❓Did you know the CEO of Instagram is an Israeli citizen whose family lives on stolen Palestinian land?

Adam Mosseri often raves about the time he spent growing up in Israel. He loved it then. Loves it now. Let me explain why this is super relevant for the moment we are in.

🚨 Quick Note Before You Read

Sisters and brothers, this is exactly why we need this space. When Israel can demand my Instagram be permanently erased, and when the man enforcing that demand has family roots on stolen Palestinian land, we have to build platforms they cannot silence. 👉🏽 Please become a paid subscriber today.

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🟥 Who Is Adam Mosseri? And Why It Matters That He Runs Instagram

The Nostalgia of a Man With Power

The CEO of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, has posted many times about his ties to Israel. On his own account, he has shared photos of “summers in Yafo” with his father and kids. He’s posted about “breakfasts with his safta in Tel Aviv” as a child. He talks casually about ice cream on the beach, family gatherings, and childhood memories. He says he grew up spending every single summer in Israel. He’s proud.

He is also a dual U.S.–Israeli citizen, with family still living on stolen Palestinian land.

I find this very, very insightful. And relevant. Not that he’s Jewish - although religion is certainly insightful for all of us, but that he is a loyal and proud citizen of a nation overseeing a genocide, with a Prime Minister indicted by war crimes, and family living all over land Palestinians were pushed off of.

Yeah, it’s super relevant for the time we are in right now.

For most of his followers, these glowing posts Adam makes probably seem ordinary. Just another successful man reminiscing about family traditions. But for Palestinians, and for anyone who knows the history of this land, these posts are reminders of something much more sinister. Because the places Mosseri remembers so fondly are absolutely not neutral vacation spots. They are the very heart of the Nakba — the violent and genocidal ethnic cleansing campaign of 1948 — when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were driven from their homes.

And it matters. It matters because Mosseri now leads the platform that permanently banned me from Instagram for my advocacy for the very Palestinians his family displaced — erasing what, at the time, was the single most engaged account in the world on Gaza — after what my lawyers were told was a “government demand.” It matters because the “government” in question was Israel. And it matters because the man at the top of Instagram, who executed that demand, has lifelong family, legal, and emotional ties to the very state that silenced me. And so do some of his most senior colleagues at Meta.

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The Real History of Yafo (Jaffa)

When Mosseri calls it “Yafo,” he is referring to is Jaffa, now part of Tel Aviv–Yafo. But its real name, its ancient name, is Yafa in Arabic. Yafa is one of the oldest cities on earth, with more than 4,000 years of continuous Palestinian life and culture.

Before 1948, Yafa was the beating heart of Palestine. It was a bustling port city, home to over 70,000 Palestinians, mostly Muslim and Christian, alongside centuries-old mosques, churches, schools, and one of the richest cultural scenes in the Arab world. It had publishing houses, cinemas, and the famous Jaffa oranges that were exported worldwide.

In April 1948, Zionist militias, including the Irgun and Haganah, launched a brutal assault on Yafa. Tens of thousands of Palestinian families fled under bombardment. By May 1948, when the new State of Israel was declared, fewer than 4,000 Palestinians remained. More than 95% of Yafa’s Palestinian population was expelled. Their homes and shops were seized, their mosques desecrated, their city repopulated with new arrivals from Europe.

In addition to being a port city and commercial center, Yafa was also the beating heart of Palestinian journalism and culture during the British Mandate. It was in Yafa that the pioneering newspapers Falastin (founded in 1911) and Al-Difa’ (founded in 1934) were established. These papers became the voice of the Palestinian national movement, documenting the dispossession and resisting colonialism with words as powerful as weapons. Their editors and writers shaped public life across Palestine and the Arab world. When the Nakba came in 1948, not only were Yafa’s homes and mosques emptied — its presses, its newspapers, and its role as the intellectual center of Palestinian life were violently extinguished.

Israel later declared Jaffa part of what it called “Tel Aviv–Yafo.” But for Palestinians, Yafa is not a neighborhood of Tel Aviv. It is an occupied, ethnically cleansed Palestinian city.

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The Real History of Tel Aviv

When Mosseri posts about his deep love for “Tel Aviv,” he is talking about a city built directly on the ruins of Palestinian villages. A much, much smaller area that called Tel Aviv was established in 1909 by Zionist settlers on land purchased near Yafa. But it only grew into a modern city because of the Nakba of 1948.

The neighborhoods and suburbs that make up Tel Aviv today were once MASSIVE, thriving Palestinian communities. Al-Manshiyya, a neighborhood of Jaffa, was emptied and destroyed. Salama, a Palestinian village with over 7,600 residents, was attacked and its people expelled; it is now a Tel Aviv district. Sheikh Muwannis, a large village whose lands covered parts of what is now Tel Aviv University, was ethnically cleansed in March 1948, its people driven out at gunpoint.

The families of some of my dearest Palestinian friends STILL HAVE THE KEYS TO THEIR HOME THAT WAS STOLEN.

The names were erased. The people were barred from returning. And what is today “Tel Aviv” was built atop their villages.

Mosseri remembers “Tel Aviv breakfasts with his grandmother.” What that means is: he grew up enjoying family life in a city created through the violent expulsion of Palestinians, on stolen land.

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Beyond 1948 — Ongoing Erasure

The story doesn’t end in 1948. After the Six-Day War of 1967, Israel occupied the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza, triggering a new wave of displacement. Palestinians who had already lost their homes in Yafa and Tel Aviv in 1948 found themselves trapped in refugee camps in Gaza — and then besieged again after 1967.

Today, those camps are full of families who can trace their roots directly back to the streets Mosseri’s family walks freely in. The children starving to death in Gaza’s famine include descendants of the people expelled from Jaffa, al-Manshiyya, Salama, and Sheikh Muwannis.

That is the reality hidden beneath Mosseri’s nostalgic Instagram captions.

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Why This Matters

When Israel demanded that Instagram erase my account in 2023, it wasn’t just a political decision. It was personal. It was executed by a company led by a man who is a dual U.S.–Israeli citizen, whose family still lives in Israel, who posts lovingly about summers in Yafa and breakfasts in Tel Aviv — places Palestinians were expelled from.

This explains why Donald Trump could be reinstated. Why war criminals, dictators, and PEDOPHILES have accounts. And yet I, for thanking Yemen for resisting genocide, was given a lifetime ban.

Because this isn’t neutral. The man in charge has deep ties to the very state that demanded my silencing.

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A Final Word

Sisters and brothers, history matters. The names matter. Yafa is not “Yafo.” Tel Aviv is not an innocent, modern city — it is built on Salama, Sheikh Muwannis, al-Manshiyya. These were Palestinian homes, schools, mosques, and churches. Their people were expelled. Their names were erased. And now, the CEO of Instagram eats breakfast there with his children, posts about it nostalgically, and bans those of us who dare to tell the truth.

👉🏽 Please become a paid subscriber today.

Because when you understand the roots of power, censorship, and dispossession, you see clearly: the silencing is not accidental. It is personal. It is systemic. And it has been happening for generations.

Love and appreciate each of you.
Your friend and brother,
Shaun King