Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians may be deadlocked, but an online community of young Israelis and Arabs from across the Middle East is hoping for better results in the virtual world. Using Facebook, a virtual peace and economic cooperation conference seeks to transcend borders by sharing ideas on the Internet.

“We shouldn’t be afraid to speak out, to say what we believe in. There are enough people who support us and they want to hear it from us. We shouldn’t be apologetic all the time. We should be strong and right, and that’s the message we’re sending from the Knesset.”

Israel has changed its attitude toward the Diaspora and is more interested in a relationship of equals than it was before. Speaking at the Women’s International Zionist Organization’s Enlarged General Meeting, the Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs Minister boasted that the government not only accepts donations from Jews living abroad but also invests in them.

Today the entire public diplomacy budget is reportedly of the order of magnitude of what a medium-to-large Israeli corporation spends on promoting fast-food or snacks. If one does not invest in winning hearts and minds, it is no wonder that they are not won.

Israel is tired of playing it straight: It is recruiting gays and lesbians as unofficial envoys. In a bid to boost its international image, the country’s ministry of Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs has established a cadre of diverse volunteers who speak about Israel around the world.

Better public diplomacy needs to be used in order to prevent a wave of legislation proscribing shechita, the kosher slaughtering of animals, Rabbi Goldberg, Deputy Director of the Rabbinical Centre of Europe (RCE), told a committee of the Knesset, Israel's parliament.

It seems that without an effective American president player on the ground, it will be very difficult to get the Israelis and Palestinians to a negotiating table, unless somehow they can figure out a way to do a secret backchannel. Public diplomacy won’t work without an American role...

When it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, perhaps no newspaper's coverage generates more passionate and emotional reaction from the Jewish community in America and around the world than that of the New York Times. There has been an increasingly troubling imbalance in the way that the Times presents stories and opinions on the Middle East conflict.