ToC: Israel Affairs, 23.2 (2017)

Israel Affairs 23.2 (2017)

Table of Contents

Articles

• The rise and decline of ‘optional control’ in the IDF / Eitan Shamir (205-230)
•  ‘Spokesman-ship is a weapon’: Israeli army news management during the October 1973 war / Giora Goodman (231-252)
• The erosion of US‒Israeli relations during Obama’s second term / Robert O. Freedman (253-272)
• A ruling party in the making: Mapai in the 1948 war / Avi Bareli (273-302)
• Politics vs. trade: a Realist view on Turkish‒Israeli economic relations / Cenap Çakmak & Murat Ustaoğlu (303-323)
• Israel is too expensive for us? Political consumerism, public policy and entrepreneurship: the case of the cottage cheese boycott / Omri Shamir (324-341)
• Banking and philanthropy in pre-state Jewish Palestine: particularist Sephardic philanthropy disguised as support for the general Zionist cause / Riki Galia (342-360)
• ‘Digital soap opera’ online radio listening patterns and the digital divide / Mira Moshe, Tal Laor & Shimon Friedkin (361-384)
• The Palestinian Authority: the dangerous transition from failing entity to failing state / Kobi Michael (385-410)
• The Holocaust paradox: Holocaust denial and its use in the Arab world / Nitza Davidovitch & Nissim Dana (411-426)
• Cultural change in a kibbutz factory as an outcome of the privatization process: an Israeli case study / Yaffa Moskovich & Yuval Achouch (427-446)

Book Reviews

• Divine service? Judaism and Israel’s armed forces (447-448)
• Crossing: Suez, 1973 (448-449)
• Eye to eye (450-451)
• Defensive Shield: An Israeli Special Forces Commander on the Front Line of Counterterrorism (451-452)

New Article: Hameiri et al, Support for Self-Censorship Among Israelis

Hameiri, Boaz, Keren Sharvit, Daniel Bar-Tal, Eldad Shahar, and Eran Halperin. “Support for Self-Censorship Among Israelis as a Barrier to Resolving the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict.” Political Psychology (early view; online first).

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/pops.12346

 
Abstract

Self-censorship, defined as an “act of intentionally and voluntarily withholding information from others in the absence of formal obstacles” often serves as a barrier to resolving intractable conflicts. Specifically, in order to protect the group, and in absence of objective constraints such as institutionalized censorship, individuals practice self-censorship and support its practice by other society members. This prevents free flow and transparency of information, within a society, regarding the conflict and the adversary. In an attempt to investigate the factors that contribute to the functioning of self-censorship as a sociopsychological barrier to conflict resolution, a longitudinal study was conducted among a large sample of Jews in Israel. The survey was administered in three waves: a few months before, during, and a few months after Israel’s Operation Pillar of Defense in the Gaza Strip. The findings showed that armed confrontation can increase support for self-censorship. In addition, the findings revealed that personal characteristics (e.g., authoritarianism, ethnocentrism, siege mentality) predicted support for self-censorship, which, in turn, mediated the effect of personal characteristics on support for negotiations and for providing humanitarian aid. The theoretical as well as the applied implications of the findings are discussed.

 

 

New Article: Evans, YouTube and the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict

Evans, Matt. “Information Dissemination in New Media: YouTube and the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict.” Media, War & Conflict (early view; online first).

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1750635216643113

 
Abstract

This work examines the ways in which YouTube videos inform audiences about international news, issues, and events. As new media increasingly becomes the public’s primary news source, research has produced conflicting contentions of how, and to whom, information is conveyed. Some studies have found Twitter and Facebook to be important tools for social organization and facilitating political involvement. Others, however, assert that these media act as echo chambers, reinforcing preexisting views rather than providing new information or perceptions. This research analyzes videos pertaining to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict to reveal how they provide information. The findings show that the methods – empirical and visceral – used to frame information in YouTube videos correspond to the narratives supported by the uploaders. Additionally, the results indicate YouTube videos are watched by a heterogeneous public and have the potential to transcend selective exposure and present viewers with new information and perspectives.

