Israel: A Linkage to the Spanish-Speaking Communities in the U.S.
The Jewish Post of New York, April 2001
" For many years Israel has developed, especially in New York City, a linkage to the African-American community in this country. It was a smart, fruitful move. Its epiphany is the annual Israeli official celebration of the Martin Luther King memorial day. It looks like Israel has ignored the new dynamic in the U.S.: The rising of Latino-Spanish communities ... The reality should be challenged by building a new infrastructure of Israeli-Latino-Spanish relationships ... The first step will be the launching of an annual Israeli-Latino-Spanish Solidarity Day ... This launching of a Solidarity Day will be only the first step in a project which will target the Spanish speaking people in this country. It will be a new chapter of mutual positive 'people to people' relationships between Israel, Jews and this world of Spanish ethnicity in America."

Israel Turns to P.R. Firm for Makeover Amid Violence.
Miami Herald [from the Baltimore Sun], July 29, 2001
"They have worked with Weight Watchers, the New York Yankees and the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau. Now the experts at Rubenstein Associates, a public relations company, are taking on a new client: the state of Israel, which hopes to spruce up its image in the deadly conflict with the Palestinians ... But Palestinian officials and young boys interviewed at the Ayosh Junction in the West Bank town of Ramallah, one place singled out by Rubenstein as a problem area, say the proposals prove Israel would rather save face than lives. ``If they want to look better, they have to stop shooting,'' said Nabil Abu Rdeineh, a spokesman for Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat."

New PR Directive: Stress Ties to the Land. Jerusalem Post, August 7, 2001
"Prime Minister Ariel Sharon yesterday conducted his first intensive meeting on Israel's public relations policies since taking office, meeting for more than two hours at his Jerusalem residence with top officials in the Foreign Ministry and the Prime Minister's Office. Sharon was quoted as telling the meeting that Israel should make a point of emphasizing the Jewish right to the land, because it is too often forgotten ... Based on suggestions by Howard J. Rubenstein Associates, the firm Israel hired in New York, the government has already begun to increase the representation of women in its PR campaigns and limit the usage of IDF speakers in uniform."

New Assault Is Launched in War for Public Opinion.
JTA [Jewish Telegraphic Agency], March 13, 2001
"The Palestinians may not be winning the war for American public opinion, but Israeli diplomats and American Jews are still forging ahead with efforts to augment Israeli 'hasbarah' – a uniquely Hebrew term that falls somewhere between explanation and propaganda. The Israeli government recently took the unusual step of contracting two prominent American public-relations firms – Rubenstein Associates and Morris, Carrick & Guma – on a three-month trial basis. More controversially, a handful of Jewish mega-donors has created a think tank they hope will generate long-term strategies for presenting Israel in a favorable light ... American Jewish leaders say international condemnation of Israel during the past half-year of Israeli-Palestinian bloodshed has made a stronger P.R. effort necessary ... Enter the new think tank – 'Emet,' the Hebrew word for truth. Spearheading the project is Leonard Abramson, the Philadelphia-based founder of U.S. Healthcare, along with philanthropist Michael Steinhardt and World Jewish Congress President Edgar Bronfman. The group consulted with Hoenlein, Foxman and other Jewish activists – and only then notified Israel’s Foreign Ministry, Foxman said. American donors are expected to provide $7 million for the think tank, with another $1 million requested from the Foreign Ministry, according to reports."

Yisrael Ba'aliya Joins Forces with Democrats, Republicans,
Jerusalem Post, November 23, 2001
"Yisrael Ba'aliya has now formed a new alliance with two larger, more influential parties: the Democrats and the Republicans. The local [Israeli] chapters of Democrats Abroad and Republicans Abroad have come together with the Yisrael Ba'aliya Israel Citizens' Information Council, a project of the immigrant party's 'Anglo Department,' in an effort to impact American policy toward Israel ... Democrats Abroad and Republicans Abroad, organizations whose primary role is registering Americans in Israel to vote by absentee, act as vehicles for their members to express political views and try to influence American policy ... Yisrael Ba'aliya director-general Eli Kazhdan said the petition is a natural fit for his party, which has many voters who have moved from America and care deeply about both Israel and the US. 'We don't see it as interfering with American policy,' Kazhdan said. 'It's not politicians who are doing this. It's grassroots people who have dual citizenship'."

Israel's War of Words Gets Dirty,
Palestine Solidarity Campaign (from The Independent - Great Britain),
April 14, 2002
"Joel is a reserve captain in the Israeli army. He has a warm handshake and a line in rapid-fire patter that betrays his New York upbringing. He introduces himself as a 'military source', but it swiftly emerges that he is a headline machine, churning out slurs. Joel is in the front line of a multi-million dollar propaganda drive by the Israeli government to try to prevent an international backlash over its military invasion into Palestinian-run parts of the occupied West Bank. They face their toughest challenge yet: limiting the damage to Israel over the atrocities committed in the Jenin refugee camp, where its army has killed and injured hundreds of Palestinians. In a newly opened Israeli government media centre in Jerusalem, Joel was looking for journalists to make his pitch. We cut straight to the question of Jenin. 'Believe me, we would love to let you guys into Jenin, but unlike the Palestinian terrorists, we respect the dignity of the dead,' he said. 'They want to gather up the bodies and show them off to the international media as evidence of a massacre - that is typical of the sort of PR tricks they play.' The press was also not being allowed into Jenin because of the 'abundance of terrorists' looking for 'Western targets'. The Israeli army has frequently shot at journalists, injuring more than 40 and killing one. Suddenly, it was concerned for our safety. A journalist himself, Joel seems to know all about 'PR tricks'. Asked why the Israeli army is refusing to allow ambulances from the International Committee of the Red Cross to enter the camp and evacuate the wounded, he urged The Independent on Sunday to investigate. 'You are on to a good story there. Go to the Red Cross and find out if they are using drivers from Sweden, or Palestinians.' The propaganda war between the Israelis and Palestinians has always been a dirty business, but now it has sunk to new depths. Israel's media centre issued a statement boasting of 'countless examples' of humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. This will be staggering news to the Red Cross and Red Crescent, who have been barred from entry, shot at and repeatedly humiliated, all in violation of the Geneva Convention."

Time to expose Israeli propaganda network,
by Linda S. Heard, Gulf News, August 20, 2002
"The Israeli government knows the importance of propaganda, but rather than use the equivalent of Lord Haw-Haw or Hanoi Jane, it encourages more subtle ways of indoctrinating an unsuspecting world in its favour, attempting to turn public opinion against the Palestinians and their supporters. Brian Whitaker of the Guardian recently exposed an innocent–appearing translation website – ostensibly a non–profit, non affiliated organisation – altruistically set–up to translate articles appearing in the Arabic and Israeli press – the Middle East Media Research Institute (Memri). Memri's stated aim on its website is to bridge the gap between East and West. Whitaker, however, realised over time that the free Memri translations of articles in the Arab press, which arrived on his desk, invariably cast the Arab world in a bad light. Aware that these selective translations were being sent not only to the Western media but also to parliamentarians in the West, including those in the U.S., he decided to do his own investigation into the people behind Memri. After some digging, Whitaker discovered that the founder, president and owner of Memri's website turned out to be none other than one Yigal Carmon, an ex–colonel in the Israeli military intelligence services. Colonel Carmon also served as an advisor to two Israeli prime ministers. Whitaker quoted Carmon as having said to an American audience: 'The controlled media of the Arab governments conveys hatred of the West and, in particular, the United States.' Carmon has also claimed that most of the guests on the Qatari–based broadcaster Al–Jazeera are anti–Semitic. Hardly the type of statements that a person who genuinely wanted to bridge the gap between East and West would make! One of the tools in the Zionist propaganda armoury is the loaded term 'anti–Semitic', which is being thrown around with wild abandon these days, used to label anyone who doesn't agree with their political agenda."

Jews Open TV Ad Campaign to Burnish Israel's Eroded Image,
Ha'aretz (Israel), October 9, 2002
"One hundred leading cable TV stations in the U.S. this week began broadcasting paid advertising by two U.S. Jewish groups trying to get Israel's message across to the American public. Believing that Israel is losing the media war, the American Jewish Committee and Israel 21C, a Silicon Valley group, decided to take the unusual step of paying for TV ads instead of traditional public relations methods, such as interviews and print newspaper advertising. Beyond the change in the medium, the ads are also a change in the Israeli message. The emphasis in them is on the similarity between Israel and the U.S., the alliance between the two countries, and most importantly, the fact that Israel is a democracy while its neighbors are not ... The TV ads infuriate James Zogby, head of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. He said the ads are latently racist, telling Americans that Israelis 'are like you Americans and they (meaning the Arabs) are not,' and that the emphasis on the differences is a form of support for continuing the conflict and distancing peace."

