Israel Matzav: Israeli government to open hasbara site in English

Israeli government to open hasbara site in English

You will recall that when I blogged the announcement of the government's new hasbara website last week, I was critical of the fact that the site was Hebrew-only. Someone in the government must read my blog, because they have now announced that they will be opening an English-language website in April. Hopefully, the English on the website will be better than the following (lifted word-for-word from the article):

“The interest there has been is too good to be true,” Edelstein said. “This shows that we pressed the right buttons.”

Edelstein said the main complaint he had received was the lack of an English-language site.

Notwithstanding my criticism, there are positive things to point out:

Training sessions have begun, and a pamphlet about how to defend the country is being distributed at Ben-Gurion Airport.

...

Edelstein said Israelis should feel free to advocate for a Palestinian state if that was their opinion, but that his ministry would concentrate on giving Israelis facts and techniques for representing Israel abroad.

As I have said previously, you can represent Israel abroad from your living room or home office. Targeting those Israelis who travel a lot is not necessarily the best thing. And while we're all happy to have materials, they have to be timely and the government cannot dictate to the people doing it how they should explain Israel's positions.

“The campaign doesn’t encourage people to give speeches on the Palestinian conflict but to talk about their lives and that we don’t take our wives out to fight Palestinians but to concerts,” Edelstein said.

“If people talk about the beautiful Israel and are ready for the tough questions, it can change the atmosphere for Israel internationally.”

Uh oh. That sounds a lot more like that awful 're-branding Israel' stuff we heard a year and a half ago. I hope not.

Israel Matzav: Israeli government to open hasbara site in English