'People are laughing at you': U.K. expert on Israel's PR effort

The reason we, the Goyim, get outraged at what Israel is doing is easy: it's because we don't expect it of Israel, any more than I, an Englishman, would expect such behaviour of Britain. Don't you see that? African or Asian dictators, yes, sure, we expect this kind of behaviour from them. When we run across it from Britain or America -- no matter that it does happen -- we are morally dismayed and deeply so. Forget the PR. Just don't do it, rocket attacks or not. You are one of us, the civilised.

Sounds like = Bring the wagens into a circle and let fight our last stand." The best part is slapping the present USA govenment and calling Obama an anti-Semite.

1. Israelis have no chance at all changing the minds of Europeans who have adopted an anti-Israeli opinion. This task should be left to the local Jews who understand the local mentality and background. 2. Israelis should be ecouraged to highlight more the positive sides of life in Israel and should do so as much as possible vis a vis local Jews only. 3. Israelis should be encouraged to not attempt to win points by pointing out only the negative side of Israel - to anybody.

To market lies, learn from Palestinian Arabs and UK...

Smugness is what it is. Israel has been pandered to for way too long, it's just a symtom of that. If they saw the scum for what it is or stopped pretending, Israel would collapse.

No wonder no one believes British bankers.

Because only Israelis are stealing land.

It looks like he's looking for more business. If he cares so much why not volunteer his services rather sitting in a comfy armchair in the UK pretending to be a Zionist.

would Eva agree?

Israel has god on its side, it is never wrong and always justified!

Israel it is time to grow up! Stop the settlement building or lose the aid! Americans have had enough!

Anti-Semitism is hatred based on who or what someone is. The many legitimate criticisms of Israel are not based on who they are as a people or what they worship religiously, it is based simply on their actions as a state. Israel should expect no exceptions as a state. Its behaviors are supposed to be governed by International Law. If Israel wants to be taken seriously as a state, and indeed wants to preserve its state, it must follow international law and follow UN resolutions and mandates immediately.

The alternative to the Cherry Tomato/Super model approach is described as.. ...explain why it's acting the way it does, Gabay suggests. "Treat people intelligently and they will respond. Treat people as if you're selling soap powder and people won't believe you. That's the bottom line." .... But the very reason to talk about sweet tomatoes and pretty women is that if you "Treat people intelligently" you might end up talking to an intelligent person who could explain that the Arabs act the way they do because Israel is built on the land that was cleansed of their ethnicity. And that it is illegal for the occupying force to establish residential settlements. Or that Israel must depend on the infinite support of the world in their eternal war to continue to maintain a nation based on ethnic exclusion. And on and on. So stick to to the veggies and pretty girls.

In which anything involving Arabs, Islam, or the Middle East exists in the background and unimportant in the everyday life and as if any one cares about Israel's material accomplishments. Israel is in the Middle East and brand Israel is associated with one thing in most people's mind: The Arab Israeli Conflict in general, and the Occupation of the West Bank specifically. Israel and Israelis could make a good case for their behaviour but if would involve forgetting about ideology and speaking directly about "The Conflict" and the so-far efforts to resolve it and why they have failed.

You know the rest.

Israel makes it easy for people to ridicule it when you have terrorist commemorating Prime Ministers.

Boycott cherry tomatoes!

"..explain why it's acting the way it does.." I hardly think telling people that you want all of Eratz Israel will help matters.

Problems with oppression all over the world, yet certain people harp on Israel. As evidence you have #s 7, 20, 21 with more obviously more to come.

I congratulate Mr. Gabay on his excellent self-promotion. His advice is worth exactly what people are paying for it (nothing), but no doubt some will rush out to buy his fifteen books. Israel is right. Many in the world sympathize with the Palestinians, and while one might try to explain that killing is necessary (as Barack Obama did when receiving the Nobel Peace Prize), that isn't likely to win many converts. So Israel is wise to show the good -- the good people, the good inventions, the good products, the good deeds -- and to have as many people working to get this story out as possible. Forget core values or Gabby Gabay's advice "treat people intelligently and they will respond." I prefer the much wiser advice of H. L. Mencken "No one in this world, so far as I know ? and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me ? has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people."