The Father of Spin: Edward L. Bernays & The Birth of PR, [Book Review]
PR Watch, 2nd Quarter, 1999
"Today, few people outside the public relations profession recognize the name of Edward L. Bernays. As the year 2000 approaches, however, his name deserves to figure on historians' lists of the most influential figures of the 20th century. It is impossible to fundamentally grasp the social, political, economic and cultural developments of the past 100 years without some understanding of Bernays and his professional heirs in the public relations industry. PR is a 20th century phenomenon, and Bernays--widely eulogized as the 'father of public relations' at the time of his death in 1995--played a major role in defining the industry's philosophy and methods. Eddie Bernays himself desperately craved fame and a place in history. During his lifetime he worked and schemed to be remembered as the founder of his profession and sometimes drew ridicule from his industry colleagues for his incessant self-promotions. These schemes notwithstanding, Bernays richly deserves the title that Boston Globe reporter Larry Tye has given him in his engagingly written new book, The Father of Spin ... The portrait that emerges is of a brilliant, contradictory man. Tye writes that Bernays' papers . . . provide illuminating and sometimes disturbing background on some of the most interesting episodes of twentieth-century history, from the way American tobacco tycoons made it socially acceptable for women to smoke to the way other titans of industry persuaded us to pave over our landscape and switch to beer as the 'beverage of moderation.' The companies involved aren't likely to release their records of those campaigns, assuming they still exist. But Bernays saved every scrap of paper he sent out or took in. . . . In so doing, he let us see just how policies were made and how, in many cases, they were founded on deception.' In an industry that is notable for its mastery of evasions and euphemisms, Bernays stood out for his remarkable frankness. He was a propagandist and proud of it ... Many of the new insights that Tye offers have to do with Bernays's relationship with his family and his uncle Sigmund Freud, whose reputation as 'the father of psychoanalysis' owes something to Bernays' publicity efforts. Bernays regarded Uncle Sigmund as a mentor, and used Freud's insights into the human psyche and motivation to design his PR campaigns, while also trading on his famous uncle's name to inflate his own stature ... . Bernays ... used psychological techniques to mask the motives of his clients, as part of a deliberate strategy aimed at keeping the public unconscious of the forces that were working to mold their minds. Characteristically (and again paradoxically), Bernays was remarkably candid about his manipulative intent. 'If we understand the mechanisms and motives of the group mind, it is now possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing it,' he argued in Propaganda, one of his first books. In a later book, he coined the term 'engineering of consent' to describe his technique for controlling the masses. 'The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society,' Bernays argued. 'Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. . . . In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons . . . who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.' This definition of 'democratic society' is itself a contradiction in terms--a theoretical attempt to reconcile rule by the few with the democratic system which threatened (and still threatens) the privileges and powers of the governing elite ... During Bernays' lifetime and since, propaganda has usually had dirty connotations, loaded and identified with the evils of Nazi PR genius Joseph Goebbels, or the oafish efforts of the Soviet Communists. In his memoirs, Bernays wrote that he was 'shocked' to discover that Goebbels kept copies of Bernays' writings in his own personal library, and that his theories were therefore helping to 'engineer' the rise of the Third Reich. Bernays liked to cultivate an image as a supporter of feminism and other liberating ideas, but his work on behalf of the United Fruit Company had consequences just as evil and terrifying as if he'd worked directly for the Nazis. The Father of Spin sheds new and important light on the extent to which the Bernays' propaganda campaign for the United Fruit Company (today's United Brands) led directly to the CIA's overthrow of the elected government of Guatemala. The term 'banana republic' actually originated in reference to United Fruit's domination of corrupt governments in Guatemala and other Central American countries. The company brutally exploited virtual slave labor in order to produce cheap bananas for the lucrative U.S. market ... Bernays relished and apparently never regretted his work for United Fruit, for which he was reportedly paid $100,000 a year, a huge fee in the early 1950s. Tye writes that Bernays' papers 'make clear how the United States viewed its Latin neighbors as ripe for economic exploitation and political manipulation--and how the propaganda war Bernays waged in Guatemala set the pattern for future U.S.-led campaigns in Cuba and, much later, Vietnam.' As these examples show, Tye's biography of Bernays is important. It casts a spotlight on the anti-democratic and dangerous corporate worldview of the public relations industry. The significance of these dangers is often overlooked, in large part because of the PR industry's deliberate efforts to operate behind the scenes as it manages and manipulates opinions and public policies. This strategy of invisibility is the reason that PR academic Scott Cutlip refers to public relations as 'the unseen power.' Bernays pioneered many of the industry's techniques for achieving invisibility, yet his self-aggrandizing personality drove him to leave behind a record of how and for whom he worked."

The Vermin On Our College Campuses,
Jewish Press, October 16, 2002
"America`s constitutionally guaranteed 'Freedom of Speech' is not a license to lie. It`s not a hall-pass to misrepresent. It`s not a green light to commit civil disobedience. Or is it? ... I`m referring to professors like Rutie Adler of Berkeley, Joel Beinin of Stanford, and student-teacher Snehal Shingavi, also from Berkeley, who have no business teaching at our universities. If you think I`m engaging in McCarthyism, you`re right. But it happens to be Charlie McCarthyism: students` heads are being worked and filled with false information. Adler has been at the forefront of the anti-Israel economic divestment petition drive ... Adler says she is not anti-Semitic. What would you call someone who selectively ignores the unspeakable cruelty of certain nations and goes out of her way to concoct lies about the world`s only Jewish state? Yes, there are many more epithets that can be added to a description of Adler, but there`s no reason not to include 'anti-Semite,' in this observer`s humble opinion ... Last spring, the media reported that Snehal Shingavi would be teaching a UC Berkeley class this fall called 'The Politics and Poetics of Palestinian Resistance.'"

‘ANTI-AMERICANISM' IS ON THE RISE IN THE MIDDLE EAST,
O'Dwyer's PR Daily, Nov. 1, 2002
"U.S. support for Israelis over Palestinians, President Bush's ‘crusade' against the Taliban and the presence of American troops in Saudi Arabia contribute to the rising anti-American sentiment in the Middle East, Yvonne Haddad, a professor at Georgetown University's Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, told a PRSA symposium on Oct. 31. 'Every city and town in Palestine has a ground zero,' noted Haddad. While Palestinian suicide bombers are given front page coverage in U.S. papers, Israeli tank aggression is hidden in the back pages,' said Haddad. 'There is a distinct feeling of a Judeo-Christian conspiracy against Muslims' ... .' Haddad explained that many Muslims were offended by the U.S. destruction of the Taliban in Afghanistan because the Taliban stood for Islam. Furthermore, the U.S. explanation that we were trying to help the Muslim women oppressed by the Taliban actually worked against us according to Haddad. She explained that Muslim women have formed their opinion of American women from watching T.V. reruns of shows like Dynasty and as a result assume American women to be 'whores' ... 'This Israeli/Palestinian issue is poisoning U.S. relations,' said Clyde Prestowitz, president of the Economic Strategy Institute and former Commerce Dept. official. He stressed that the images Muslims are bombarded with via cable T.V. networks like Al Jazeera reinforce the perception that the U.S. is not fighting a war against terrorism, but a war against Islam. Clyde Prestowitz Prestowitz called the Israeli settlements in Palestine 'poison.' 'We are seen as being complicit with the expansion of these settlements. When we call Ariel Sharon a 'man of peace' we look bad,' said Prestowitz. He sided with Haddad on the overwhelming negative impact of the U.S. involvement in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict on Muslim attitude toward Americans."

Asper's charges of media bias 'bizarre,'
Globe and Mail (Toronto),by Doug Saunders, November 1, 2002
"After a long, angry speech by Winnipeg media mogul Izzy Asper, which accused most of the world's media of being insufficiently pro-Israeli and implied that reporters are anti-Semitic, bewildered journalists yesterday struggled to respond. Mr. Asper's Wednesday night speech, which was reprinted prominently in his city papers and the National Post, effectively positioned Mr. Asper and his newspapers to the far right of most of the world's major media. As with speeches he delivered last month with former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, it repeated the Israeli Likud party's conservative and aggressively anti-Arab views. This time, though, he named names, accusing the CBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Associated Press and Reuters wire services, ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, BBC, the British Guardian, Independent, Evening Standard and Daily Mirror newspapers, as well as ITV and Sky News networks, and other outlets of being 'lazy, or sloppy, or stupid . . . [or] plain and simple, biased or anti-Semitic.' He singled out the CBC and its former Middle East reporter Neil MacDonald, accusing them of providing 'the most slanted and biased information' and of routinely practising 'dishonest reporting.' In particular, he demanded that reporters in the Mideast, such as Mr. Macdonald, refer to all Palestinian militants as 'terrorists.' Tony Burman, head of the CBC-TV news division, said yesterday that he considered Mr. Asper's opinions 'bizarre,' and that he would be demanding space to respond to the accusations in the Asper-owned papers. 'To suggest that most of the world's media are involved in a conspiracy against Israel, it's just a totally extreme conception on Asper's part.' ... 'There is something profoundly ironic about being told off about media bias by someone like Izzy Asper,' said Mr. Burman, apparently referring to Mr. Asper's former practice of forcing his city papers to print company-written editorials that expressed the owner's views."

