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Israel-Gaza: Why is the region blurry on Google Maps?
- encryptluks2 5y agoBecause they don't want you to see the war crimes taking place in Israel.
- Permit 5y agoThis reads like a thoughtless, knee-jerk reaction but I think there is opportunity for you to expand on your comment and guide the discussion to an interesting place. Who is “they” in this case? What war crimes are hidden by low quality satellite images that would have been exposed by high quality images? Are there any competing ideas as to why these regions might be hidden?
- encryptluks2 5y agoWow, well I mean if you want I can just link you to well-thought and detailed blog posts and news articles about Israel's war crimes against Palestine and how Israel is an apartheid state.
- Permit 5y agoDo those articles relate to low quality regions of Google Maps satellite imagery? That’s the connection that would be interesting in the context of the original article.
- encryptluks2 5y agoDo they provide the latitude and longitude in the article?
- flyinglizard 5y agoThat's such trivialization of the word "apartheid", considering Gazans are under their own rule and that 20% of Israel are equal rights Arabs (something like 10% in France, for example). It has become a political term, but meaningless in practice.
- yoavm 5y agoIsraeli here. I find the word apartheid pretty suitable to describe the situation of Palestinians living in the West Bank - no citizenship or voting right, many issues with land ownership, a majority controlled by a minority, etc etc.
- flyinglizard 5y agoYes but this was referring to Gaza. Do you think that post disengagement Gazans live under "apartheid"? An Israeli can't even set foot there.
- dragonwriter 5y ago> Do you think that post disengagement Gazans live under "apartheid"? Yes bantustans were an important part of apartheid, and Gaza is a bantustan on steroids. Both South Africa and Israel disclaimed responsibility for their respective bantustans, but at least South Africa at least formally granted them independence and (unsuccessfully, to be sure) tried to get them international recognition and engagement. Israel, while disclaiming responsibility, also takes active diplomatic steps to deny Palestinian territories recognition as independent and actively seeks to thwart any international engagement with them.
- yoavm 5y agoThe parent post didn't even mention Gaza (simply said "Israel is an apartheid state"), and you were the one who brought up lives of Israeli Arabs. For your question however, I don't think that apartheid is a suitable term to describe the terrible conditions Gazans are living in.
- politithroway 5y agoAccording to a recent Btselem study 25% of Israelis themselves think it's an appropriate term to use. https://www.btselem.org/press_releases/2021413_new_all_population_israeli_palestinian_survey https://www.btselem.org/press_releases/2021413_new_all_popul...
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- mtalantikite 5y ago> What war crimes are hidden by low quality satellite images that would have been exposed by high quality images? ““Deliberate targeting of civilian objects and extensive, unjustified destruction of property are war crimes. Destroying entire multi-storey homes making tens of families homeless amounts to collective punishment of the Palestinian population and is a breach of international law," Saleh Higazi, deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International, said in a statement.” [1] Having high resolution satellite imagery would certainly help determine what has been and hasn’t been targeted. [1] https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2021/05/israel-opt-cycle-of-impunity-leaves-civilians-once-again-paying-the-price-amid-escalation-of-hostilities/ https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2021/05/israel-opt-cy...
- Ozzie_osman 5y agoI've heard there are some pretty intense debates inside Google about mapping issues related to Israel/Palestine (what to label, where to draw lines, etc).
- packetslave 5y agoFrom what I remember, it's less of an "intense debate" over the political issues themselves, and more "how do we define and serve a world map in a non-political way, in areas of the world where the map itself is political" like Kashmir, Israel/Palestine, and a bunch of other places that most people who don't live there haven't heard of.
- senko 5y ago> areas of the world where the map itself is political That would be everywhere. Even the most boring border in the world is political: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_areas_disputed_by_Canada_and_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_areas_disputed_by_Ca...
- packetslave 5y agoRight, hence the team of lawyers and policy people that Google (and presumably Microsoft, Apple, and anyone else who runs a mapping product) pay to figure out how to craft a policy that at least APPEARS non-political.
- The_Colonel 5y ago> Even the most boring border in the world US-Canadian border is definitely one of the more intense borders I crossed. And some of the horror stories I heard (e.g. Peter Watts) sound pretty bad. It might be the most boring US border though. Really boring borders can be found in EU/Schengen where you drive by a sign announcing a different country and that's it. There are even more boring (and interesting at the same time) borders: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baarle-Nassau#/media/File:Baarle-Nassau_fronti%C3%A8re_caf%C3%A9.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baarle-Nassau#/media/File:Baar...
- MattGaiser 5y agoI suspect that being endlessly cited as a source of data in this conflict would make for frustrating public relations. It wouldn't surprise me if there are intense labelling debates that they would prefer to sidestep as well.
- lousken 5y agoWhat about non-US companies like yandex, baidu etc? Why don't they provide higher resolution? Is there any company already providing them in higher res for free?