 

 

New Article: Gilboa and Magen, Crisis Communication Research in Israel

Gilboa, Eytan, and Clila Magen. “Crisis Communication Research in Israel. Growth and Gaps.” In The Handbook of International Crisis Communication Research (ed. Andreas Schwarz, Matthew W. Seeger, and Claudia Auer; Malden, Mass. and Oxford, UK: Wiley Blackwell, 2016): 327-36.

 

Extract

Gesser-Edelsburg and Zemach (2012) explored CC strategies used by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to deal with the December 2010 Carmel forest fire disaster. Ostensibly, this crisis belongs to the national type, but the focus on the prime minister moves it to the individual crisis category… They concluded that Netanyahu made effective use of CC principles including inclusion, clarity, and addressing the public’s values and norms. They claimed, however, that those strategies were used to produce what they labeled “cover-up risk communication,” because the end result was a cover-up of a failure rather than an admission of malfunction and willingness to correct defects. The analysis is interesting but the conclusion ignored important measures applied by the government in the post-crisis era. While the government refused to admit guilt, it took immediate and bold measure to correct the defects.

 

 

Report: Mapping ownership in Israeli media

http://www.the7eye.org.il/50534

The Israeli Media Ownership Map is an ongoing project of “The Seventh Eye,” intended to present, interpret, and track the identity of media moguls and business groups who control the media and its organizations in Israel. The chart allows not only to locate the identity of individuals and groups who control the media companies, but also to view their holdings in other areas, and thus obtain a certain idea of the web of interests in which they and their subordinates must act, including the level of centralization in the Israeli market and the cross ownership within it.

Click here for a PDF of the map.

מפת הבעלויות בתקשורת הישראלית היא פרויקט מתמשך של “העין השביעית” שמטרתו להציג, לבאר ולעקוב אחר זהותם של בעלי ההון והקבוצות העסקיות השולטות בגופי ואמצעי תקשורת בישראל. התרשים מאפשר למעיינים בו לא רק לאתר את זהותם של האישים והגופים השולטים בחברות המדיה, אלא גם להציג את אחזקותיהם מחוץ לתחום התקשורת – ובכך לקבל גם מושג כלשהו על רשת האינטרסים שמכורחה פועלים הם והכפופים להם, על רמת הריכוזיות במשק הישראלי ועל הבעלויות הצולבות בו.

New Article: Golan & Stadler, The Dual Use of the Internet by Chabad

Golan, Oren, and Nurit Stadler. “Building the Sacred Community Online: The Dual Use of the Internet by Chabad.” Media, Culture & Society (early view; online first).

 
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0163443715615415
 
Abstract

Religious communities have ongoing concerns about Internet use, as it intensifies the clash between tradition and modernity, a clash often found in traditionally inclined societies. Nevertheless, as websites become more useful and widely accessible, religious and communal stakeholders have continuously worked at building and promoting them. This study focuses on Chabad, a Jewish ultra-Orthodox movement, and follows webmasters of three key websites to uncover how they distribute religious knowledge over the Internet. Through an ethnographic approach that included interviews with over 30 webmasters, discussions with key informants, and observations of the websites themselves, the study uncovered webmaster’s strategies to foster solidarity within their community, on one hand, while also proselytizing their outlook on Judaism, on the other. Hence, the study sheds light on how a fundamentalist society has strengthened its association with new media, thus facilitating negotiation between modernity and religious piety.

 

 

 

New Article: Lewis et al, Medical Cannabis. A Framing Analysis of Israeli Newspaper Coverage

Lewis, Nehama, Doron Broitman, and Sharon R. Sznitman. “Medical Cannabis. A Framing Analysis of Israeli Newspaper Coverage.” Science Communication (early view; online first).

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1075547015608507

 

Abstract

Medical cannabis is a topic of increasing debate. To investigate this issue, we conducted a content analysis of Israeli news coverage of medical cannabis from 2007 to 2013. A deductive framing analysis examined three elite issue frames—medical, policy, and law enforcement. Additionally, inductive analysis revealed a a fourth, nonelite patients’ frame. Each frame was associated with a distinct pattern of textual elements, including portrayal of patients, references to cannabis, opinion about medical cannabis, and salience of scientific research. The most common and most stable frame was the policy frame. Implications for framing theory are discussed.