Critics of Mideast coverage put heat on local papers,
Jewish Bulletin of Northern California, November 1, 2002
"[Pete Hebert] led a weeklong June boycott of The Washington Post that pro-Israel activists claim led to 1,000 subscription cancellations ... EyeonthePost.org already links to such onetime boycott efforts as http://geocities.com/ truthmasters/ jointheboycott.htm -- aimed at the Los Angeles Times. David Frankenthal, the Los Angeles attorney and teacher behind that Web site, said 'thousands' of people boycotted the Times for one day in April. 'There are so many sites commenting on the media that have identified this problem. It's a crowded field,' he said ... [T]he JCRC [Jewish Community Relations Council] undertook a study that organizers say demonstrates an anti-Israel leaning within the [San Francisco] Chronicle, and facilitated a meeting between the paper's editors and Jewish community leaders in May ... Like [Rabbi Doug] Kahn, Frankenthal is troubled by the 'moral equivalence' that newspapers purportedly draw between Palestinian terror attacks and Israeli counter-terror operations ... In Philadelphia, for example, the Zionist Organization of America, which led a boycott fight against the Philadelphia Inquirer that culminated in a July rally at the newspaper's headquarters, maintains the Inquirer is guilty of 'bad journalism' when it comes to reporting on Israel, said Steve Feldman, executive director of the Greater Philadelphia district of the ZOA ... In Chicago, Kotzin said Jewish officials continue to meet with Chicago Tribune officials and journalists to foster good relations and voice Jewish concerns about Mideast coverage. Meanwhile, Ed Lasky, a stock trader who is active in a group called Citizens Against Terror, which has been critical of the Tribune's Israel coverage, said that in coming weeks the group will launch a Web site called The Tribune Watch to track the Tribune's reporting ... One group that claims success with its media campaign is Minnesotans Against Terrorism, which says it convinced the Minneapolis Star Tribune to alter its editorial policy on Mideast stories. Mark Rotenberg, a general counsel for the University of Minnesota and a leader of the group, said the Star Tribune has begun reversing that trend, owning up to mistakes in columns and running 'dozens of references' to anti-Israel terrorism. The paper's reader representative, Lew Gelfand, could not be reached for comment."

Jewish board condemns 'sensationalist' doccie,
Indepenent Online, November 07 2002
"The South African Jewish Board of Deputies has slammed e.tv for the screening of a hard-hitting documentary on the Israel-Palestinian conflict, highlighting abuses of innocent Palestinians by Israeli troops. Palestine is Still the Issue was broadcast on the current affairs programme 3rd Degree on Wednesday night. It was produced by John Pilger, a columnist for the UK Daily Mirror, and was, he said, aimed at being 'pro-justice, not pro-Palestine' ... But Israeli Rami Elhanan, who was interviewed for the documentary, would have disagreed. Elhanan, whose 14-year-old daughter was killed by a Palestinian suicide bomber in 1997, said: 'If you think from the head and not the guts, if you look at what has made these people do this, people with no hope, who are desperate enough to commit suicide, you have to ask yourself if you have contributed in any way to this despair and craziness. It did not come out of the blue.' He was not the only Israeli interviewed on the documentary who took a critical view of the situation. Others, including historians and former Israeli soldiers, spoke harshly of the way Palestinians are oppressed and humiliated. Palestinian Mona al-Farra, also interviewed for the documentary, said: 'Our destiny is not in our hands. They (Israelis) are controlling every detail of our lives.'"

P.R. campaign already winning support for Israel, producers say,
Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Nov. 7, 2002
"Pro-Israel TV ads seem to be winning some key American hearts and minds. A series of 30-second spots trumpeting Israeli democracy, which began airing nationally in September on CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, reversed a downward spiral in support for Israel among influential opinion shapers, according to the ads’ producers — who also conducted the follow-up polls to gauge their impact. The ads were aimed at Americans who help shape national discourse. The producers defined that group as those with a college or post-graduate education who earn at least $75,000 and get their news from national newspapers, magazines, or network and cable TV shows. ... The [Israel Project] set about raising close to $1 million for a public relations campaign to reverse the trend [of viewer neutrality of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict] . ... In Washington, where the most ads appeared, support for Israel among opinion movers rose from 36 percent to 52 percent. 'Israel’s image has moved from the intensive care unit to a normal room in the hospital,' said Washington Democratic strategist Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, a key figure in the pro-Israel campaign ... Others behind the Israel Project are the American Jewish Committee and Israel 21c, a group of Silicon Valley high-tech businessmen devoted to promoting Israel. During the summer the Israel Project produced the pro-Israel ads, paid for a series of polls of Americans and American Jews and led seminars for Israeli and U.S. Jewish officials aimed at improving Israel’s image in the media. Joining Laszlo Mizrahi in the effort were Democratic pollster Stanley Greenberg and Republican pollster Frank Luntz. ... After seeing the ads, opinion elites also increasingly believed that Israel shares American principles of freedom and equality."

Man Bites Watchdogs,
Chicago Reader, November 15, 2002
"'This is actually a quite unique event,' said Sut Jhally, settling in at the podium. 'I thought this was going to be a progressive conference that put the analysis of propaganda at its center. In fact, it has turned into an example of the operation of propaganda itself.' Jhally had just insulted the people who'd invited him to Chicago to speak. ... Jhally's host was Chicago Media Watch, a grassroots organization haunted by mounting evidence that the American media are being taken over by a handful of massive corporations ... Jhally, a professor of communications at the University of Massachusetts and executive director of the Media Education Foundation, is famous for his studies of how advertising and marketing work on the public mind ... But Jhally had chosen a subject -- perhaps the only subject -- that actually does divide media progressives. He intended to argue that the Israeli government is brilliantly manipulating American public opinion against the Palestinians. And so CMW president Liane Casten had asked someone else to follow him to the microphone and give Israel's side. Jhally arrived at midday, got the lay of the land, and was so furious he promptly canceled his hotel reservation and booked a six o'clock flight back home. But he went through with his lecture. He told his audience he'd come to 'unpack' the American public's strong support for the Israelis, something he called 'the end result of perhaps the most powerful example of propaganda and public relations we can find in the world' ... The pressure on journalists to conform, he said, 'works in other ways as well. It also works when there is an event such as this, which, as I said, I thought was a left-wing progressive event in which you may actually open the debate in some way.' Apparently it wasn't. 'It's not often,' he said, 'I can actually point and say, `Here it is, actually working' ... Jhally was telling his audience that this polarization serves the ends of the Israeli government: when any critique of Israeli conduct is regarded as a viewpoint so controversial that immediate rebuttal must be provided -- in the name of fairness and balance -- the critique is blunted if it's heard at all. 'No one wants to be controversial,' he said. 'So look around you and see how the propaganda system works. This is, in fact, the system in operation. It's kept a lot of people quiet. It kept me quiet a long time.'"

State Dept. official: All U.S. aid to Arab world under review,
Ha'aretz (Israel), November 16, 2002
"The United States is reviewing all its aid to the Arab world to see how much it can redirect to programs that promote democracy and the rule of law, a State Department official said on Friday. The review includes all assistance to Egypt, the second largest recipient of U.S. aid after Israel and one of Washington's best friends in the Arab world, he said ... But the Egyptian government has upset the United States at least twice this year, first by jailing prominent Egyptian-American sociologist Saadeddin Ibrahim and more recently by allowing state television to broadcast a series which American Jewish groups say is anti-Semitic. U.S. diplomats in Cairo have been watching the series, 'Knight without a House', as it unfolds during the fasting month of Ramadan and have concluded that they do not like its treatment of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. 'We are very disappointed that the Government of Egypt TV station would air a program that includes scenes treating the so-called Protocols of the Elders of Zion, an anti-Semitic forgery, as fact,' the U.S. official said. "This broadcast does great harm to Egypt's reputation. We will continue to express to the government of Egypt our serious concern over this matter. This kind of program does not contribute to the climate of mutual understanding and tolerance that the Middle East so needs,' the official added. Egypt and the United States have also been at odds this year over U.S. threats to attack Iraq ... U.S. officials say they believe that antagonism toward the United States in the Arab world is based on ignorance, misunderstanding or propaganda by Arab governments. Arabs say their main problem is with U.S. policies."

UN rejects Israeli account of British official's killing,
Independent (UK), November 25, 2002
"The United Nations dismissed as 'not credible' yesterday an Israeli army claim that Palestinian gunmen fired from inside a UN compound in the West Bank city of Jenin on Friday before its soldiers shot dead Iain Hook, a 52-year-old British relief worker. Paul McCann, a spokesman for the UN relief agency, said: 'Our preliminary findings are completely contrary to what the Israeli army said. The compound is quite small. At no point did we lose control of the site. There were no militants on the site. I am very sad and angry that the man was shot dead while working in a clearly marked UN compound.' A security expert from UN headquarters in New York began immediately to investigate in greater depth how Mr Hook, who was heading a £17m project to rebuild the Jenin refugee camp razed in an Israeli invasion in April, met his death. He was transferred last night to an Israeli forensic medicine laboratory near Tel Aviv, but UN officials were awaiting his family's decision on where to hold a post-mortem examination. Palestinians showed up in big numbers with flowers when the dead man was put into a UN ambulance for transfer to Jerusalem ... Although Israel apologised for the 'error', the shooting provoked a crisis in its relations with the UN and Britain. Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, demanded a full investigation ... Elsewhere on the West Bank, Israeli troops yesterday barred worshippers from attending services in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. They reoccupied the city of Jesus Christ's birth on Thursday after a Hamas suicide bomber killed 11 Israelis on a Jerusalem bus. Thursday's bus bombing provoked a series of attacks by angry Jews against Arabs and their property in Jerusalem."

