The "Telegram" application is very popular among users for its numerous features, the most prominent of which is the ease of conducting conversations and sharing information or large files.

This application has become the most famous in the Middle East following the ongoing "Operation Al-Aqsa" and the subsequent Israeli aggression on Gaza, due to the fact that many users rely on it for communication and following the news.

In this regard, Pavel Durov, the founder of "Telegram," posted on his public channel on the application on October 8th, saying, "Hundreds of thousands are currently registering on Telegram from Israel and the Palestinian territories," adding that the company provides support for both the Hebrew and Arabic languages in the application. He mentioned that everyone affected by the war should have reliable access to news and communication.

Omer Benjakob, a cybersecurity correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, stated that the setbacks that Israel used to face at the beginning of resistance attacks usually coincided with a slight increase in activity on Telegram. This is precisely what happened during the recent Operation Al-Aqsa, but the increase in activity on Telegram this time was significant.

According to sources, the Telegram application played a major role in the operation, especially from a psychological standpoint at the beginning of the war. It facilitated the delivery of content to millions of people quickly, partly because observers considered there to be a lack of strong content censorship on this platform. Additionally, there is a wide network of channels and public groups.

The Islamic resistance movement Hamas relies on the Telegram application to disseminate its content and news. During the attack on October 7th, in which Operation Al-Aqsa was launched, news about the operation and the attack, as well as video clips, were presented on its Telegram channels, which number 7 in total.

Hamas finds Telegram to be a more suitable application than others for disseminating its news and video clips that it wants to reach the world. This is due to the quality of content censorship, as the movement's posts on Telegram do not face the strict enforcement seen on other platforms.

Telegram also offers the advantage of easily gathering a large audience. Public channels can have an unlimited number of subscribers, while private groups can have up to 200,000 members, which is much more than the maximum allowed in WhatsApp, which only allows up to 1024 members.

Telegram also includes built-in tools for sharing content on other platforms. For example, it allows users to upload files of up to 2 gigabytes in size and share them on platforms that do not allow the upload of such large files, especially video files. This has made Telegram a bridge for content between social networks and other platforms.

This feature has helped Hamas attract users from various social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to its Telegram channels to see developments from its perspective.

The viewership of Telegram channels affiliated with Hamas rapidly increased in the first five days of Operation Al-Aqsa. The Al-Qassam Brigades channel, which is dedicated to the military wing of the movement, multiplied its subscribers threefold, from around 205,000 participants to approximately 620,000. The number of views for each post also increased tenfold.

According to analysis from the Digital Research Lab at the Atlantic Council, the Al-Qassam Brigades channel on Telegram in the year prior to Operation Al-Aqsa only gained around 20,000 subscribers. However, before Google and Apple sent requests to Telegram to remove content related to Hamas, the number of subscribers to the Al-Qassam Brigades channel approached 800,000. Currently, after the removal and deletion requests have been implemented, the number of subscribers has decreased to around 670,000.

Telegram has banned a number of channels associated with the Hamas movement following significant pressure from external groups that pressured both Apple and Google to force Telegram to ban channels that these groups alleged were violating the terms of service of Apple and Google stores through which the Telegram app is downloaded.

While accounts related to Hamas were banned on most other major social networks, Telegram remained one of the central platforms for the movement, thanks to the application's approach that supports social media content freedom, allowing the spread of accounts of individuals affected by the war between Hamas and Israel.

Apple pressured Telegram to remove the channels and not allow their presence on iPhones and other Apple devices.

Later on, Telegram banned four channels of the movement on Apple devices, including the Al-Qassam Brigades channel, which had more than 700,000 subscribers, and an account known as "Spokesman_2020," which had over 500,000 followers.

Google's spokesperson did not confirm whether they had requested Telegram to remove Hamas channels in a statement to the "Wired" tech site. However, the spokesperson pointed out the app store policies of the company, which require apps to regulate content that includes what they call "terrorist attacks or promotes violence." The Google spokesperson said, "When violations are discovered, we take appropriate action."

It is clear that a "violation" of Apple and Google app store rules can lead to the removal of the app from Google Play and the App Store. Removing the app from Apple and Google stores makes it impossible for new users to download the app legitimately and gradually disables the service's functionalities since Telegram won't have a way to send software updates to over 800 million monthly active users.

Article 230, which pertains to online freedom of expression in the Supreme Court, is considered advantageous for platforms like Telegram because it protects their decisions regarding hosting or removing specific content under the banner of constitutionally guaranteed freedom of expression. This might make it difficult for plaintiffs to use legal measures to compel Telegram to remove content related to the Hamas movement.

However, Telegram could face stricter scrutiny from the European Union, where regulations require platforms to remove any content classified as "terrorism" within one hour of being notified by EU authorities. Platforms that do not comply with these regulations could face fines of up to 4% of their annual revenue.

The European Union has warned very large platforms of the possibility of being fined billions if their handling of illegal or misleading content violates the Digital Services Act, the law that came into effect for companies, including Meta, Facebook, and TikTok, last August.