just 31 minutes before the onset of Shabbat in Jerusalem and less than 24 hours after the Palestinians succeeded in upgrading their status at the UN, a senior diplomatic source sent out a text message to diplomatic reporters saying Israel “had decided to approve the building of 3,000 housing units in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria.

Participating in the video conference were personnel from the Prime Minister's Office National Information Directorate, the Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs Ministry, the Foreign Ministry (from Dublin), the IDF Spokesperson's Office New Media Division, and students and public diplomacy activists.

Netanyahu has been publicly pressuring the Obama administration to set so-called “red lines” that would trigger an American military response to Iran’s growing nuclear program. And the prime minister kicked his campaign into overdrive after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s publicly rebuked his request.

My answer is best summarized in the words of Joseph Nye... "Even the best advertising cannot sell an unpopular product. Policies that appear as narrowly self-serving or arrogantly presented are likely to prohibit rather than produce soft power."

Opposition leader Tzipi Livni dismissed a purported plan by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to launch a new peace initiative, saying on Sunday that the premier's attitude toward peace talks showed an utter lack of leadership.

Of all the world leaders featured in the WikiLeaks cables, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has probably been the most positive about the revelations, saying, "The documents show many sources backing Israel's assessments, particularly of Iran." All the same, the documents present the voluble Israeli leader in some illuminating candid moments.

If you closed your eyes for a minute while listening to what Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Sunday to a group of Likud MKs opposed to an additional 90-day settlement moratorium, you could swear you were hearing Ariel Sharon.

United States President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy George Mitchell landed in Damascus on Thursday for his fourth visit since mid-2009. He came to brief President Bashar al-Assad about ongoing talks between Palestinians and Israelis, which he has called "impressive", arranged by the Obama administration.