Group Urges Pro-Israel Leaders' Silence on Iraq. Memo Outlines Response If Hostilities Occur, Discourages Lecturing of Americans on Middle East,
Washington Post, November 27, 2002; Page A13
"A group of U.S. political consultants has sent pro-Israel leaders a memo urging them to keep quiet while the Bush administration pursues a possible war with Iraq. The six-page memo was sent by the Israel Project, a group funded by American Jewish organizations and individual donors. Its authors said the main audience was American Jewish leaders, but much of the memo's language is directed toward Israelis, urging them to play down the likelihood Israel would retaliate after an Iraqi attack and asking them not to lecture Americans about the Middle East conflict. The memo reflects a concern that involvement by Israel in a U.S.-Iraq confrontation could hurt Israel's standing in American public opinion and undermine international support for a hard line against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. 'Let American politicians fight it out on the floor of Congress and in the media,' the memo said. 'Let the nations of the world argue in front of the U.N. Your silence allows everyone to focus on Iraq rather than Israel' ... The Iraq memo was issued in the past few weeks and labeled 'confidential property of the Israel Project,' which is led by Democratic consultant Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi with help from Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg and Republican pollsters Neil Newhouse and Frank Luntz ... [The memo] added: 'You do not want Americans to believe that the war on Iraq is being waged to protect Israel rather than to protect America' ... It advised leaders to say: 'Like America, Israel has a right to defend itself and our people.' The memo coached: '(A)s an Israeli, most certainly don't talk about why some Arab leaders and their people dislike the United States. Americans don't want to be told by an Israeli why we have problems in the Middle East or why people hate us.'"

Back Home Israel's struggle for hearts and minds,
Ha'aretz (Israel), December 2, 2002
"The conventional wisdom among policy-makers in Israel and the United States is that if there is one front on which Israel enjoys a clear advantage in the international arena, it is hasbara - information and public relations - in the United States. Israel's views are accepted by the administration and win support in Congress and American public opinion clearly prefers the Israeli cause to the Palestinian one. However, closer scrutiny of the elements that make up American public opinion will show that Israel has cause for concern. In the duel with the Palestinians over the hearts of average Americans, Israel wins hands down. But when Israel puts itself up for judgment, things look different: Israel is seen as a country that is not pursuing peace, is largely responsible for the violence in the territories and is not morally in the right in the conflict. These positions largely reflect the approach taken by the public at large and to an even greater extent, the views of the most influential groups within American society. An inside look at American public opinion about Israel has been provided by a survey conducted in late October by pollster Stanley Greenberg, and including a variety of questions related to Americans' approach to Israel, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Jews in America. The survey, which according to experts in the field faithfully reflects the current mood in America toward Israel, was privately commissioned by a group of Jewish activists who are conducting a broad-based television campaign for Israel. The results were kept confidential. The purpose of the survey was to find out how effective messages aimed at the public are, but the answers it supplies show what Americans really think about Israel' ... Although the Palestinian cause is at a very low point in the United States, and the American public, according to other surveys, for the most part, identifies Palestinian violence with terrorism in general, Israel enjoys a support rate of only 50 percent among 'influential' Americans (high-income, educated people who take a considerable interest in the news). The figure drops to 48 percent when this group of Americans is reduced to those living in the Washington, D.C. area, in other words, those with access to government circles ... The Israeli attempt to establish a moral distinction between Israel's actions in the territories and Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians has not been successful: Only 39 percent believe that Israel is morally justified, while 38 percent believe that Israel is behaving like the terrorists it is trying to combat ... Greenberg's survey shows that three-quarters of those polled among the general public believe that 'Israeli's actions in the territories are raising a new generation of potential terrorists, who could attack the United States in the future' ... So what should the United States do in the Middle East? The elites, according to the survey, believe that the American administration should pressure Israel to enter into negotiations with the Palestinians. On the question of which side the United States should support, Israel still enjoys an advantage, but it involves only one-third of the population that believes that Israel should be supported. A large majority of 60 percent believes that the United States should not support either of the sides ... Beyond the obvious advantage over its Palestinian rivals, Israel is viewed among the influential population as a strong ally of the United States, a country that shares American values of equality and freedom and is a partner to the democratic ideology upon which the United States is based. From a public relations standpoint, these are very important points that help establish Israel's unique status in American public opinion and guarantees that it will be judged favorably by the public, even if that public does not always agree with its actions and behavior. However, the survey reveals the fact that in the long run, the American public, despite its loyalty to Israel, could become open to a different approach toward Israel by the administration ... The new obstacle facing Israeli PR at present is the question of the possible American war against Iraq. An expose in The Washington Post recently caused considerable embarrassment to Israeli PR experts, when the newspaper published an internal memorandum with recommendations for Israeli PR vis-a-vis Iraq. The recommendations, authored by Republican strategist Frank Luntz, were commissioned by Project Israel, the same organization that commissioned Greenberg's survey of public opinion about Israel. The article enabled readers to have a look behind the scenes of hasbara - including an appeal to Israeli spokesmen not to present the war in Iraq as an "Israeli matter," a demand to minimize comments on a possible response to missile fire on Israel from Iraq and the suggestion that Israel not try to teach the American public about the Middle East. Israeli officials hurried to repudiate the leaked study, saying there was no connection between the government of Israel and the private Jewish organizations that commissioned it ... Moreover, how will Israel explain the fact that it supports active international intervention to solve one focus of instability in the region (Iraq) while firmly opposing any such intervention in another (the Israeli-Palestinian conflict)? The public relations line taken by the Arabs in the past few months has been that Iraq is not the problem - Palestine is, and that the Americans should first resolve the issues in that troubled area of the region before dealing with Saddam Hussein."

Israeli Icon Under Fire. Did the nation's most celebrated archaeologist deliberately deceive the public about Masada?,
Chronicle of Higher Education, December 6, 2002
"On the last day of October, a cavalcade of foreign dignitaries and Israeli officials joined hundreds of ordinary citizens making their way to the top of a plateau overlooking the Dead Sea. They gathered to proclaim this secluded fortress, called Masada, one of the world's most important historical sites -- a place worthy of global attention and protection. The United Nations, which put the Israeli mesa on the list of World Heritage Sites, chose the place in part to commemorate the Jewish rebels who held the lofty stronghold, and eventually perished there, in the waning days of a revolt against the Roman Empire in AD 73. In its report on Masada, the U.N. concludes that 'the tragic events during the last days of the Jewish refugees who occupied the fortress and palace of Masada make it a symbol both of Jewish cultural identity and, more universally, of the continuing human struggle between oppression and liberty.' One prominent Israeli scholar, though, stayed home. He tossed aside his invitation and instead made scornful remarks to the news media. For Nachman Ben-Yehuda, a sociologist who is dean of the faculty of social sciences at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Masada stands as a symbol of national mythology and academic deception -- a case study of how archaeologists can hijack the scientific method for ideological purposes. In his controversial new book, Sacrificing Truth: Archaeology and the Myth of Masada (Prometheus/Humanity Books), Mr. Ben-Yehuda accuses Israel's most celebrated archaeologist, the late Yigael Yadin, of professional misconduct in his excavations at the site during the 1960s. After studying transcripts of conversations and documents written during the work and years later, Mr. Ben-Yehuda concludes that Yadin conducted 'a scheme of distortion which was aimed at providing Israelis with a spurious historical narrative of heroism' ... Over the past decade, Mr. Ben-Yehuda has dedicated a large portion of his time to exposing what he sees as the Israeli self-delusion over Masada."

PRIME MINISTER ARIEL SHARON: I CALL UPON EVERY JEW IN THE WORLD TO JOIN ISRAEL'S INFORMATION CAMPAIGN. TOGETHER WE SHALL WIN!,
Global Jewish Agenda (Jewish Agency), 2002
"To facilitate your information efforts, guidelines disseminated by Israel's Foreign Ministry follow: GUIDELINES FOR INFORMATION ACTIVITIES ... Central Message Israel's central message today is 'a bleeding nation.' This terminology must be used repeatedly as well as the term 'the Passover Massacre.' It must be emphasized that no country in the world can allow such carnage. Those nations that are preaching to Israel would not ignore terror within their boundaries. Discussion can resume only when terror is halted. Removing the Limelight from Arafat The foreign media depict Arafat as a hero. It must be repeatedly stressed that Arafat is not the problem, but rather, the slaughter and terror that are plaguing Israel, in which entire families have been killed. Arafat should not be discussed; emphasis should be placed, rather, on the orphans, the bereaved families, and the victims of terror. The Palestinian spokespeople do not mention the terror attacks but only the Israeli army and tanks; we must respond by portraying the victims and the bereaved families ... Providing information Information must be supplied to journalists continuously. No door must be left open for disinformation by Palestinian spokesmen. It is essential to provide photographs of terror attacks, the personal stories of the victims of terror, etc."

