How to market Israel
London-based marketing expert Jonathan Gabbay is ridiculing the hasbara (public diplomacy) website set up by the government, and says that we have to explain Israel's positions and not try to smooth things over by talking about Bar Rephaeli and tourism. For Gabay, this is "too fluffy." Rather, such a campaign should work according to his basic branding model, for which he draws the interior of an egg. The values - the white - draw their strength from its core idea, the yolk. Masbirim, Gabay contests, focuses too much on Israel's values - such as tourism, culture and science. "What is Israel about? It's not just about Bar Refaeli, as beautiful as she is," he said. "Without the central bit, all this stuff is fluff and doesn't mean anything."As you all can guess, I'm with Gabbay on this.
Gabay proposes Israel to be more straightforward about the one issue people connect with the brand Israel - the conflict with the Palestinians. Instead of merely reacting to accusations of oppression or war crimes, Jerusalem should actively and confidently - but not arrogantly - 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."
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:52 AM
1 Comments:
Well that is one part of the problem, it's also a lot of cultural ignorance....
As someone who has spent a lot of time in Europe, these very soft handed sissy argument used in Europe are not convincing!
What must be done is to shift the argument.. By that I mean asking what does a "Palestine" mean?
Will this be a place where homosexuals can live free? Just ask all the homosexual 'palestinian refugees' by the Shalom towers...
Will this be a place will minority rights will be respected? I don't even think I need to begin to list the number of cases...
Will this be a place where Women will have basic human rights? Considering that Gaza is soon to become more Saudi than Saudi Arabia...
Will this be a place of liberal education and free speech? Will thats a knee slapper if I ever heard one...
The current problem is that the narrative has become very simple. "Create Palestine = Get Peace". Everyone views it as a Panacea... what must be done is to ask, so what happens the next day with the recognition of Ramallah?
This has been the complete failure of Israeli hasbara and diplomatic corp, that no one has asked these essential questions. While I will definitely not deny that many in particular the Leftists elite want to destroy Israel, there must a wedge driven between them and average Europeans, who will say "I may not like all of Israels policies... but I don't want my money to make another Saudi Arabia"
And this is part of the reason why Israel has failed so miserably in Europe we are not speaking the European language, yet on the other hand Israel talks the American language thats why we have been able to convey our case to the American people... and why it's vice versa with the 'paletinians' in the US and Europe...
We must immediately start asking hard questions... ones that the 'palestinians' will not be able to answer without squirming...
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