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JEWISH AND CONTEMPORARY ORIGINS OF ISRAELI “HASBARA”

JEWISH AND CONTEMPORARY ORIGINS OF ISRAELI “HASBARA”

April 11, 2003 | Ron Schliefer
Negative image has become a major concern for Jews and Israelis. Standard arguments such as "reversal image of David and Goliath, " Israeli democracy as a news gathering heaven, and split in freely expressed political views as opposed to Arab/Palestinian monolithic control, cannot explain properly the extentof Israeli helplessness in terms of image management. This article argues that the roots of Israeli "hasbara" [a positive sounding synonym for "propaganda"] lay deep in Jewish history and the Zionist stage of Jewish history was not able to make a fundamental change. This article analyzes the various attitudes towards hasbara and outlines the deeper changes that Israel should internalize.