Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid released a statement Tuesday night in which he boasted about his efforts to help Israel explain Operation Pillar of Defense to the international community and accused Avigdor Liberman’s Foreign Ministry of failing to cooperate with him. “I am trying to help in the public diplomacy effort with the foreign press,” Lapid wrote. “But despite my request, the Foreign Ministry did not agree to give me its message sheet so I could coordinate my positions with the official spokesmen.”

The Russian Foreign Ministry is planning to open a Facebook page in the near future and has already launched special courses to teach diplomats how to make the most of their Twitter accounts to help promote Russia’s position on the world stage, the report said.

As part of a public diplomacy program, the Fiji mission in New Zealand is actively building people-to-people contacts. The Foreign Ministry says the mission is also seeking to raise awareness of Fiji's national interests among future leaders of New Zealand.

The Chinese language course was designed as part of the ROK’s public and complex diplomacy aimed at strengthening the capacity for conducting diplomatic activities involving Chinese citizens and promoting the friendship between the youth of the two countries.

The authoritarian Government prefers the docile, cuddly panda as the national insignia, and uses the iconic endangered species as highly successful soft power diplomatic gifts, with the most recent pair sent to Edinburgh Zoo.

The project was initiated by El Al CEO Eliezer Shkedi, a former head of the Israel Air Force, who said the national carrier would encourage its flight staff to engage in public diplomacy efforts in three North American cities served by the airline - New York, Los Angeles and Toronto.

The diplomats are learning how to use the advantages of online media in such networks as Facebook and Twitter as well as PR activity in campuses. They are also learning how to use search engines to increase the exposure of Israel's messages.