 

 

New Article: First & Adoni, The Development of the Communication Discipline: Israel as a Case Study

First, Anat, and Hanna Adoni. “An Interactive Model for Analyzing the Development of the Communication Discipline: Israel as a Case Study.” Journalism and Mass Communication 5.7 (2015): 324-40.

 

URL: http://www.davidpublisher.org/index.php/Home/Article/index?id=15850.html

 

Abstract

Our paper presents an interactive four-dimensional model for studying the long- and short-term development of the communication discipline with Israel serving as a case study: institutional-contextual, institutional-in-field, intellectual-contextual, and intellectual-in-field. Our empirical analysis utilized personal interviews, archive documents, and statistical data. Four main processes were discerned: transition from integration to alienation between institutions of higher learning and the larger political and ideological context; a shift from Hebrew University Institute of Communication’s institutional monopoly to a multiplicity of increasingly competitive communication schools/departments; transition from intellectual hegemony to limited intellectual diversity; and gradually improving status for the communication field among social science disciplines. Our case-study analysis validated the interactive relationship among the model’s conceptual dimensions, calling for future cross-national comparisons.

 

 

New Article: Berenson, Social Justice Protest’s Narrative in Israeli News

Berenson, Alonit. “‘Painting with Words’: ‘Social Justice’ Protest’s Narrative in the Israeli’s News”. Journalism and Mass Communication 5.8 (2015): 373-87.

 

URL: dx.doi.org/10.1177/0044118X15606157/ [PDF]

 
Abstract

This article analyzes the role of the media during the 2011 social protests in Israel, in order to examine why the “Social Justice” protest proved more effective than any other social protest organized previously in Israel. Scholars have shown that media framing has a powerful effect on citizen perception and policy debates. The social protests focused on the political-social-economic policy based on a neo-liberal ideology. They signified the beginnings of resistance to the system and became the focus of public and media identification via reports published by leading Israeli newspapers: Yedioth Ahronoth and Israel Hayom. Using content analysis, the author explore how the media plays an important role to shape the public perception of how to think and act about the protest. Due to the results, we evident the expand media capacity and influence, and that these effects are mediated in presenting positive and supportive coverage, including connotations and metaphors expressed by means of familiar slogans and events in the collective memory of Israeli society. Additionally, the expression “social justice” that became the protest’s slogan, offered a broad common basis with which each citizen could identify, including journalists.

 

 

 

New Article: Yemini and Gordon, Media Representations of National and International Standardized Testing

Yemini, Miri, and Noa Gordon. “Media Representations of National and International Standardized Testing in the Israeli Education System.” Discourse (early view; online first).

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2015.1105786

Abstract

This study applies discourse analysis to Israeli media coverage of national and international standardized examinations within Israel’s public education system. Through systematic analysis of the topic in the two main Israeli financial publications between the years 2000 and 2013, we explore the nature and narrative of the media and compare the coverage of national and international standardized testing. We find that most of the media attention was devoted to international examinations, while national examinations were covered in a more limited yet critical way, perceived as unnecessary and even dubious. International examinations, in contrast, were described as axiomatic components of the education system. Articles on both national and international standardized testing criticize the education system, blaming teachers, the Ministry of Education, budget constraints, and marginalized populations for Israeli students’ inadequate results. We frame our analysis by alignment of the articles along global–local and also neoliberal–humanistic axes. We structure our assessment within the global–local nexus and discuss the broader implications of the role of the testing in framing the local educational public discourse.

 

 

New Book: Campbell, Digital Judaism

Campbell, Heidi A., ed. Digital Judaism: Jewish Negotiations with Digital Media and Culture. New York: Routledge, 2015.

 

In this volume, contributors consider the ways that Jewish communities and users of new media negotiate their uses of digital technologies in light of issues related to religious identity, community and authority. Digital Judaism presents a broad analysis of how and why various Jewish groups negotiate with digital culture in particular ways, situating such observations within a wider discourse of how Jewish groups throughout history have utilized communication technologies to maintain their Jewish identities across time and space. Chapters address issues related to the negotiation of authority between online users and offline religious leaders and institutions not only within ultra-Orthodox communities, but also within the broader Jewish religious culture, taking into account how Jewish engagement with media in Israel and the diaspora raises a number of important issues related to Jewish community and identity. Featuring recent scholarship by leading and emerging scholars of Judaism and media, Digital Judaism is an invaluable resource for researchers in new media, religion and digital culture.

