A curated selection of public diplomacy-relevant news from a global cross-section of English-language media outlets, including independent, corporate-owned, and state-sponsored sources. The stories featured don't necessarily represent CPD's views nor have they been verified by CPD.
Gaza needs a peace stimulus
People-to-people diplomacy works on the assumption that if Israelis and Palestinians connect at a human level, they will build compassion and trust. They will change public opinion. Painfully, slowly, they will create cross-border movements to transform the cultural and political reality on the ground. Many question the impact of people-to-people diplomacy. But it has hardly been tried.
Israelis United on Gaza War as Censure Rises Abroad
To Israel’s critics abroad, the picture could not be clearer: Israel’s war in Gaza is a wildly disproportionate response to the rockets of Hamas, causing untold human suffering and bombing an already isolated and impoverished population into the Stone Age, and it must be stopped. Yet here in Israel very few, at least among the Jewish population, see it that way.
Put up or shut up
Far more than in the Danish cartoons stupid-storm, every relevant actor in the Middle East already sees the U.S. as deeply implicated in the Gaza crisis. Being silent doesn't make the U.S. invisible any more than closing your eyes means that others can't see you.
GAO Calls for A New Priority On Public Diplomacy
Improving the United States' image abroad is No. 5 on the Government Accountability Office's list of 13 urgent issues requiring the attention of Barack Obama and the 111th Congress during the first year of the new administration. "In today's highly volatile global environment, it is more critical than ever that the United States effectively coordinate, manage, and implement its public diplomacy and strategic communications activities to affect foreign public opinion," the GAO said.
China TV Faces Propaganda Charge
Chinese intellectuals have signed an open letter calling for a boycott of state television news programmes. The letter says China's Central Television (CCTV) has turned its news and historical drama series into propaganda to brainwash its audience. The author of the damning letter told the BBC that the action should at least serve as a health warning to the susceptible public.
God is Great: Faith and Public Diplomacy at Work
On January 10th 2009, about hundred Delawareans shared a unique spiritual and cultural experience. They participated in a dialogue on the role of faith in Middle Eastern and American communities. A delegation of Islamic and social science scholars from Saudi Arabia and Egypt, joined with twelve leaders of various faith communities – Catholic, Jewish, Methodist, Muslim, Hindu, Presbyterian and Christian Fellowship – to engage in a conversation that neither focused on the commonalities of their faiths nor on its differences.
Few in U.S. See Jazeera’s Coverage of Gaza War
Recognizing that its material from Gaza will have influence in the United States only if it is highly accessible online, Al Jazeera has aggressively experimented with using the Internet to distribute the information it has gathered...Al Jazeera said that since the war started the number of people watching its broadcasts via the Livestream service has increased by over 500 percent, and the views of videos on its YouTube channel have increased by more than 150 percent.
War 2.0 or Public Diplomacy 2.0: The Role of Internet in Israel’s Gaza Strip Bombing
The Israel Defense Force has a blog and a YouTube channel, the Israel consulate in New York held a press conference on Twitter and summarized the discussion on their Israel Politik blog, and the Likud prime ministerial candidate Benjamin Netanyahu is active on both Twitter and YouTube... According to Gwen Ackerman at Bloomberg, this effort is also part of a larger cross-media initiative to manage international perceptions of the Israel-Palestine conflict.
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