The quest for exposure: How pro-Palestine activists navigate algorithmic visibility and content moderation on TikTok

While political content, particularly from warzones, is frequently subject to moderation and censorship on social media platforms, pro-Palestinian creators face uniquely constrained conditions when speaking up for their cause. Often physically confined, they use digital platforms to connect with diasporas, share everyday struggles, and amplify narratives to a global audience. On these platforms, they are both hyper-visible and hyper-censored, challenged by opaque moderation systems, anti-Arab biases, and narrative erasure driven by platforms’ monetary interests and political pressures. This study examines how pro-Palestinian activists on TikTok navigate these challenges through qualitative interviews with 13 content creators. Participants describe experiences of visibility moderation and content removal, often under vague or inconsistent enforcement. These accounts align with the concept of platform gaslighting, in which unclear explanations and ineffective appeals foster uncertainty and mistrust in platform governance. Yet our findings reveal that, despite these pressures, the well-connected creators we interviewed continue to develop creative strategies to maintain visibility and avoid suppression. Through collective action, they expose misleading community guidelines, contest platform gaslighting, and resist silencing, reflecting a broader struggle over freedom of expression in algorithmically governed spaces.