 

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

• 1. Introduction: Studying Jewish Engagement with Digital Media and Culture Heidi A. Campbell
• 1. Ethnography and social movement studies
• 2. The Jewish Communication Tradition and its Encounters with (the) New Media Menahem Blondheim
• 3. Appropriation & Innovation: Pop-up Communities: Facebook, Grassroots Jews and Offline Post-Denominational Judaism Nathan Abrams
• 4. Yoatzot Halacha: Ruling the Internet, One Question at a Time Michal Raucher
• 5. Sanctifying the Internet: Aish HaTorah’s use of the Internet for Digital Outreach Heidi A. Campbell and Wendi Bellar
• 6. Jewish Games for Learning: Renewing Heritage Traditions in the Digital Age Owen Gottlieb
• 7. Communicating Identity through Religious Internet Memes on “Tweeting Orthodoxies” Facebook Page Aya Yadlin-Segal
• 8. Resistance & Reconstruction: Legitimation of New Media and Community Building amongst Jewish Denominations in the USA Oren Golan
• 9. On Pomegranates and Etrogs: Internet Filters as Practices of Media Ambivalence among National Religious Jews in Israel Michele Rosenthal and Rivki Ribak
• 10. Pashkevilim in Campaigns Against New Media: What Can Pashkevillim Accomplish that Newspapers Cannot? Hananel Rosenburg and Tsuriel Rashi
• 11. The Israeli Rabbi and the Internet Yoel Cohen

Contributors
Index

 

HEIDI A. CAMPBELL is Associate Professor of Communication at Texas A&M University and Director of the Network for New Media, Religion and Digital Culture Studies. She is author of Exploring Religious Community Online (2005) and When Religion Meets New Media (2010) and editor of Digital Religion: Understanding Religious Practice in New Media World (2013).

 

New Book: Rodgers, Headlines from the Holy Land

Rodgers, James. Headlines from the Holy Land: Reporting the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.

 

 

Tied by history, politics, and faith to all corners of the globe, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict fascinates and infuriates people across the world. Based on new archive research and original interviews with leading correspondents and diplomats, Headlines from the Holy Land explains why this fiercely contested region exerts such a pull over reporters: those who bring the story to the world. Despite decades of diplomacy, a just and lasting end to the conflict remains as difficult as ever to achieve. Inspired by the author’s own experience as the BBC’s correspondent in Gaza from 2002-2004, and subsequent research, this book draws on the insight of those who have spent years observing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Starting from a historical perspective, it identifies the challenges the conflict presents for contemporary journalism and diplomacy, and suggests new ways of approaching them.

 

Table of Contents

• Foreword by Rosemary Hollis
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Reporting from the Ruins: The End of the British Mandate and the Creation of the State of Israel
• 2 Six Days and Seventy-Three
• 3 Any Journalist Worth Their Salt
• 4 The Roadmap, Reporting, and Religion
• 5 Going Back Two Thousand Years All the Time
• 6 The Ambassador’s Eyes and Ears
• 7 Social Media: A Real Battleground
• 8 Holy Land
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index

 

 

New Article: Sznitman and Lewis, Cannabis in Israeli Newspaper Coverage

Sznitman, Sharon R. and Nehama Lewis. “Is Cannabis an Illicit Drug or a Medicine? A Quantitative Framing Analysis of Israeli Newspaper Coverage.” International Journal of Drug Policy 26.5 (2015): 446-52.

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.drugpo.2015.01.010

 

Abstract

Background

Various countries and states, including Israel, have recently legalized cannabis for therapeutic purposes (CTP). These changes have received mass media coverage and prompted national and international dialogue about the status of cannabis and whether or not it can be defined as a (legitimate) medicine, illicit and harmful drug, or both. News media framing may influence, and be influenced by, public opinion regarding CTP and support for CTP license provisions for patients. This study examines the framing of CTP in Israeli media coverage and the association between media coverage and trends in the provision of CTP licenses in Israel over time.