Jewish group banned from Concordia University,
CBC, Dec 6, 2002
"There's more conflict at Montreal's Concordia University. The Jewish group Hillel has been suspended by the student union for handing out pamphlets at an information table. The student council says those pamphlets violate Canadian law. Hillel says the pamphlets were recruitment propaganda for the Mahal faction of the Israeli Defence Forces. It's a volunteer service that enlists non-Israelis to fight on the country's behalf. Co-president Noah Joseph says an intern placed the pamphlets on the table for two hours. But the Concordia Student Union (CSU) says they contravene Canada's Foreign Enlistment Act because armed forces from other countries are not allowed to recruit in Canada. Joseph says Hillel lawyers are looking into the allegations. But he believes there's another reason his group has been targeted by the student union. 'The CSU is not going after us over one issue. They've been trying to get us for a while and they've found something with which they can pounce on us,' said Joseph. CSU spokesman Ralph Lee says that's not the case ... Lee says the suspension means Hillel's funding is frozen and it is not allowed to set up any information tables."

Hezbollah says Canada was duped into calling them terrorists,
CBC [Canadian Broadcasting Company], December 12, 2002
"Hezbollah says it has been the victim of a propaganda campaign and Canada made a mistake in listing it as a terrorist organization.Until Wednesday, Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham had resisted adding the organization to a list of terrorist groups, saying the social arm of Hezbollah was a legitimate charity. He said he changed his mind – in part – after hearing media reports of the group's leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, urging Palestinians to expand their suicide bombings worldwide. But those reports have not been confirmed. CBC TV reported Wednesday that no record of those remarks could be found, and the Canadian embassy in Beirut has tried and failed to document the quotes. The quotes were in a story written by London-based freelancer Paul Martin. He told CBC TV that he cannot back up the quotes but maintains he understands Nasralla's true agenda. Hezbollah said Canada has fallen for a disinformation campaign run out of Israel, and the decision to list the organization as a terrorist group will hurt Canada's image in the Arab world ... To the Bush administration in the United States, it is the 'A-team of terror.' Lebanese newspaper columnist Ibrahim al-Mousawi said the group was born out of Israel's 1982 invasion, which killed nearly 20,000 Lebanese civilians. 'Hezbollah started resisting this invasion just like any people that defend their country and their people. This resistance is depicted as terrorism by the Americans and the Israelis, and I would be very sorry to hear the Canadians using the same language,' he said .... Today Hezbollah is a political party that holds 12 seats in Lebanon's parliament. It also runs schools, hospitals and social services. Senior Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Izz el-Dine said the organization has no quarrel with the West. 'Hezbollah works inside Lebanon to resist the Israeli occupation, to get them out of the country. Hezbollah defends its land, its people, its independence, and Hezbollah does not have any branches outside Lebanon,' he said."

Telling the Real History of a Legendary Forgery. Israeli Filmmaker Plans a Documentary on 'The Protocols of the Elders of Zion',
[Jewish] Forward, December 13, 2002
"Nitzan Aviram is trying to keep his argument focused. When the 50-year-old Israeli filmmaker found out that Egyptian television was making a series based in part on 'The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,' the 97-year-old czarist forgery about Jews plotting to conquer the world, he thought it would be just another arrow in his quiver and little more ... Aviram, who is currently in New York to raise funds for the film, has found people more willing to donate money than they might have been only weeks earlier. Daniel Talbot, head of New Yorker Films, has already agreed to distribute the unshot film, and Elie Wiesel has lent Aviram his support ... Although born in Israel and currently residing in Tel Aviv with his wife, a film editor, Aviram spent many years in New York, first as an undergraduate at New York University and later as a frequent visitor with many devoted Upper West Side friends. Aviram's father, Joseph, was a prominent archaeologist at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Nitzan spent much of his childhood at Masada and in the Negev ... After graduating from NYU, where he majored in film, Aviram decided to become involved in the Israeli film industry. 'I wanted to work in Israel, with the Israeli film industry,' Aviram said, 'but my first job was with a big $40 million American film series ['Masada'] that was being shot in Israel.' Since that first project, Aviram has been immersed in the Israeli film industry." [NOTE: It is extraordinarily ironic and profoundly hypocritical that Mr. Aviram seeks to expose a fraud when the legend of "Masada" -- the film that got his film career started -- is itself based on fraud: myth, not history. See here]

Breaking News. Campaign to improve Israel´s U.S. image,
JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency), May 10, 2002
[This link is to home page of JTA, where the two "breaking news" items here do not have a specific URL address]
"Breaking News: A campaign has been launched to improve Israel´s image in the United States. A series of television advertisements are already airing on television news channels in Washington, with plans to make the campaign national. 'I really firmly believe the U.S.-Israeli relationship is in serious danger," said Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, a Washington political consultant organizing the effort. The initiative, funded by individual donations and family foundations, is seeking $10 million to reach its goal.'" ALSO: "Breaking News: Pamphlets for Israel. A million pamphlets designed to help Americans support Israel are being sent around the country. The Simon Wiesenthal Center is mailing a million pamphlets to Jewish community centers, campuses and synagogues that urge people to fight against the campaign to "delegitimize Israel" being waged by Muslims. The mailing offers specific responses to a number of "lies and misconceptions" and urges people to contact U.S. and world leaders and the media."

European Poll Faults US for Its Policy in the Mideast,
by Adam Clymer, New York Times, April 19, 2002
"People in Europe, while sympathetic to recent American efforts in the Middle East, strongly feel that the United States has not done enough to bring about a peace settlement, according to coordinated polls in Britain, France, Germany and Italy. A key reason for the European unhappiness appears to be a much greater sympathy for the Palestinians than is found in the United States. The survey, conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, showed that majorities of 71 percent in France, 67 percent in Italy, 64 percent in Germany and 57 percent in Britain said the United States was not "doing as much as it can to bring about a peace settlement between the Israelis and the Palestinians." The respondents, about 1,000 people in each country, were asked, "In the dispute between Israel and the Palestinians, which side do you sympathize with more?" In none of the European countries did more sympathize with Israel, while in a companion poll in the United Sates, 41 percent sided with Israel to 13 percent for the Palestinians. The closest European division in the poll -- conducted with the International Herald Tribune and the Council on Foreign Relations -- came in Germany. There 24 percent sided with Israel and 26 percent with the Palestinians, a difference that fell within the poll's margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points. But in the other three nations, the Palestinian side was preferred, 36 percent to 19 percent in France, 30 to 14 in Italy and 28 to 17 in Britain."

Today, I am a Jew,
by Catherine Ford, The Calgary Herald, March 2, 2002
"You are either with Israel or against it. Catherine Ford has picked her side. He was slaughtered far away from Jerusalem or Ramallah. But Daniel Pearl's death and mutilation in Pakistan, because he was an American, but most importantly because he was a Jew, has done what no other act of barbarism accomplished. The Wall Street Journal writer's death turned my heart to stone. Even this week's peace overtures from Saudi Arabia are no longer enough. Not after yet another Jew has been humiliated, slaughtered, and his remains debased. There is an apocryphal Second World war story during the German occupation of Denmark: When the Nazis ordered all Jews to wear a yellow star, so did King Christian X. And he encouraged all his subjects to do the same. That Queen Margrethe says it didn't happen doesn't in any way debase the symbolism. The myth continues because bravery and defiance in the face of hatred is always inspiring. Today, those who hate Jews are able to do so because too many gentiles will not stand up and be counted as the Danish myth proposes. Too many non-Jews tacitly accept racism and discrimination. No more. Today, I proudly echo Pearl's last words: I am a Jew. I join my husband, his family, our friends, and my colleagues who are Jews. I am a Jew because I can no longer accept the excuses made for anti-Semitism. I no longer accept the lies that hatred on the part of Arab countries and hatred shown the Jews in the West is something individual and isolated. It is not. Our silence for long years has encouraged Holocaust deniers, revisionists, baiters and hater to spread their poison. I used to think there was a middle ground, that especially when the question of Israel arose, that both 'sides' were equally at fault. No more. I can't agree with the actions of Ariel Sharon's government, in its eye-for-an-eye, death-for-death retaliation against the Palestinians, but my disgust for anti-Semites and Israel-deniers who populate Israel's Arsb neighbours is worse ... There are few countries in the Middle East that share our civilized values and democratic principles as closely as Israel does. It is time to stand up and be counted in more than words. We have the power and moral responsibility to do so, and it doesn't need to be with bombs ... The time for "understanding" the plight of the Palestinians is past. It's now time to affirm on the world stage the inherent right of Israel to exist in peace. Israel's neighbours must accept their responsibility in fomenting hatred and open their borders to displaced Palestinians ... If we are committed to Israel, we have tp show we mean it, and if that means less oil for SUVs because we refuse to trade honour for comfort, tood bad. It is time for all of us to stand up and say: I am a Jew."

