Ramallah: Nearly a quarter million people have signed a petition calling on Google to add Palestine to its maps.
The petition calls on Google to label Palestine on Google maps and to clearly designate and identify the Palestinian territories illegally occupied by Israel.
“According to Google, Palestine does not exist. Whether intentionally or otherwise, Google is making itself complicit in the Israeli ethnic cleansing of Palestine,” read the petition.
“The omission of Palestine is a grievous insult to the people of Palestine and undermines the efforts of millions of people who are involved in the campaign to secure Palestinian independence and freedom from Israeli occupation and oppression.”
Palestine’s removal by Google has prompted a huge social media campaign as it launched the hashtags #PalestineExists and #PalestineIsHere.
In 2013, and after the UN General Assembly upgraded the Palestinian status to that of a non-member observer state, Google changed the text on its Palestinian home page from ‘Palestinian territories’ to just ‘Palestine’.
The Palestinian Forum of Journalists condemned “the crime carried out by Google in deleting the name of Palestine and calls on Google to rescind its decision and apologise to the Palestinian people”, the forum said in a hard-worded statement.
“This is part of the Israeli scheme to establish its name as a legitimate state for generations to come and abolish Palestine once and for all.”
The forum slammed Google saying the move helped Israel distort history and geography and undermines Palestinians’ right to a homeland.
“Google should reverse the changes made in the maps applications since the move was contrary to all international norms and conventions,” read the statement.
Meanwhile, a Google spokesperson told Quartz that the decision is aimed at featuring the regions objectively.
“Google maps makes every effort to depict disputed regions and features objectively,” said the spokesperson.
“Certain jurisdictions have laws regarding maps. Where we have local versions, we follow local regulations for naming and borders.”
A search for Palestine in Google maps yields a blank map of Israel with areas of Gaza and West Bank with broken borderline but not mentioned by name.