The Justice Department has continued its efforts to ban the websites of Iraqi factions.they consider bad for US policies, taking down two websites belonging to Kataib Hezbollah.
Kataib Hezbollah is a Shi’ite militia group, and its ties to Iran have led the US to label it a foreign terrorist organization. This has been used as a pretext for taking down its websites, arguing they advocate for “violent extremism.”
The new takedowns appear related to the Rubu Allah parade in Baghdad Thursday. The US accuses the group of being a front for Kataib Hezbollah, and being used by them to recruit.
It’s not clear how the newly banned sites were used, as the US had banned most Kataib Heznollah and media sites with US domain names in 2020. The US has been keen to use its control of major top-level domains to control access to the Internet.
This must only have limited impact on shutting down sites, as the US government doesn’t have control over all top-level domains, and they can just move elsewhere to keep the sites accessible.
Didn’t we go to war to spread democracy and introduce freedom of information ?
No.