Methods

All published news articles relevant to CTP and the framing of cannabis (N = 214) from the three highest circulation newspapers in Israel were content analyzed. Articles were published between January 2007 and June 2013, a period in which CTP licenses granted by the Ministry of Health increased substantially.

Results

In the majority of CTP news articles (69%), cannabis was framed as a medicine, although in almost one third of articles (31%) cannabis was framed as an illicit drug. The relative proportion of news items in which cannabis was framed as an illicit drug fluctuated during the study period, but was unrelated to linear or curvilinear trends in CTP licensing.

Conclusion

The relatively large proportion of news items framing cannabis as a medicine is consistent with growing support for the expansion of the Israel’s CTP program.

 

Highlights

• We examine the framing of cannabis for therapeutic purposes (CTP) in newspapers.
• We use quantitative content analysis.
• News articles generally describe cannabis as a medicine and not an illicit drug.
• Trends in media framing are unrelated to trends in CTP licenses.

 

 

ToC: Hebrew Higher Education 17 (2015)

Hebrew Higher Education 17 (2015): Table of Contents

Click here to download the full issue as a PDF.

EDITOR’S NOTE

5 ADINA OFEK

 

ARTICLES

Hebrew literature over various periods

 

7-18 ESTHER HANOCH

האומנם מרחם אלוהים על ילדי הגן? אינטרפרטציה לארבעה שירי יהודה עמיחי

(Does God Pity Little Children? An Interpretation of Four Yehuda Amichi Poems)

 

19-34 TAMAR SETTER

קריאה חדשה בחיי נישואים בעקבות גילויו של רומן וינאי לדוד פוגל

(A New Reading of Married Life Following the Discovery of Viennese Romance by David Vogel)

 

35-47 MICHAL FRAM COHEN

הפילוג החסידי-מתנגדי בספר מזכרונות ימי ילדותי או מראה העיר דווינסק מאת שרה פייגה פונר: עדות היסטורית או הטיה אישית?

(The Hasidic-Mitnagdi Schism in the book Memories of My Childhood or a View of Dvinsk by Sarah Feiga Foner: Historical Testimony or Personal Bias?)

 

49-73 ABDALLAH TARABEIH and ADEL SHAKOUR

The Influence of the Letter of the Sword and the Pen by Ibn Burd on the Maḥbarot of Alharizi and Ibn Ardutiel

 

Linguistics

 

75-86 LIOR LAX

שקיפות מורפו-סמנטית ומורפו-קטגוריאלית כגורם לשינוי לשוני

(Morph-Semantic and Morpho-Categorical Transparency as a Trigger for Language Change)

 

87-99 BAT-ZION YEMINI

רטוריקה ריגושית בסוגה השימושית בלשון העיתונות

(Emotional Rhetoric in the Journalistic Instrumental Genre)

 

101-115 SHMUEL BOLOZKY and RESPONDENTS

אוריינות בעברית הישראלית ומעמד הגרוניות-לשעבר א’ ה’ ע’

(Literacy in Israeli Hebrew and the Status of the Formerly-“Guttural” ‘alef, he, and `ayin)

 

Teaching Biblical Hebrew

 

117-129 MICHAEL B. SHEPHERD

Hebrew Exegesis Worksheets

 

131-152 RAHEL HALABE

Realistic and Effective Practice and Assessment System for the Biblical Hebrew Introductory Course Teaching Modern Hebrew

 

153-158 ESTER SIMONS

שיקולים לשוניים ותוכניים בכתיבת ספרי לימוד בעברית: עדויות מן השטח

(Writing Hebrew Language Textbooks: Linguistic Considerations and Content Choices)

 

BOOK REVIEWS

159-162 ERAN BUCHALZEV

Modern Hebrew: The Past and Future of a Revitalized Language. By Norman Berdichevsky

163-167 RUTH BEN-YEHUDA ADLER

קשרים. A Text Book for Advanced Learners of Hebrew

מאת אביטל פויר, טל נורמן, שירלי מליחי, רינה קרייטמן ומיכל כהן

(Ksharim: A Text Book for Advanced Learners of Hebrew.

by Avital Feuer, Tal Norman, Shirly Malichi, Rina Kreitman and Michal Cohen)

 

169-170 RINA DONCHIN

חדשון בעברית קלה

(Hadshon: An Online Newspaper for Hebrew Learners)

