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Screenshot by Lance Whitney/CNET
Twitter again appears to be in the crosshairs of the terrorist group ISIS.
A message posted Sunday on the website JustPaste.it called for the death of Twitter founder Jack Dorsey and Twitter employees due to the site’s takedown of ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) member accounts, news site BuzzFeed reported. The message displays an image of Dorsey in the crosshairs of a gun and urged jihadis to kill Twitter employees because of the company’s blocking of ISIS accounts.
ISIS is considered a major threat by the US and other countries for its terrorist tactics in occupying areas of Syria and Iraq. The group has been using social networks such as Twitter to spread its message and encourage followers to carry out attacks. In January, ISIS posted a video on Twitter urging followers to attack targets in the West, CBS News reported at the time.
Twitter’s guidelines specifically bar users from posting content that calls for threats of violence against others. As such, the site has been busy removing ISIS accounts almost as soon as they pop up. But that has angered the group’s members. In October, ISIS said that the management and employees of Twitter should be assassinated.
The exact author or authors of the latest message is unknown, but Twitter seems concerned enough to take the threat seriously. A spokesman for Twitter told CNET that “our security team is investigating the veracity of these threats with relevant law enforcement officials.”
The latest post accused Twitter by saying: “You started this failed war. We told you from the beginning it’s not your war, but you didn’t get it and kept closing our accounts on Twitter, but we always come back…For the ‘individual jihadi’ all over the world, target the Twitter company and its interests in any place, people, and buildings, and don’t allow any one of the atheists to survive.”
