Israeli Spokesmen Won’t Brook Journalists’ Malicious Nonsense

Israelis have long recognized that their country has a “hasbara” (public relations, propaganda) problem. Unlike the Arabs, their tiny state hasn’t hundreds of millions of dollars to invest in PR

JIHAD WATCH

NOV 28, 2023 2:00 PM BY HUGH FITZGERALD

Israelis have long recognized that their country has a “hasbara” problem. Unlike the Arabs, their tiny state hasn’t hundreds of millions of dollars to invest in PR. Its generals can often be laconic, and gruff. Its civilian leaders have proven insufficiently quick-witted at making their case, and only two — Benjamin Netanyahu and Golda Meir — had or have a native command of English.. It is so difficult to make the case for Israel when so much of the world’s media is so ready to find fault with the tiny state that has had to fight three times for its very survival — in 1948, 1967, and 1973 — and in a half-dozen campaigns, against the PLO in Beirut, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and most often against Hamas in Gaza. Many journalists at news agencies, such as the AP, and at such broadcasters as the BBC, CNN, and France24, and last but definitely not least, at major papers, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, Le Monde, cannot hide their palpable want of sympathy for Israel, or their support for those, not limited to the Palestinians, who want to destroy the only Jewish state and replace it by a twenty-third Arab state. The BBC reporters are particularly unpleasant when it comes to their coverage of Israel. They include John Simpson, Jeremy Bowen, Lyse Doucet, Orla Guerin, and Yolande Knell.

But now Israeli spokesmen are giving not just as good as they get, but much better. They are refusing to accept the journalists’ tendentious framing of the questions, their hectoring tone when speaking to Israelis but not when interviewing Palestinians, their determination to avoid recognizing the genocidal intent of Hamas, as expressed in its charter. More on this new breed of eloquent and pugnacious spokesmen for Israel can be found here: “Is Israeli Hasbara Getting Better, Or Are Journalists Losing It?, by Daled Amos, Elder of Ziyon, November 26, 2023:

There is always concern about Hasbara, Israel’s ability to counter anti-Israel propaganda, especially during conflicts with Hamas terrorists in Gaza. When it comes to the reaction from the IDF, there are obvious problems where there is a need to get the facts out quickly while making sure the information is confirmed. Just as important, the spokesperson has to have a good command of the language of the audience to which he is speaking and must also speak confidently and coherently.

This has been a continuing concern.

There is also the need for Israeli spokespersons to present Israel’s case when interviewed on live TV by journalists who are not necessarily sympathetic, or even objective. Some recent examples show that Israeli spokespersons can hold their own. Those same examples call the objectivity and ability of the journalist into question.

Here is Mark Regev, former Israeli ambassador to the UK and currently an adviser to Netanyahu. The journalist doesn’t attack anything Regev said or Israel has done. She just makes a disturbing comparison in passing and Regev reacts immediately.

He doesn’t just challenges the comparison of Israeli hostages with Palestinian Arab prisoners. When the interviewer attempts to defend herself by bringing up the example of a 14-year-old Palestinian Arab, Regev challenges her again to reveal what crime the boy had been imprisoned for. She could not….

Regev would not let the journalist get away with equating the Israeli hostages freed to the Palestinian prisoners who were freed that same day. She described those being freed on both sides as “women and children,” but Regev was having none of it. The Israeli hostages being freed that day included a two-year-old, a four-year-old, a six -year-old, and a nine-year-old. But none of the Palestinians were “children” save one 14-year-old; when Regev challenged her to describe what he had been imprisoned for — an attempt to kill a policeman with rocks — she could not. As the interviewer, having lost her footing, stumbled through the rest of her questions, the no-nonsense Regev had shown he was not about to let anything unfair go unchallenged. It was a satisfying moment.

Fortunately, the spokesmen for Israel, such as Mark Regev, are native speakers of the languages of those who interview them, are articulate and even eloquent, well prepared to discuss any conceivable line of questioning, and most important, are unwilling to let pass any misstatement or outrage. When Regev firmly corrects the interviewer who describes “women and children” being freed on both sides, and notes that while Israeli hostages that day include four children under the age of nine, only one of the Palestinian prisoners could be considered a child, and that prisoner was 14 years old and had tried to murder a policeman, his interviewer is unable to answer.

When Kay Burleigh for SkyNews makes the preposterous charge that in trading 150 Palestinian prisoners for 50 Israeli hostages, Israel is showing that it values Israeli lives over Palestinian ones, the Israeli spokesman Eylon Levy, momentarily stunned, rebukes her for the sheer idiocy of her remark, and says that “we would be glad to have a one-for-one exchange.” He calls her remark “disgusting.” Burleigh is reduced to silence. In the presentation of Israel’s case by such articulate spokesmen as Regev and Levy, Israel now has a hasbara operation equal to its task.

https://www.jihadwatch.org/2023/11/israeli-spokesmen-wont-brook-journalists-malicious-nonsense