Israeli Govt: They Hate Us For Our Freedom

New 'Public Diplomacy' Website Rejects Basis for Palestinian Statehood

This week Israel’s government officially launched a new “Public Diplomacy” English language website, with the site urging Israelis planning to travel abroad to “be ambassadors for Israel” and which includes a number of talking points that Israelis are supposed to parrot.

As the site is an official Israeli government website, the statements could be seen as official Israeli policy, but the statements seem to fly in the face of much of the rhetoric coming out of the peace process with the Palestinian authority.

In particular the site seeks to emphasize debunking the “myth” of Palestine, declaring that there “has never been such a concept as Palestine” and that there is no basis for a Palestinian state, an odd declaration at a time when the Israeli government is negotiating the creation of that state.

Beyond that the site also insists that “Muslim terror” has nothing to do with the Palestinians, and declares instead that “Western values (freedom of religion, freedom of speech, a free press, a free market, free education, democracy, etc.) are a moral threat to the existence of dictatorial Muslim regimes.”

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.