Rewriting History in Textbooks By Mitchell Bard (December 1993),
Jewish Virtual Library
"The following examination of 18 of the most widely used world and American history texts indicates this silence has allowed publishers to distribute books that are filled with egregious factual errors and specious analyses. The mistakes invariably are to the detriment of the Jews or Israel, raising questions about the predisposition of authors and publishers. The anti-Israel bias is usually a result of factual inaccuracy, oversimplification, omission and distortion. Common errors include getting dates of events wrong, blaming Israel for wars that were a result of Arab provocation, perpetuating the myth of Islamic tolerance of Jews, minimizing the Jewish aspect of the Holocaust, apologizing for Arab autocrats, refusing to label violence against civilians as terrorism and suggesting that Israel is the obstacle to peace. Some of the most flagrant examples that occur in more than one book are the failure to mention that Syria and Egypt launched a surprise attack in 1973 on Israel's holiest day, Yom Kippur, and that Iraq fired SCUD missiles at Israel during the 1991 Gulf War. The books in this study were so poorly written that all but one require major revisions. The best way to correct the bias in textbooks is for parents to take an active role by examining the books their children are being assigned. If they know or suspect that Jewish history is being distorted, they should protest to the school, school board and publisher. The study does not suggest that anti-Semitic publishers are conspiring to corrupt our nation's youth. On the contrary, it acknowledges that errors are most likely to occur because editors are harried or the books are inadequately reviewed by experts. The best publishers do now want mistakes in their texts. It is up to parents and educators, however, to alert them when they occur so they can be corrected."

AIPAC trains student activists,
Cleveland Jewish News, December 31, 2002
"As part of an initiative to groom a new generation of pro-Israel activists on campus, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee brought 240 students to Washington for four all-expense-paid days of intense advocacy training. When pro-Palestinian activism swept the country's college campuses after the intifada began in September 2000, it seemed that nearly every Jewish organization hatched plans to `take back the campus.' The different groups often work together through a coordinating body, the Israel on Campus Coalition, that formed last fall. The effort appears to be working: Students say the anti-Israel forces are on the wane on campus. Within the Jewish community, there are `clearly differences of opinion when it comes to how to deal with detractors of Israel,' said Daniel Frankenstein, [EDITOR'S NOTE: Honest. That's his name] 21, a junior at the University of California at Berkeley, where he leads several secular campus groups. AIPAC doesn't advocate for any specific policy, but pounds out a simple message about the necessity of a strong U.S.-Israel relationship, he said. AIPAC teaches students the benefits of the relationship to the United States and shows them how to pass that message along to campus leaders ... The conferences are a segment of the Schusterman Advocacy Institute, an expansion of AIPAC's 20-year- old student program. The program now focuses on 60 campuses, chosen because they have large Jewish populations and feed Congress with future leaders. On each campus, AIPAC works with four `portfolioed' activists -- each with his or her own designated tasks -- to turn Jewish leaders into pro-Israel activists ... With AIPAC's help, Osofsky arranged a 50-person lunch with Mark Regev, a spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington, and made an opportunity for certain guests, including the student body president, to have some private time with Regev."

[Letter to Editor]
Shame on the CBC's Israel coverage,
by Norman Spector, National Post, January 8, 2003
"Dear Mr. Burman [Editor in Chief, CBC News], I am writing in reply to your recent letter, in which you ask that I withdraw my criticism of the CBC's Mideast coverage. Many Canadians are still struggling to comprehend how Chief David Ahenakew could have spoken approvingly of Hitler and the Holocaust. Their understanding has not been helped by the media, who've largely failed to explain the context -- a speech in which he had just blamed Jews for the Second World War and, by 'killing Arabs,' an eventual third one. I believe your Mideast coverage encourages demented views such as these. I understand this is a serious charge, and am prepared to debate in a mutually agreed forum if you disagree ... The CBC's consistently negative presentation of Israel -- a country where minefields are not a bureaucratic problem, and that has its few good points along with the bad -- is, in part, a consequence of sending reporters who lack Hebrew. Even a senior reporter like Neil Macdonald, in my experience though understandably not yours, normally lags behind news freely available on radio and the Internet. And, the linguistic gap perhaps explains why -- despite the expense of maintaining a foreign bureau -- he rarely reports on Israel's medical, cultural, scientific and technological achievements. Your correspondent deserves praise, on the other hand, for studying Arabic, which is not easy to acquire. ... Yours sincerely, Norman Spector" [former Canadian Ambassador to Israel]
Jewish group plans rally against CBC,
by Gayle MacDonald, Toronto Globe and Mail, January 14, 2003
"An angry, grassroots Jewish organization is organizing a demonstration today against the CBC [the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation], alleging its Middle East coverage has been 'consistently negative' against Jews. Supporters of Canadians Against Antisemitism plan to gather outside the CBC's Toronto headquarters late in the afternoon. The Toronto-based group, which has 700 members, is taking particular aim at the news reports of veteran CBC correspondent Neil MacDonald, the public broadcaster's correspondent in the Middle East for the past five years. Sandra Stern, the group's chairwoman, believes Mr. MacDonald's coverage is biased, criticism that comes on the heels of a heated debate in newspaper columns between Norman Spector, a former Canadian ambassador to Israel, and Tony Burman, the CBC's executive director of news. Mr. Spector has criticized the CBC harshly, suggesting it takes an anti-Israel, anti-Jewish stance. Mr. Burman has stoically maintained CBC coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is balanced and fair. The two men are now trying to hammer out terms agreeable to both for a 30-minute TV debate slated to take place on Sunday on CBC News: Sunday, a 10 a.m. show with hosts Evan Solomon and Carole MacNeil."

Group installs pro-Israel ads at BART Controversial billboards highlight 'similarities' between the U.S. and Israel,
Contra Costa Times (California, January 14, 2003
"Some unexpected billboards are cropping up at East Bay BART stations. The posters feature a pretty, sun-tanned girl with an American flag painted on her cheek standing in front of an Israeli flag. The text below says, 'Israel and America: Shared values, shared dreams -- peace, justice and democracy.' The signs are designed to say that Israel and America have more in common than residents might think. But that message is igniting its own controversy. Launched by the Oakland-based Jewish Community Federation of the Greater East Bay last week, the ad campaign aims to raise public awareness of 'similaritie' between America and Israel at a time when conflicts in the Middle East make such comparisons tough for some to swallow. 'In terms of education, culture, technology and values, America and Israel are remarkably similar,' said Ami Nahshon, executive vice president of the Jewish Community Federation. 'The basis on which our countries were founded, the democratic freedoms we enjoy are fundamental to life in both societies.'"

[The best way to protect massive Jewish social and political influence is to ignore those who protest it. But as more and more people notice this situation, it is necessary for Jewish apologists to cautiously come forward with dissimulation. When was the last time you saw anyone allowed a media forum to debate Mr. Aaronovitch's position here?]
The ultimate Jewish conspiracy theory,
by David Aaronovitch, Guardian (UK), January 15, 2003
"God save us from conspiracy theorists, were Senator Joseph Lieberman to be elected US president in 2004. Things are quite bad enough as they stand, without a Jewish head of state in America. Fortunately, it looks as though George Bush will win, whoever his opponent is. For the past 40 years, the common explanation for US partiality towards Israel has been the power of the Jewish lobby. It is an explanation that, broadly, has united leftwingers and rightwingers. Why has the United States been so supine in the face of Israeli intransigence, and so uncaring in its attitude towards the plight of the Palestinians? Above all, why has it behaved in this way, when a more balanced approach might have served its long-term interests far better? The Jewish lobby, that's why. The lobby explanation has been outlined with great clarity by Mark Weber, who is director of the American Institute for Historical Review. ... Jews have cropped up in almost all of the major 19th and 20th-century political movements - many of them completely contradictory. They are cited as leading forces in liberalism, neo-conservatism, socialism, bolshevism and market capitalism. The only two movements that Jews don't seem to have led are fascism and Islamic fundamentalism. Still, they were the guys behind Reagan, the guys behind Clinton - either ever mutating, ever powerful (if you're a conspiracist), or ever disagreeing with each other if you're not. The other difficulty for non-conspiracists is that there just aren't that many Jews in America."

Carriage before the horse,
Al-Ahram Weekly (Egypt), November 14-20, 2002
"The hysterical Israeli and American reaction to the television show Horseman Without a Horse is indicative of the way the Zionist media machine seeks to twist facts and distract attention from the real issues. The campaign is an obvious attempt to divert attention from the crimes Israel is committing against the Palestinians, and from Washington's flagrant support of Israel's racist policies. The Horseman Without a Horse debacle comes at a highly charged moment, a time when the Arabs are desperately seeking any backing for the Palestinians in the face of Israel's merciless assault ... The diplomatic frenzy orchestrated by the State Department, the US Embassy in Cairo and, of course, the Israelis, resulted in 46 congressmen taking an interest in programmes they had not seen. These venerable congressmen daily witness Israeli murders of Palestinians, daily witness the destruction of all things Palestinian. This, though, has never moved them. The Zionist media machine, however, managed to engage their attention immediately. The first episodes of the show, together with the press conference given by actor Mohamed Sobhi and statements by Egypt's Information Ministry, have underlined the fact that Horseman Without a Horse could not be more removed from the anti-Semitism the Americans so forcefully condemn. The show reviews the history of Arab struggle against imperialism, from Ottoman rule to British occupation. It tackles the Balfour Declaration and the role of imperialism in planting Israel in the region, together with the Jewish assault on the rights of the Palestinian people. The show only mentions The Protocols in passing. It must be said, however, that the producers committed a grave error. Their promotional campaign stupidly suggested that the Horseman would be a dramatisation of The Protocols. Knowing the emotional associations of The Protocols, which the Arab street sees as an embodiment of the evil of Zionism, and with an actor with Sobhi's status in the leading role, the show was bound to attract attention. Some critics have pointed out that Egyptian television did not need to place itself at the heart of a political and international controversy, particularly one so pointless. Israel inevitably benefits from any stoking of the charge of anti-Semitism against Arabs."

