Sydney, Australia, witnessed two horrific incidents within the span of five days last week.
At a hearing overnight, Australia’s Federal Court ordered X, formerly called Twitter, to temporarily hide posts showing video of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel being stabbed in an Assyrian Orthodox church. 
How did X react?
Tech billionaire Elon Musk, who bought the platform formerly known as Twitter in 2022, indicated on Tuesday that he would fight the court order. He said that the ruling meant any country could control “the entire internet.” 
Musk posted a meme depicting a cartoon of a fork in the road, with one path leading to “free speech” and “truth” and the other to “censorship” and “propaganda.”
Don’t take my word for it, just ask the Australian PM! pic.twitter.com/ZJBKrstStQ
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 22, 2024
X as being pro-free speech and other social media platforms supporting censorship and propaganda, with the caption: “Don’t take my word for it, just ask the Australian PM!”
He added, “I’d like to take a moment to thank the PM for informing the public that this platform is the only truthful one.”
Our concern is that if ANY country is allowed to censor content for ALL countries, which is what the Australian “eSafety Commissar” is demanding, then what is to stop any country from controlling the entire Internet?
We have already censored the content in question for… https://t.co/aca9E4uAB7
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 22, 2024
Earlier, the social media platform said that it had already blocked Australian users from viewing the posts.
What was Australia’s response?
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Tuesday hit back at Musk and berated his remarks.
He said that the government was prepared to take on Musk, whom he labelled an “arrogant billionaire who thinks he’s above the law, but also above common decency”.
“The idea that someone would go to court for the right to put up violent content on a platform shows how out-of-touch Mr Musk is,” he added.
Australia’s eSafety Commission, which describes itself as the world’s first government agency dedicated to keeping people safer online, successfully applied to the Federal Court in Sydney for a temporary global ban on sharing the video of the bishop being stabbed.
Later, Justice Geoffrey Kennett suppressed the footage from all X users until Wednesday, when an application for a permanent ban will be heard.
“While X respects a country’s right to enforce its laws within its jurisdiction, the eSafety Commissioner does not have the authority to dictate what content X’s users can see globally.” “We will robustly challenge this unlawful and dangerous approach in court,” X said.
It is said that a 16 year-old boy has been accused of the stabbings and is charged with terrorism offences.