"the campaign advises citizens on how to discourse politely" Really? Politely? I had few polite discussions with the Jews on few boards lately. They indeed treated me very politely: threw ethnic slurs, constantly labeled me the worst names you can ever imagine + every second sentence I was called a nazi. And their 'polite' discussion was all about it: call the opponent various names and trash him, providing ZERO material for discussion at the same time.

At least Colombia is pro- American and anti leftwi ng/socialist and is dealing with it,s drug cartels ,unlike Chavez and other leftist south American stooges ?

Shame these poor downtrodden Palestinians like Mark Lincoln who have the audacity to refer to Israel as a lunatic asylum,if that,s his thinking then what do people around the globe make of stupid intransigence Palestine ,made a state in May 1948 ,next to it,s highly industrialised progressive secular Jewish state Israel ,but still can,t be weaned off UNRWA handouts 62 years later ,how ludicrous ?

I don't get it. We had cherry tomatoes in Nepal before any developed tomatoes were found. We didn't call them cherries though. Did somebody from Israel bring it to Israel and patent it?

The labels coming from the "peace lovers" who really want to see Israel destroyed is the first place to start. The dishonest party line against Israel by angry "peace lovers" can be addressed first.

The labels coming from the "peace lovers" who really want to see Israel destroyed is the first place to start. The dishonest party line against Israel by angry "peace lovers" can be addressed first.

It says "we're not all about teams of identity-stealing assassins in Israel - we also enjoy botany." I think they ought to include, with the cherry tomato, the story about the IDF unit that had commandeered a Gazan home during Cast Lead, and were thoughtful enough to do the laundry and dishes before they left. I bet Goldstone didn't devote much space to that story.

The propaganda is doing much better than reality. That seems to me the biggest problem with the whole thing.

It's hard to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.

Agree with you about Ramat Shlomo, but like that project, the people the "im masbirim mevinim" campaign insulted most are ordinary Israelis like you and me.

These are people who live in a very narrow world. As Mark Lincoln says, the paranoiacs are now running the asylum. Yuli Edelstein is another famous ex-refuznik minister. Bright, certainly, they have not in the past proved our most realistic politicians. Sadly, it seems that for them the world will always be a pack of KGB wolves who eat Jews for breakfast. Hasbara is a leaden attempt to explain the inexplicable by way of distracting attention from it. The only thing the increasingly sceptical public wants to know is why we constantly talk about peace while obsessively undermining any chance of it. That's the yolk - note the comically Freudian typo "yoke" in this article! - of Jonathan Gabay's egg. If we manage to explain that to ourselves and act accordingly, we may no longer need to explain it to anyone else. The illustration for this article should have placed the cherry tomato not in the mouth, but on a nose.

You mean behave like the US, who when they got hit by a terror attack, stomped two countries flat, one of which hadn't anything to do with it? Behave like you who regularly kill bunches of civilians with drones in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and no one whines about war crimes? You know what? Maybe Israel should take the gloves off, like you all when you're hit, since I notice the world doesn't say much about America's kind of warfare. Thanks for the hint.

BECAUSE ISRAEL POSESSES THE POWER TO SET THE WORLD ON FIRE WITH NUCLEAR WEAPONS.

"Why the intense focus on one country with 7 million people?" -seisen Because you won't behave.

The thing is..everybody knows a jew or an Israeli. so this for some funny reason entitles you to have an opinion about them and how they handle thier problems..How many Chechen did you meet ? or Christian Sudanese ? If you speak to the aid workers in Holland who actuaaly meet these people they know where the attention should really go. But as true Western knowitalls we like to blame the big High tech soldiers against shaking stown throwing Palestinian baby (?) . Who can even visualize the war in Sudan or Checnya ? how many people die a day ?....obviously not interesting enough...we prefer to judge the easy targets.

haaretz is getting such a flat paper. as interesting as the new york times. bradley burston was interviewed on the bbc. he was boring or lack of any fun. but this article proves that tehran, riyadh gaza ramallah and other highly intellectual places are feeding people with edible and acceptable propaganda. not many individuals are interested in non violence,

Mark, you have the wisdom of Abraham!

we are the most stupid in competent experts, and when you think that some of the worlde largest and most efficients PR companies are directed by our folks it makes you think about our chiefs inteligence when it comes to select people and no matter in what field. just look at our government...