 

171-173 MICHAL RAIZEN

Poetic Trespass: Writing between Hebrew and Arabic in

Israel/Palestine. By Lital Levy

 

175-180 ORA (RODRIGUE) SCHWARZWALD

The Languages of the Jews: A Sociolinguistic History. By Bernard Spolsky

 

181-183 JODY WASHBURN

Learning Biblical Hebrew Interactively. Instructor

Edition. By Paul Overland

 

OTHER PUBLICATIONS IN THE SUBJECT OF HEBREW

 

185-188 HED HA’ULPAN 102-103: Table of Contents

 

189-198 HELKAT LASHON 47-46: Table of Contents

 

INFORMATION FOR CONTRIBUTERS

New Article: Lavie-Dinur et al, Media’s Coverage of Israeli Female Political Criminals

Lavie-Dinur, Amit, Yuval Karniel, and Tal Azran. “‘Bad Girls’: The Use of Gendered Media Frames in the Israeli Media’s Coverage of Israeli Female Political Criminals.” Journal of Gender Studies 24.3 (2015): 326-46.

 

URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09589236.2013.841572

 

Abstract

The study examined news media coverage of Israeli female political criminals to determine how the media construct and portray women who commit ideological crimes against the state, ultimately to discern what these framing choices suggest about women involved in political crimes. Studies show that the media tend to rely on stereotypical gender frames to portray female criminals and their motivations to the public. These frames depict women perpetrators as motivated to commit political crime for personal reasons as opposed to political reasons, which are often cited for male criminal behavior. The study examined the Israeli news media’s use of stereotypical gender news frames when reporting on three Israeli women who committed ideological crimes against the state. The study compared the coverage of these cases among three Israeli newspapers representing different political affinities. As a country with a long history of political conflict, Israel offers a unique opportunity to examine gender bias in the media’s coverage of female actors in the public sphere. The study’s theoretical contribution lies in its analysis of Israeli female political criminals who, by definition of their crime, acted within the political sphere. The study confirms previous research on the subject – mainly that the media rely on gender frames and explanations of personal motive in its portrayals of female criminals.

New Article: Evans and Kaynak, Media Framing in Religious–Secular Conflict in Turkey and Israel

Evans, Matt and M. Selcan Kaynak. “Media Framing in Religious–Secular Conflict in Turkey and Israel.” International Political Science Review 36.2 (2015): 139-52.

 

URL: ips.sagepub.com/content/36/2/139.abstract

 

Abstract

The functioning of the media as a public watchdog and as a neutral forum for society’s different perspectives is a model that is seen as vital in modern democracies. However, in societies with major social rifts these functions may conflict with one another and alter the media’s role. This work contributes to the theoretical discussion of the role of the media, through a study of the media in religious–secular conflict in Turkey and Israel. In recent years, religious parties’ electoral gains have challenged secular communities’ hold on the countries’ decision-making institutions. With the increase in religious–secular political tensions, the media on both sides have taken a central role, highlighting perceived dangers presented by the other side. As the media come to function as the vanguard of the opposing sides, the impact is twofold: loss of an important public watchdog and a deepening of societal rifts.

New Book: Oren, Fishing with the President; The Rise of the Diplomatic Spin (in Hebrew)

אורן, יצחק. לדוג עם הנשיא. עלייתו של הספין הדיפלומטי. תל אביב: רסלינג, 2014.

 

 

URL: http://resling.co.il/book.asp?book_id=806

 

Yitzhak Oren’s book examines and analyzes four dramatic events in the relationships between Israel and the United States towards the end of the 20^th century, in which the diplomatic spin dominated the chain of events: the loan guarantees crisis, Israel’s willingness to attend the Madrid Conference, the deportation of Hamas leaders, and the receipt of the loan guarantees, accompanied by a journalist speculation about “fishing with the president.” The book further diagnoses and proposes the characteristics of the diplomatic spin as a new and fascinating theoretical field. The author adds to these case studies his personal perspective, as one who experiences the events from within the Prime Minister’s office.

Dr. Yitzhak Oren teaches political science and public diplomacy at the Academic College of Emek Yezreel and Haifa University. In the past he was a political advisor to Prime Ministers Yitzhak Shamir and Yitzhak Rabin, as well as an envoy for US congress matters at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. and an Ambassador in Nigeria.

