Hasbara

NOTE much of this article lifted from Sourcewatch

Hasbara - the Hebrew word for 'Explanation'. In practice it has come to describe those who contribute to the dispersed propaganda effort to sell Zionist Israel, justify its actions, and defend it in the court of worldwide public opinion. The Hasbara portrays Israel as fighting on two fronts:

1. A hostile, native, non-Jewish Palestinian population and Israel's surrounding Arab States
2. World opinion.

The latter is the province of the Hasbara. It's premise is that Israel's problems are the result of inadequate 'habara' - in practical terms, propaganda - rather than an extended underlying unjust situation involving what has, defacto, become a grossly apartheid State.

The techniques utilized

• Smearing/defaming critics of Israel, aka, attacking the messenger. This is even the terminology found in the Hasbara Handbook
• Selective discussion of issues
• Framing of issues, and setting the terminology used in discussing Israel
• Harassing media about its coverage
• Challenging the portrayal of an alternative narrative, and attempting to keep the zionist narrative as the dominant one.

Hasbara Campus Manual

The Hasbara Handbook: Promoting Israel on Campus, is available online. It contains some interesting admission: Propaganda is used by those who want to communicate in ways that engage the emotions and downplay rationality, in an attempt to promote a certain message.

It describe seven propaganda techniques:

1. Name calling: through the careful use of words name calling techniques link a person or an idea to a negative symbol.
2. Glittering generality: name calling in reverse. Glittering generalities use positive phrases in order to lend positive image to things. Words such as "freedom", "civilization" …
3. Transfer: involves taking some of the prestige and authority of one concept and applying it to another. For example, a speaker might decide to speak in front of a United Nations flag, in an attempt to gain legitimacy for himself or his idea.
4. Testimonial: enlisting the support of somebody admired or famous to endorse an idea or campaign.
5. Plain folks: a technique that attempts to convince the listener that the speaker is a 'regular guy', who is trust-worthy like 'you or me'.
6. Fear: the inculcation of fear.
7. Bandwagon.

External resources

• "Habara Handbook: Promoting Israel on Campus", World Union of Jewish Students, March 2002.
• Fadi Kiblawi, Israel's Campus Concerns, The Palestine Chronicle, Oct. 23, 2003. Quote: "The Hasbara Handbook prescribes fascinating instructions on attacking the messenger and avoiding the message at all costs ‘in ways that engage the emotions, and downplay rationality, in an attempt to promote’ their cause. In a section entitled ‘Name Calling,’ Israel's Jewish Agency writes, ‘Creating negative connotations by name calling is done to try and get the audience to reject a person or idea on the basis of negative associations, without allowing a real examination of that person or idea."
• Conal Urguhart, Israel uses TV show to find its best spin doctor, The Guardian, Nov. 27, 2004.
• Gary Rosenblatt, "Hasbara’ Goes Prime Time", The Jewish Week, December 3, 2004.
• Hilary Leila Krieger, Expert: Israeli PR improving, but..., Jerusalem Post, December 16, 2004. Interviews Frank Luntz during the 2004 Herzliya Conference.
• Gary Rosenblatt, "Inside Israel’s Image War", The Jewish Week, January 19, 2007.