Billboards give Israel a human dimension. Pro-Israel group hopes to educate Oakland, Berkeley commuters about the two countries' democratic ideals,
Contra Costa Times, Jan. 22, 2003
"A pro-Israel group hopes that Bay Area commuters will take a second look at its message: The United States has more in common with this tiny nation than Americans might think. A dozen billboards have gone up at six Bay Area Rapid Transit stations in Oakland and Berkeley in recent weeks, each bearing the picture of a smiling girl with the Israeli flag in the background and the Stars and Stripes painted on her cheek. 'America & Israel/Shared Values, Shared Dreams/Peace, Justice and Democracy,' the message reads. The 46-by-60-inch signs invite passers-by to learn more about Israel and the similarities it shares with the U.S. by clicking on the Web site www.SharedValuesSharedDreams.org. Sponsored by the Jewish Federation of the Greater East Bay, the approximately monthlong campaign is an attempt to help Americans learn more about Israel, a key Middle East ally for the United States ... The timing of the campaign has nothing to do with escalating tensions between the U.S. and Iraq, said Riva Gambert, director of federation volunteers known as the Israel Task Force. 'This is not ... at all directed (against) countries in the Middle East,' she said. The Web site attempts to emphasize the similarities between Israel and the United States, drawing parallels between the two countries' democratic ideals. Both nations began as a refuge for immigrants seeking religious freedom, and both value peace and justice, the Web site contends. Israel and the U.S. have economic ties and collaborate in such fields as science, health and education. 'We want to show the real Israel, the Israel behind the headlines,' Gambert said."

Publicity campaign winning support for Israel in U.S.,
November 8, 2002, Jewish Telegraphic Agency
"Pro-Israel TV ads seem to be winning some key U.S. hearts and minds. A series of 30-second spots trumpeting Israeli democracy, which began airing nationally in September on CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, reversed a downward spiral in support for Israel among influential opinion shapers, according to the ads' producers -- who also conducted the follow-up polls to gauge their impact. The ads were aimed at U.S. citizens who help shape national discourse. The producers defined that group as those with a college or post-graduate education who earn at least $75,000 and get their news from national newspapers, magazines, or network and cable TV shows. Back in July, polls commissioned by a coalition called the Israel Project found that 42 percent of these opinion leaders supported Israel in its conflict with the Palestinians, while 10 percent sided with the Palestinians. Yet about nearly half of these people also described themselves as growing increasingly neutral in the conflict, reflecting a deep decline in U.S. support for Israel since the Palestinian uprising began two years ago. The Israel Project blamed the dive in support on negative news images of Israel during the intifada. The group set about raising close to $1 million for a public relations campaign to reverse the trend. The heart of the Israel Project's message arose from focus groups it ran over the summer that showed American perceptions of Israel improving when Israeli democracy was highlighted. The producers say post-ad surveys bear out the project's premise. After ads showing Israeli democracy ran in 50 major TV markets, sympathy for Israel climbed in October to 50 percent nationwide, while sympathy for the Palestinians edged up to just 12 percent. In Washington, where the most ads appeared, support for Israel among opinion movers rose from 36 percent to 52 percent. 'Israel's image has moved from the intensive care unit to a normal room in the hospital,' said Washington Democratic strategist Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, a key figure in the pro-Israel campaign. While the American Jewish community traditionally has considered Israel's poor public image the inevitable result of unfair perceptions, the ads and subsequent polls showed that "we're making a difference," she said. Others behind the Israel Project are the American Jewish Committee and Israel 21c, a group of Silicon Valley high-tech businessmen devoted to promoting Israel."

[Jewish/Israeli propaganda feast over the Space Shuttle tragedy: a chance for more Holocaust heralding, Israeli "democracy," etc. etc. etc.]
Grief tightens U.S.-Israeli bond,
Jewish World Review, February 4, 2003
"Beyond national pride, the joint voyage into space represented for Israelis an almost mystical entwining of both our destinies. 'It's a sign from G-d about our common fate,' a secular friend said to me. Several Israeli newspaper columnists noted that Ramon, one of the Israeli pilots who destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor in 1981, was included on an American space shuttle just as Washington prepares for war against Saddam Hussein. Though Israel is barely the size of New Jersey, the two nations share common values and origins. Both were founded by immigrants inspired by biblical humanism. Both are societies whose diversity is a microcosm of humanity. Israel is one of the few countries where America is still regarded without cynicism as the world's great defender of freedom. And Americans appreciate Israel as a laboratory for testing the durability of democracy under duress. Israelis love America. On Israeli Independence Day, some motorists in the Jewish State fly the Israeli and American flags. And although a U.S. attack could make us the first target of Saddam's revenge, most Israelis back the war. For Israelis, U.S. support represents far more than foreign aid. It is proof that Jews aren't fated to once again become a pariah people. Israelis were especially grateful that Ramon was included in the shuttle crew at a time when the Jewish state has been widely demonized for defending itself against terrorism ... The pro-Israel lobby is one of Washington's most powerful, but it would never have been successful had Americans not recognized in Israel a reflection of themselves. Ramon, the son of Holocaust survivors, brought to the Columbia a drawing of planet Earth made by a child who died in Auschwitz. That symbolic gesture was particularly apt, given the central role the Holocaust has played in stirring American sympathy for Israel. It is no coincidence that the first country outside of Israel to dedicate an official Holocaust museum was the United States. Ramon's presence on the Columbia, in turn, has imparted the gift of courage to America as it prepares to depose Saddam in defiance of much of the international community."

[Here's the ongoing Jewish war with Europe. Jews have free reign to smear anyone in its endless dual moral standard. Jews of course are beyond criticism.]
Anti-Europeanism in America,
The New York Review of Books, February 13, 2003
"This year, especially if the United States goes to war against Iraq, you will doubtless see more articles in the American press on 'Anti-Americanism in Europe.' But what about anti-Europeanism in the United States? Consider this: To the list of polities destined to slip down the Eurinal of history, we must add the European Union and France's Fifth Republic. The only question is how messy their disintegration will be. (Mark Steyn, Jewish World Review, May 1, 2002) And: Even the phrase 'cheese-eating surrender monkeys' is used [to describe the French] as often as the French say 'screw the Jews.' Oops, sorry, that's a different popular French expression. (Jonah Goldberg, National Review Online, July 16, 2002) Or, from a rather different corner: "You want to know what I really think of the Europeans?" asked the senior State Department Official. "I think they have been wrong on just about every major international issue for the past 20 years." (Quoted by Martin Walker, UPI, November 13, 2002) ... Pens are dipped in acid and lips curled to pillory 'the Europeans,' also known as 'the Euros,' 'the Euroids," "the 'peens," or "the Euroweenies." Richard Perle, now chairman of the Defense Policy Board, says Europe has lost its 'moral compass' and France its 'moral fiber.' This irritation extends to the highest levels of the Bush administration. In conversations with senior administration officials I found that the phrase 'our friends in Europe' was rather closely followed by 'a pain in the butt.' The current stereotype of Europeans is easily summarized. Europeans are wimps. They are weak, petulant, hypocritical, disunited, duplicitous, sometimes anti-Semitic and often anti-American appeasers ... Two prominent American journalists, Thomas Friedman of The New York Times and Joe Klein of The New Yorker, back from extensive book tours around the United States, separately told me that wherever they went they found anti-French sentiment— you would always get a laugh if you made a dig at the French ... [Jonah] Goldberg told me that when he started writing anti-French pieces for National Review in 1998 he found 'there was a market for it.' French-bashing became, he said, 'a shtick.'" ... Conservative writ-ers such as Jonah Goldberg and Mark Steyn make outrageous statements, some of them obviously humorous, some semi-serious, some quite serious. If you object to one of the serious ones, they can always reply 'but of course I was only joking!' Humor works by exaggeration and playing with stereotypes. But if a European writer were to describe 'the Jews' as 'matzo-eating surrender monkeys' would that be understood as humorous banter?"

Israel looks to Hispanics for peace,
By Francisco Miraval, La Voz (Denver, CO), June 22, 2001
"For the third time in the past few months, a representative from Israel visited Denver to meet with local Hispanic leaders, asking U.S. Hispanics to be part of the Middle East peace process. The government of Israel is closely following the growing presence of the Hispanic community in the United States. Hispanics are a political and ecomonic force that, if they exercise the right pressure, may have an impact on the cycle of violence in the Middle East, said Gadi Baltiansky, a journalist and diplomat from Israel. Until last April, he was the press advisor for the Prime Minister of Israel. Baltiansky visited Denver last week to address a conference of Jewish journalists. According to Baltiansky, U.S. Hispanic business persons and politicians have to understand that a conflict between Israel and the PLO may bring undesirable economic consequences for everybody in the world, as it was the case after the 1973 war. May God never allow it, but a war in Israel may close the access to petroleum. If gasoline prices go up to $5 or $10 dollars per gallon, nobody, Hispanics, Irish or whoever, may be able to do business, said Baltiansky. The diplomat also said Hispanics and Jewish people have several things in common, including values and traditions. We are two communities with solid moral values, a sense of social justice and a desire to live in democracy. We also help those who suffer, he said. We both oppose terrorism and dictatorship, and we both recognize Israel as the Holy Land.".