New Article: Lichtenstein, Prague Zionists and the Paris Peace Conference

Lichtenstein, Tatjana. “Jewish Power and Powerlessness: Prague Zionists and the Paris Peace Conference.” East European Jewish Affairs 44.1 (2014): 2-20.

 

URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13501674.2014.904583

 

Abstract

This article explores how perceptions of Jewish power shaped the negotiations between Czechoslovak leaders and Jewish minority representatives at the time of the Paris Peace Conference. In the aftermath of the First World War, Prague-based Zionists embarked on a mission to convince Czechoslovak elites that attacks on Jews were detrimental to the internal stability of the new state and to Czechoslovak interests abroad. As Edvard Beneš, the head of the Czechoslovak delegation in Paris, worked to cultivate an image of the new state as more “Western” and “civilised” than other successor states – a strategy meant to garner international support for Czechoslovak territorial demands and its projected absorption of large minority populations – Jewish activists encouraged his uncertainty with regard to Jews’ influence on Western audiences and statesmen. They did so in order to convince him to accept their demands for special protection clauses for the new country’s Jews. The paper thus shows that the unprecedented victimisation of Jews and the upsurge in antisemitism during and after the war coexisted with a new bold and public Jewish activism. Yet, Jewish leaders did not in the end have the ability to convince Beneš and his colleagues to give in to international Jewish demands for special protection. Instead, they sought to cultivate a strategic alliance between the state’s Czech elite and the Jewish minority which centred on the claim that Czechoslovakia was a particularly welcoming and tolerant place for Jews, an image that would evolve into a significant component of the myth of Czechoslovakia as an island of democracy in Eastern Europe.

New Article: Harel, A Zionist Newspaper in Damascus during the Reign of Faysal in 1920

Harel, Yaron. “Ha-Mizrah/al-Sharq: A Zionist Newspaper in Damascus during the Reign of Faysal in 1920.” Middle Eastern Studies 50.1 (2014): 129-43.

 

URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00263206.2013.863758

DOI: 10.1080/00263206.2013.863758

 

Abstract

During the span of 22 months stretching from the entry of Faysal b. Husayn into Damascus in October 1918 until his expulsion at the end of July 1920, 42 newspapers and 13 journals appeared in Syria, more than half of them in Damascus. During this time, in which the press had a critical role in expressing and shaping public opinion in Syria, it became clear to the emissaries of the Zionist institutions in Damascus that they, too, needed to turn to this medium in order to spread their message. Hence, they argued that there was a need to publish a newspaper reflecting a moderate and calming outlook that would draw Arabs and Jews nearer to and increase their understanding of the Zionist idea. The result of their activities in this area saw the founding of a bilingual, Hebrew and Arabic, newspaper, called ha-Mizrah/al-Sharq (‘The East’). An examination of the only extant copies of the three issues that were printed before the newspaper ceased publication provides us with a deeper observation into the Zionist activities in Damascus during the reign of King Faysal.

Cite: Shukrun-Nagar, Coverage of the Israeli Haredi Community as a Case in Point

Shukrun-Nagar, Pnina. “The Construction of Paradoxes in News Discourse: The Coverage of the Israeli Haredi Community as a Case in Point.” Discourse Studies 15.4 (2013): 463-80.

 

URL: http://dis.sagepub.com/content/15/4/463.abstract

 

Abstract

This article focuses on the construction of two types of non-logical paradoxes in news discourse: 1) inconsistencies of positions and acts; 2) conflicts between reality and expectations or common sense. I will argue that these paradoxes are constructed by various discursive devices and will demonstrate the key role played by conventional and conversational implicatures in this regard. The discussion will focus on 23 items covering disputes between ultra-Orthodox (Haredim) and secular Jews, broadcast on mainstream Israeli television news in 2009. I will show that the journalists consistently attribute paradoxicality to Haredim, and that this corresponds with the common public bitterness towards them because they enjoy financial support from the government, while sharing little of the economic and security burden. Moreover, I will argue that the paradoxical representations of Haredim rely on the secular ‘we’ group view and serve to base its common sense and norms.