- cutemonster 5y agoThe authors hint that they think the photos are low resolution, to make it harder to see how many buildings got bombed in Gaza. Which would indicate that the current politicians in Israel have some leverage over Google? (Which I find interesting.) (Other nearby regions, eg Syria, are high resolution they write.) The authors mention that, elsewhere, satellite photos were used to measure "the destruction of Rohingya villages by the military in Myanmar".
- 542458 5y agoThey wouldn’t need leverage over Google, only over the companies (or the approvals and regulations that govern the companies) that take the arial photos that Google uses.
- pydry 5y agoWhether or not it was leverage related, I remember thinking the same thing when I saw that Google routinely placed me in Israeli settlements (e.g. Kiryat Arba, pop 700) when I was in Palestinian territory (Hebron, pop 215,000).
- petra 5y agoHigh-resolution maps could be used by militaries, for example, when targeting. Maybe it's just a way to stay out of the conflict.
- packetslave 5y agoThe military (ours and others) have their own overhead imagery. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ofeq https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ofeq
- akiselev 5y agoAccording to [1] only 19 countries have military satellites. It's really difficult to hide a satellite launch but even if you assume the real number is twice that due to secrecy, that is very few countries and chances are none of them are particularly friendly with Hamas or Fatah. Their useful not just for targeting but for tactics, strategy, and logistics. Even having access to freely available satellite imagery is a huge benefit to under-equipped armies and militias. Without them, effective warfare against a modern style military like Israel's, that depends on an independent command structure and rapid movement, is practically impossible without devolving into an insurgency. Hamas/Fatah likely have the resources to pay for a few commercial satellite shots using middlemen from sympathetic countries for up to date data for major offensives, but those shots often cost in the hundreds or thousands of dollars per sq mile. For day to day planning, even civilian imagery that updates once a year or two would be invaluable. [1] https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/countries-by-number-of-military-satellites.html https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/countries-by-number-of-m...
- packetslave 5y agoThis seems to not be a new thing. It's illegal for US companies to release high-resolution images of Israel: "In fact, all of Israel is shown in low resolution by all U.S.-based mapping services due to the Kyl–Bingaman Amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act of 1997. Entitled "Prohibition on collection and release of detailed satellite imagery relating to Israel," the amendment requires the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Commercial Remote Sensing Regulatory Affairs Agency to regulate the distribution of zoomed images of Israel. While a review of the Kyl-Bingaman amendment is said to be taking place, images of Israel stubbornly remain blurry." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyl%E2%80%93Bingaman_Amendment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyl%E2%80%93Bingaman_Amendment
- kccqzy 5y agoThe article says the KBA was dropped in 2020.
- packetslave 5y agoAh, I see, the limit was revised from 2m to 0.4m, but not dropped entirely (and Wikipedia needs an update). There's still an Israel-specific restriction, but it's significantly less draconian: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/07/21/2020-15770/notice-of-findings-regarding-commercial-availability-of-non-us-satellite-imagery-with-respect-to https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/07/21/2020-15...
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- azernik 5y agoMost of the article spends its time on the results. For people looking for the actual answer to the headline question: ==================================================== Until last year, the US government restricted the quality of satellite images that American companies were permitted to provide on a commercial basis. The Kyl-Bingaman Amendment (KBA) had been introduced in 1997 to address Israeli security concerns. Although the ruling only referred to Israel, it was also applied the restriction to images of the Palestinian territories. The KBA limited image quality so that an object the size of a car was just about visible as a highly blurred image, but anything smaller would be very difficult to identify. "We [Israel] would always prefer to be photographed at the lowest resolution possible", said Amnon Harari, head of space programmes at Israel's Defence Ministry last year, reported by Reuters. "It's always preferable to be seen blurred, rather than precisely." It's not uncommon that sites such as military bases have been blurred - but the KBA was the only case of such a wide area being subject to such a restriction. However, once non-US providers, such as French company Airbus, were able to supply these images at a higher resolution, the US came under increasing pressure to end its restrictions. In July 2020, the KBA was dropped, and now the US government allows American companies to provide far higher-quality images of the region (so that objects the size of a person can be readily picked out). ==================================================== i.e. it's only been legal for US companies to take higher-resolution imagery for under a year, and Israel is certainly not going to allow the aerial photography that gets really high-resolution imagery in developed countries. Presumably over the next few years there will be enough overflights by high-resolution satellites, and companies like Planet Labs will no longer be charging their new-imagery premiums.
- Zak 5y agoI was surprised to read this. Surely many countries allied with the US would prefer more of the publicly-available satellite imagery of sensitive parts of their territory to be low-resolution, but the US government gave special treatment to Israel alone.
- azernik 5y agoMost countries only want this for specific places: https://fas.org/blogs/security/2018/12/widespread-blurring-of-satellite-images-reveals-secret-facilities/ https://fas.org/blogs/security/2018/12/widespread-blurring-o... Letting Israel have something more extreme was a concession that cost the US very little, and came at a period of exceptionally good US-Israeli relations. Specifically, the US wanted to reward Israel for successive handovers of bits of the Territories to the Palestinian Authority, and staying out of the Gulf War.