 Hi friends and subscribers welcome back to my youtube channel my name is Daniel Rosel and this channel focuses on life on the ground in Jerusalem and Israel. With Israel soon heading into the fourth week of the war against Hamas in Gaza like many people I've been looking to diversify and optimize my selection of new sources. I covered in a previous video what I called the big four Israeli TV channels these are channels 11 the state broadcaster as well as channels 12 13 and 14 all of which broadcast in Hebrew. However if you spend any time trying to get your news from social media sources and telegram groups in Hebrew then sooner or later you're bound to run into a curiously named source entitled Abu Ali Express whose watermarked photos seem to crop up all the time. For those who didn't get the joke in the name Abu followed by a name is a naming convention called the Kunya that is used in the Arabic speaking world and Ali Express is a popular Chinese online e-commerce platform that's vastly popular here in Israel so Abu Ali Express literally means the father of Ali Express. Contrary to what the title might lead you to think Abu Ali Express is actually the moniker for a Jewish Israeli by the name of Gilad Kohn. Kohn's identity was for a time protected by Israel's military censor however the decision was reversed and his identity had since been widely reported upon in the Hebrew speaking press. The sensitivity regarding Abu Ali Express's identity had to do with the fact that he was working as a paid contractor to the army in a role that entailed psychological operations commonly abbreviated as Syops. This has since proven a source of controversy for those who think that the channel is too closely associated with the military establishment. However with hundreds of thousands of followers spread across various social media channels but mostly concentrated on telegram Abu Ali Express is the Hebrew language world's most influential and best known blogger. At the time of producing this video his telegram channel alone had ratcheted up more than 270,000 subscribers. Information shared on the telegram channel is commonly used by a number of influential Israeli news outlets including channel 12. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also previously shared content released and first reported by Abu Ali Express. Abu Ali Express is best known for collecting information from a wide variety of news sources including private sources in the Gaza Strip as well as official information disseminated by the IDF as well as reporting about Israel in the Arabic language press. The channel also actively monitors Hebrew language social media and shares particularly noteworthy updates. I think it's more accurate to describe Abu Ali Express as a source of open source intelligence or OSINT rather than as a conventional news source. In addition to telegram Abu Ali Express operates a website, an ex-account, an Instagram channel as well as a TikTok. Want to get more videos from me then please do consider liking this video and subscribing to this YouTube channel.