for 4M Analytics, said before adding that this type of digital vandalism is nothing new.

“From time to time there are localized attempts to damage the data, deletions, curses, etc,” Harel added. “The phenomenon has grown in the past 18 months because of the war in Ukraine.”

The ongoing editing wars have ignited a discussion around the “freedom to edit” on OpenStreetMap among its users’ community according to Haaretz. The platform has triumphed not blocking edits as a long-held policy, but Harel says that may be harming it. 

"It's too easy to make deletions," Harel told Haaretz. “Second, in contrast to Wikipedia, there is a much smaller number of editors.”

In contrast, the popular open-source online encyclopedia Wikipedia has instituted temporary editing blocks on sections of its website during periods of heightened tension. Harel says that Wikipedia’s temporary block policy is possibly something OpenStreetMap can’t mimic, however.

“It would be very difficult to impose editing locks because many systems use this, for example, code that automatically updates the information on public transportation based on Transportation Ministry data,” Harel told Haaretz.

“Restoring a dynamic map that is constantly being updated is complicated even without regard to the war. Sometimes, it requires an investment of several days and management by OpenStreetMap moderators [senior editors].”