One of the most tired yet evergreen complaints inside Israel is a question: Why does the country have such a bad public relations problem in making its case to the world?
For Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s PR suffers during the war on Gaza because “he is surrounded by people who can’t put two words together in English.”
For Jewish Insider, Israel is losing the PR war because it’s “very bad at public diplomacy.”1 Here’s a key passage:
While some Israeli leaders take a defeatist outlook, citing rampant international antisemitism and hatred of Israel as a reason for the bad PR, Oren and others interviewed for this report said simply improving basic tactics like a better understanding of the specific audience officials are speaking to and improving bureaucratic organization and structure would offer some help in the court of international public opinion.2
For a former Israel Defense Forces spokesman quoted in The Times of Israel, it’s the Netanyahu government’s fault for not establishing a clear plan for Gaza and his cabinet ministers who are “pyromaniacs spouting nonsense.”3
Even Donald Trump said that Israel’s losing the PR war.
Now Israel’s image isn’t suffering because of a lack of defenders. Here’s a short list of organizations that are accurately deemed as very supportive of Israel.
The Israeli Citizens Spokesperson Office, a new venture from Eylon Levy
Indeed, the amount of people defending Israel to governments and in the media is astounding in Canada and the U.S.
Therefore, the answer to the question about bad PR is twofold. There’s the immediate context of the war on Gaza and the longer view.
For the war on Gaza, here are some of the key details:
More than 14,000 children reportedly killed
Around 1.9 million people are estimated to have been internally displaced
Those in Gaza do not have enough water, food, fuel and medicine4
The World Food Programme notes 96 per cent of Gaza’s 2.15 million population is facing food insecurity5
The UNDP says even with a five-fold increase of construction materials into Gaza, it would take until 2040 to rebuild destroyed housing6
The UN Environmental Programme says it might take up to 15 years and $500 million U.S. to clear all of the rubble from Gaza7
Poliovirus has been detected in samples of Gaza’s sewage water, placing Palestinians at risk of contracting the infectious disease that causes paralysis8
One does not need a PhD in health or Middle East studies to recognize that Israel’s war on Gaza is horrifying. The depths of this humanitarian crisis is a legitimate reason why people are calling for an end to “this terrible war.”9
Because of the war, South Africa brought a case of genocide against Israel to the International Court of Justice. Several other countries, including Mexico and Spain, have joined the case. While the ICJ has yet to release a definitive ruling, which will take years, the court ruled that “Palestinians had ‘plausible rights to protection from genocide.’”10 Then there is the application by the International Criminal Court for arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, which I wrote about back in May. Lastly, the ICJ’s ruling on Israel’s occupation, though filed before the war on Gaza, likely increases the country’s status as a global pariah.
A deal to stop the war and free the hostages in Gaza would probably help Israel’s image. The contours of a deal are generally clear: there’s an immediate ceasefire to allow much-needed aid to enter Gaza, and the Israeli hostages are released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who excels at delaying decisions, doesn’t seem eager to make a deal to return the hostages.
However, the long view is encapsulated in one word: inequality. Here’s how the Israeli human rights group, B’Tselem, describes the situation.
The key tool Israel uses to implement the principle of Jewish supremacy is engineering space geographically, demographically and politically. Jews go about their lives in a single, contiguous space where they enjoy full rights and self-determination. In contrast, Palestinians live in a space that is fragmented into several units, each with a different set of rights – given or denied by Israel, but always inferior to the rights accorded to Jews.11
There are two points about Palestinian citizens in Israel that are important. One is that they were governed by military rule from 1948-1966. Second is that there is a separate school system for Jewish and Palestinian students in Israel.
The historian Rashid Khalidi explains that Israel’s inequality, based upon its illiberal and discriminatory nature, is in contradiction with liberal democracies such as the U.S., Canada, Great Britain, France and Germany.12 Votes on Gaza have already taken place in France and the U.K. The same could happen in the U.S.
And this brings me to answering the original question: No matter how many organizations are working to preserve Israel’s image, the country and its supporters can’t reasonably expect a substantial improvement without improved policies. At least some of those have to involve creating fairer, more equitable conditions for Palestinians. Whether it’s A Land for All, which calls for two states in a confederation, or a single democratic state for Jews and Palestinians, the goal should be to work on a just and sustainable future for both peoples.
However, the Israeli Knesset’s vote against a Palestinian state and reaffirmation that “from the river to sea” is acceptable for Jews and not Palestinians will not help the country’s international image. Embracing an Israeli Jewish consensus that the Palestinian question is only resolved by continued repression or ethnic cleansing will not improve the country’s PR. What it will do instead is to continue to make Israelis and Palestinians unsafe, and it will increase unjust hatred of Jews in the diaspora.
In truth, Israel’s image, despite the many investments in money, time and energy, can only do so much to put a seal of kashrut on a pig. What really matters are its actions and deeds.
Here’s The Jewish Insider story: https://jewishinsider.com/2024/03/israel-hasbara-public-diplomacy-war-gaza-hamas/
Ibid.
Here’s The Times of Israel story: https://www.timesofisrael.com/pyromaniacs-who-spout-nonsense-ex-idf-spokesman-blames-ministers-for-wars-bad-pr/
Here’s UNICEF’s appeal: https://www.unicef.org/emergencies/children-gaza-need-lifesaving-support
Here’s the World Food Programme: https://www.wfp.org/emergencies/palestine-emergency
Here’s the UNDP: https://www.undp.org/sites/g/files/zskgke326/files/2024-05/2400257e-gaza_war-_expected_socioeconomic_impacts-pb.pdf
Here’s The Guardian on the UN’s Environmental Programme: https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jul/15/clearing-gaza-of-almost-40m-tonnes-of-war-rubble-will-take-years-says-un?CMP=oth_b-aplnews_d-1
This is being reported by many outlets, but here’s Al Jazeera: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/7/19/ticking-time-bomb-poliovirus-found-in-gaza-sewage
The phrase is taken from a United Nations press release: https://press.un.org/en/2024/sc15767.doc.htm
The view comes from the BBC’s legal correspondent based on an interview with one of the judges of the ICJ. A more common interpretation is that the ICJ “found it plausible that Israel’s acts could amount to genocide.” See UN here: https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/01/gaza-icj-ruling-offers-hope-protection-civilians-enduring-apocalyptic
B’Tselem’s work is here: https://www.btselem.org/apartheid
Rashid Khalidi makes this point on page 244 of The Hundred Years War on Palestine.