Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Pages: 218
•
Trim: 6½ x 9¼
978-1-4422-6598-1 • Hardback • July 2016 • $116.00 • (£89.00)
978-1-4422-6599-8 • eBook • July 2016 • $110.00 • (£85.00)
Jonathan Cummings is a political analyst and consultant and former director of the Israel office of BICOM (Britain Israel Communication and Research Centre). He served as a parliamentary assistant at the Knesset and was a research fellow at Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies.
Introduction: “Muddling Through”
Chapter 1: The Genesis of Hasbara: From the Diaspora to the Birth of Zionism
Chapter 2: “Trapped in the Past”: Government Communications Policy under Yisrael Galili
Chapter 3: Breech Birth: The Introduction of Television to Israel
Chapter 4: “The Image Problem of a Tough Victor”: After the Six-Day War
Chapter 5: Deterioration and Diffusion: Before and After the Yom Kippur War
Chapter 6: The Rise and Fall of the Ministry of Information
Conclusion
[This book] is timely and welcome...
— Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs
A significant and interesting contribution to the historical analysis of public diplomacy. An excellent case study of the public diplomacy of a new state, Israel, during a critical period of several major wars with its neighbors. Presents and evaluates organizational and policy challenges in public diplomacy, and ways to fix them. Well-grounded in documents, memoirs, biographies, and interviews.
— Professor Eytan Gilboa, Director, The Center for International Communication, Bar-Ilan University
This rigorous, penetrating and long-overdue study examines Israel's international public opinion efforts. In his highly readable and thoroughly researched book, Jonathan Cummings successfully tackles the key problems of Israel's "hasbara" and has produced the definitive work on this sensitive topic.
— Meron Medzini, former Director, Israel Government Press Office
Hasbara has become synonymous with Israel's heavy-handed efforts at making its case on the international stage. By unpicking the details of a critical phase of Israeli history, Jonathan Cummings has reclaimed the centrality of Israel's public diplomacy as an element of the country's foreign policy. This is an important book and a compelling read.
— Nachman Shai, MK, former IDF Spokesperson
Israel’s Public Diplomacyserves as a useful introduction to Israeli deliberations on international image-making at a crucial juncture, before and after the 1967 war; a transformative period for the image of Israel in the Western world.
— Journal of Contemporary History