Change world perceptions? Israeli citizens face an uphill battle

A number of years ago, I joined a group of well-meaning, motivated and relatively intelligent Israeli “Anglos” who had a brilliant idea. Since the Israeli government does such a poor job in hasbara (public diplomacy efforts), why don’t we take a jab at advocacy and become “unofficial spokespersons” for Israel?

Irwin J. (Yitzchak) Mansdorf

Despite our best intentions — and some success — we soon learned that not everyone is built for the job, something that the people running the Masbirim Web site will soon undoubtedly discover. (The Hebrew-only site, http://www.masbirim.gov.il, was launched by the Israeli government in February as a how-to guide for representing Israel abroad; an English version is supposed to be ready this month.)

One of the ideas of our group was to promote “speakers” from the ranks of “ordinary Israelis” who, while on trips overseas, would address local communities. Some of these talks were arranged through friends, others through contacts with various Jewish organizations and yet others through informal contacts with like-minded people overseas.

What we found was a cadre of Israelis who spoke English well, but unlike Arab spokespersons who know what they want and say it loud and clear, we still do not have a clear message. We began hearing about some of our speakers who sounded like a cross between Attila the Hun and Genghis Khan, and others who seemed ready to have Arabs move back to Tel Aviv.

Then we had the one “moderate” who spoke to a group of Jews in the New York area and felt that “both sides” need to make concessions and “both sides” have their extremists and people on “both sides” want peace, but the leaders of “both sides” are simply screwing it up for everyone.  In the end, the crowd learned little about the issues. Now that Israeli government officials are gung-ho on using citizen masbirim (explainers), they should soon learn what we already know.

Israelis have a wide range of views that do not always mirror government policy. Is it “occupation” or is it “disputed territory”? Are settlements wise or not? Should we have withdrawn from Gaza or not?

Moreover, the language of the media and delegitimization of Israel in the public’s eye is based largely on emotions. You cannot counter the impact of videos showing Arab families and their destroyed homes, or photos of

Palestinian children carried in the arms of grieving parents, by telling people that Israel has nice beaches and invented the cell phone. Germany had Beethoven and Brahms, the Volkswagen Beetle and impeccable taste. So what?

Part of the reason that Israel’s image is hard to counter is because the problems are real and the dilemmas faced are complex and multilayered. It is naive at best to expect the country’s teachers, dentists and bus drivers to succeed where seasoned, educated professionals have not.

Israel’s problem in the public sphere is less about policy and more about perceptions. Despite all the “facts” that citizens can be armed with and all the rationale for why the Fourth Geneva Convention does not apply to settlements or how much we can stress that Arabs have the right to vote, the real issue is not the “facts” but rather the impression people have of the conflict.

Israel is perceived as morally illegitimate, and until the message of Israel’s basic decency and justice resonates, masbirim will manage to convince only the converted.

The issue is not settlements, not the Golan, not Gaza and not even Jerusalem. The real issue, and the only one that means anything, is Israel’s right to exist as an independent Jewish state, a nation state where its people, the Jewish people, exercise self-determination.

That is the message, and that is what our citizens and the world need to understand.

All the rest is commentary.

Irwin J. (Yitzchak) Mansdorf is an Israeli psychologist who writes about the Israel-Arab conflict and directs a program in Israel-Arab studies at Midreshet Lindenbaum in Jerusalem. This piece first appeared on Ynetnews.com.