The real problem is that the people in charge of Hasbara are ignorant of what is needed, which is why they have come up with such a moronic campaign which has achieved nothing other than to insult foreigners. The issue is that this government has no aim other than to stay in office, it has no vision to offer us, it has no intelligence to think of anything to offer us, and its perspective is limited to trying good on the next news broadcast. Take this latest decision to build housing in the middle of land which a chimpanzee could tell you is going to be given to the new state of Palestine, which will inevitably come into existence, so that we the secular tax payers can pay twice over for housing that is purely and exclusively for haredim who contribute nothing to the country,but are happy to live off our backs. The government cannot explain this decision to us, who live here and who desparately want our state to act in our best interests, how can they explain it to foreigners.

On the Web site, fake news clips show a British television journalist asserting that in Israel the camel is the main means of transportation and a Spanish reporter claiming that Israelis grill meat outdoors because they lack kitchens. Really? That's Israel's image problem? Grow up idiots, you're losing more support by the minute?

He is right, you know. A country which thinks that Rannan Gissin is a persuasive spokesman is clearly delusional. I remember the IDF once had a very nice girl doing PR. She had a pleasant suburban English accent, and she didn't at all give the impression that she was about to punch the interviewer in the face. Gissin could have learnt from her.

However, there have been many stories about the death of women and children during Cast Lead, apartheid in the West Bank and the theft of Palestinian land and water. Does anyone really believe that this childish propaganda campaign is taken seriously anywhere?

The sooner other leaders take over the goverment, the better. And by soon I mean days or weeks. Months with daily blunders is too costly for a tiny Israel, surrounded by enemies and a global delegtimization wave.

No on is laughing on my side of the world. Im dead serious. Everyone knows Israel is awesome. Who else in this world can stand up to constant terrorism like Isreal could? For those who hate Israel, they can die a slow dead. Israel is moving on and she is leading the way. Either you grab on to the tow line or you perish in peace.

Israel does not have a PR problem. It is the world that has an anti-Israel problem, an Israel obsession which is often raw anti-semitism. Why does Russia not care about PR in Chechnya? China in Tibet? Does Sudan care about PR? Sri Lanka about the Tamil land? The world has a problem they need to figure out - Why the intense focus on one country with 7 million people?

LOL...LOL....thanks for the laugh!!

Their lack of listening skills is one of the aspects that makes life in Israel unbearable for olim.

It sounds like the Israeli Information and Diaspora ministry is of the opinion that people think only horrible people do horrible things, after all, only oppressors oppress, right? If you're not an oppressor, then you don't oppress, or, rather, if you are a nice person, and people think you are a nice person, then you can't possibly be doing horrible things, right? People are not that stupid, think of the civilisations that have achieved remarkable technological advancements, and still committed horrible acts, Europeans for example. Morality is not judged by the number of patents a country holds, or by the number of Nobel Laureates it boasts. Edelstein should perhaps learn something about the people he is trying to persuade of his message.

When you let the inmates run the asylum guess what happens? People think you are nuts. There are plenty of sane and decent Israelis, but all the world sees is the lunatics running the nation and the results of their actions. America should disengage from Israel completely for a while. Then IF sane Israelis take control of their nation from the likes of Netanyahu and Lieberman, the US will have the credibility to take dramatic actions to welcome Israel back from it's self-imposed status as a pariah nation. When does a friend have to take action to show a friend that they are drunk upon snake-oil and in danger of harming themselves? America should cut off Israel now, in hope that Israel will overcome the mental illness that has overwhelmed it's body politic. Then, when Israel has taken the ten-steps necessary to once again become a decent nation, America should welcome and embrace it.

"[T]he campaign...brought 150,000 Israelis to visit its Web site to date." Wonderful! With the cherry tomato, you've convinced 150,000 Israelis that Israel is a good country. Now, if you want to convince the rest of the world, clear out of Palestine. The cherry tomato just won't do it. Not even Bar Rafaeli, although she is better than the cherry tomato.

Well, since we have the Ministry of foreign affairs populated by clowns, we should not be surprised if people regard Israel as a circus !!