As social media platforms such as X, formerly Twitter, Meta and TikTok face off with the regulators and the theater of public opinion for how they're handling incendiary and graphic content, disinformation, writing and other forms of media related to Hamas and Israel, Telegram Chief Executive Pavel Durov controversially has come out defending how his messaging app does not take down some of the more sensitive war-related coverage that can be found there, claiming it can be an important channel for information.

He also classified it from social media since users only view content to which they subscribe. (Yes, that does not take into account how content posted on Telegram gets shared.)

In a post on his Telegram channel today, Durov — drawing some of the more "high-level" language that other social media executives have used — said, "Telegram's moderators and AI tools remove millions of obviously harmful content from our public platform," but he rapidly shifted into defense of allowing sensitive content to remain on the app under the category of "war-related coverage."

Tackling war-related coverage is seldom obvious." (He does not explain what the line is between "obviously harmful" and "war-related coverage").

"While it would be easy for us to destroy this source of information, doing so risks exacerbating an already dire situation," he continued, citing how, he said, Hamas used Telegram to warn civilians in Ashkelon to leave the area ahead of missile strikes. "Would shutting down their channel help save lives — or would it endanger more lives?" he asked in his post today.

Durov's statements come at a time when Telegram has most certainly been in the middle of how information has been getting out to the rest of the world, but that has not been limited to Telegram channels. In the first hours and days of the deadly terrorist attacks, Hamas and those associated with it published several graphic and highly unedited videos of their acts on Telegram, and the application soon became a frequently quoted reference point by mainstream media and many people posting and sharing news on other social channels, sometimes linking directly to Telegram posts, or capturing and resharing the content within them. That information dissemination role of Telegram has itself come under attack.

A cynical take might be that Telegram is profiting from the situation, by picking up more traffic from it. Durov noted, two days after the attack, that "hundreds of thousands" of new users were signing up for the app from Israel and the Palestinian Territories, noting that Telegram was adding support for Hebrew in its UI.

"Everyone affected should have reliable access to news and private communication in these dire times," he said at the time.

Durov's words and actions should not come as too much of a surprise: They are in line with the company's previous approach to sensitive content.

Part of Durov's defense of Telegram has always been to make a distinction between it and social media apps.

Unlike other apps that algorithmically promote shocking content to unsuspecting people, on Telegram, users receive only the content to which they specifically subscribed," he wrote. "As such, it's unlikely that Telegram channels can be used to significantly amplify propaganda. Instead, they serve as a unique source of first-hand information for researchers, journalists, and fact-checkers."

The app has previously taken a light touch when it comes to how it is used by violent individuals or groups, courting a lot of controversy in the process. It has become, for example, a go-to place for communication around the war in Ukraine, but it has also become a hotbed for misinformation, as this piece details. Resistance groups in Myanmar may be using it, but so are militants supporting the current regime, who are using it to target individuals, as this investigation by CNN showed. And its controversial place as a go-to platform for recognized terrorist groups was well-known. (Hamas is recognized by many countries, including the U.S., U.K. and Israel, as a terrorist organization.)