[The following grotesquely fraudulent statement is brought to you by the world's most famous "anti-hate" organization. The ADL serves as a front organization for racist Israel. Read the truth about Israeli "colorblindness" and its "democracy" here, or here.]
Israel: The Facts,
Anti-Defamation League,
"Civil Rights Israel is a colorblind society, comprised of Jews and non-Jews from at least 100 different countries from diverse ethnic, religious and cultural backgrounds. Democracy is the cornerstone of the State. Israel ensures complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex. It guarantees the freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture. Israel safeguards the Holy Places of all religions. All Israeli citizens, regardless of religion, ethnicity or color are accorded full civil and political rights, and equal participation in all aspects of Israeli social, political and civil life."

[The omnipresent pro-Israel propaganda machine:]
Hispanic Coverage of Israel Mixed,
Jewish Journal of Greater Metropolitan Los Angeles, April 11, 2003
"'What are they saying about us?' many Jews wonder about Spanish-language media, which have increased in number and influence. The spectacular growth of the Latino population in the United States has brought about a boom in Spanish-language media ... Yet, to date, Spanish-language coverage of the Middle East has eluded the radar of organizations that monitor media treatment of Israel and the Arab world. The oversight doesn’t make sense, considering the reach of Spanish-language print media. La Opinión, for example, the largest Spanish newspaper in the country, reaches an estimated 680,000 readers a day. And, in stark contrast with the English-language press, its circulation is growing ... If the op-ed pages of the Spanish media lack consistent pro-Israel voices, it is often because those voices aren’t speaking up. Jewish points of view are seldom heard in Spanish, missing an important opportunity to communicate Israel’s position to this increasingly influential market. Jews need to disseminate more information about Israel’s position in Spanish as well ... Indeed, leaders bridging the Latin and Jewish communities generally characterize any negativity toward Israel as the result of an innocent lack of knowledge, prompting many efforts to promote dialogue between Jewish and Latino groups, particularly with the media. Through an AJC project, the Israel Project Interchange, [Rabbi Gary Greenebaum, Western Region director of the American Jewish Committee] has been involved in organizing trips to Israel for newspaper and magazine editors and legislators. Rafael Buitrago, director of editorials for La Opinión, visited Israel through the program. ... 'The Latino population is growing and is becoming important and influential. The comfort of the Jewish community in Los Angeles is dependent on our relationship with the Latino community. It’s where our future is.'”

Israeli Communications Priorities 2003, [in pdf form, here]
The Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee,
"ADC has obtained, and is publishing in full, a vital new Israeli propaganda strategy document for the period following the war in Iraq. The document, entitled 'Wexner Analysis: Israeli Communications Priorities 2003'” was prepared for the Wexner Foundation, which operates leadership training programs such as the 'Birthright Israel' project which offers free trips for young Jewish Americans to Israel, by the public relations firm the Luntz Research Companies and the Israel Project. However, please note that the report’s suggested language is written in a distinctly Israeli, as opposed to a Jewish American, voice:
WEXNER ANALYSIS: ISRAELI COMMUNICATION PRIORITIES 2003 OVERVIEW The world has changed. The words, themes and messages on behalf of Israel must include and embrace the new reality of a post-Saddam world. In the past, we have urged a lower profile for Israel out of a fear that the American people would blame Israel for what was happening in the rest of the Middle East. Now is the time to link American success in dealing with terrorism and dictators from a position of strength to Israel's ongoing efforts to eradicate terrorism on and within its borders. In the current political environment, you have little to lose and a lot to gain by aligning with America. With all the anti-Americanism across the globe and all the protests and demonstrations, we are looking for allies that share our commitment to security and an end to terrorism and are prepared to say so. Israel is a just such an ally. THE NEXT STEP The fact that Israel has remained relatively silent for the three months preceding the war and for the three weeks of the war was absolutely the correct strategy - and according to all the polling done, it worked. But as the military conflict comes to a close, it is now time for Israel to lay out its own "road map" for the future which includes unqualified support for America and unqualified commitment to an ongoing war against terrorism. Perceptions of Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are being almost entirely colored and often overshadowed by the continuing action in Iraq. Partisan differences still exist (the political Left remains your problem) and complaints about Israeli heavy-handedness still exist ... If you only read two pages, these are the key conclusions: 1) Iraq colors all. Saddam is your best defense, even if he is dead. The worldview Americans is entirely dominated by developments in Iraq. This is a unique opportunity for Israelis to deliver a message of support and unity at a time of great international anxiety and opposition from some of our European 'allies.' For a year - a SOLID YEAR - you should be invoking the name of Saddam Hussein and how Israel was always behind American efforts to rid the world of this ruthless dictator and liberate their people. Saddam will remain a powerful symbol of terror to Americans for a long time to come. A pro-Israeli expression of solidarity with the American people in their successful effort to remove Saddam will be appreciated ... THE TWO MOST IMPORTANT WORDS: SADDAM HUSSEIN (STILL) This document is about language, so let me be blunt. 'Saddam Hussein' are the two words that tie Israel to America and are most likely to deliver support in Congress. They also just happen to be two of the most hated words in the English language right now ... A WARNING.There are some who would say that Saddam Hussein is already old news. They don't understand history. They don't understand communication. They don't understand how to integrate and leverage history and communication for the benefit of Israel. The day we allow Saddam to take his eventual place in the trash heap of history is the day we loose our strongest weapon in the linguistic defense of Israel. References to the successful outcome of the war with Iraq benefit Israel." [Etc. for 17 pages]

Our Humanity in the Balance,
By Carel Moiseiwitsch, Gordon Murray and Drew Penland, Winnipeg Free Press, May 4, 2003
"We recently returned from the Occupied Territories of the West Bank and Gaza where we volunteered with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM). Upon returning to Vancouver, we were shocked by the disconnection between our experience of Palestine and its portrayal in the Canadian media. During our stay there, we accompanied and supported people whose daily lives were being interrupted, interfered with and strangled by the Israeli military. We saw humiliation, pain and death inflicted on ordinary Palestinians. Back in Canada, we saw newspaper stories about the heroic Israeli victims of barbaric Palestinian terrorists. Our point is not that Israeli suffering is irrelevant or that Israeli deaths are inconsequential, but that the North American media treat Palestinian suffering and death as irrelevant and inconsequential. In the West Bank and Gaza, we observed soldiers beating medical personnel and using them as human shields, taunting young children to throw rocks at their tank so they could respond with live ammunition, forcing women with infants to stand for hours in the cold a few metres from their homes, destroying food and water systems, and firing heavy machine guns into residential streets and buildings. In short, the Israeli military did not seem to view Palestinians as human beings. Soldiers at checkpoints gave us dire warnings that all Palestinians would kidnap or murder us. On the contrary, the Palestinians we met were incredibly warm, hospitable and generous, and many Israelis work bravely to uphold human rights, including some who join ISM in Palestine. The Israeli military claims many Palestinians they kill are "armed militants" or at least "suspected militants". The vast majority have not been tried or convicted of anything, but we are expected to trust this instant justice. The logic seems to be that since the army doesn't target civilians, all dead Palestinians somehow deserved their fate -- even a kid throwing stones at a tank that could withstand an artillery shell. According to human rights groups, 85 per cent of the Palestinians killed in the Occupied Territories are civilians ... The Israeli army is killing and wounding obvious non-combatants such as medical workers, journalists and international human rights activists with increasing frequency ... The Israeli occupation army's "policing" has killed more than 2,000 Palestinian civilians (including more than 450 children) and demolished more than 3,000 Palestinian houses since September, 2000. That's taking police brutality to a whole new level. A stunning media imbalance is revealed by studies of U.S. coverage of the Palestinian uprising. Analysis of the San Jose Mercury News by Alison Wier, a former Sausalito editor, showed that it covered 73 per cent of Israeli deaths on its front page from April to September, 2001, compared to just five per cent of Palestinian deaths. Cursory readers of the paper would be left with the impression that 500 Israelis -- but only about 100 Palestinian civilians -- had been killed in the current uprising, when the real figures are 700 Israelis and 2,000 Palestinian. According to the media watchdog organization, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), National Public Radio (NPR) in the U.S. fared somewhat better, reporting 34 per cent of Palestinian deaths and 81 per cent of Israeli deaths in the first six months of 2001. However, the distortion was much worse in the emotionally-charged category of dead children. Only 20 per cent of the killings of Palestinian children were reported, compared to 89 per cent for Israeli children. In other words, being less than 18 years old makes your death more newsworthy to NPR if you are Israeli, but less newsworthy if you are Palestinian. Our experience in the Occupied Territories bears this out ... Portraying one side's suffering as more tragic or important than the other's -- or some deaths as justified by a simplistic "truth" that serves one side -- just facilitates violence. The media must support the search for shared truths and not merely reiterate the formulas of fundamentalist ideologues -- on either side of the Mideast conflict -- that serve a single interest. All of us are responsible for helping find a humane solution. To be silent is to be complicit in the ongoing oppression."