MediaCentral
Activities Update
July – September 2022
Laura Cornfield
Director, MediaCentral
Dear friends,
In the third quarter of 2022, Israel was once again faced with more than 1,000 rockets from terrorists in Gaza. During the operation dubbed “Breaking Dawn,” the IDF responded by targeting the leadership of Islamic Jihad.
Over the three-day operation, MediaCentral had exceptional success in arranging briefings and one-on-one interviews for foreign journalists based in Israel.
President Joseph Biden visited Israel for the first time in his capacity as president, and MediaCentral was on-site with the journalists who documented his visit. We facilitated forums focused on conveying the facts and the critical context of his trip.
And, amid all of the sensationalist headlines surrounding the Booking.com decision to issue warning labels on listings in the West Bank, we took an on-site field tour to the people and properties that were affected. The journalists we brought spoke with Jews and Arabs alike who had been harmed by the decision.
Wherever news is happening, MediaCentral is working to connect reporters with local and foreign experts who can provide them with the nuance behind the soundbytes.
We greatly appreciate the ongoing support of all of our partners and supporters who empower us to make a tremendous difference in Israel’s portrayal in the international media.
Director, MediaCentral
Journalists appreciation
Operation Breaking Dawn
MediaCentral organized 5 briefings and 4 one-on-ones.
All of the top tier outlets took part in these conferences – including AP, Reuters, NYT, Washington Post, Bloomberg, Financial Times, VOA, CBS, Wall Street Journal, Sky News, CBN, AFP, ARD, DPA.
Immediately after the war broke out, MC held a strategic Briefing by Maj. Gen. (ret.) Yaakov Amidror. Our analyst was cited in these outlets:
Hamas, which Israel says it wants to keep out of this, must now decide what it does next. If the group joins forces with PIJ and fires rockets into Israel, then things could escalate very quickly, and we could be looking at a second war in as many years.
Our intention is clear, to us and to Hamas,” said Yaakov Amidror, a retired general and former head of the Israeli National Security Council. “If Hamas comes in, it will bring the operation to another level.
Operation Breaking Dawn - Day 2
MC Hosted Former Israel Air Force Commander Zvika Haimovich
Both AP and Reuters had our speakers quoted in their Explainers. These articles were fed to hundreds of sites and, by all standards, were surprisingly balanced.
Once you will hit the commanders it will affect immediately all the organization,” said Zvika Haimovich, the former head of the Israeli military’s air defense force. “It immediately creates a big mess in the Jihad.
Zvika Haimovich, a former commander of the Israel Air Defense Forces who served in previous operations against Gaza in 2012 and 2014, said there were significant disagreements with PIJ that could make Hamas stay out. The direct immediate interest of Hamas is not to join this operation, he said. If Hamas joins this operation it will totally change the situation that we are talking about.
A one-on-one was arranged for AP, and our speakers were quoted here as well:
Lapid is in a much stronger position then he was before because the main claim against him is he is not experienced enough,” said Gayil Talshir, a political analyst from Jerusalem’s Hebrew University. ”He might also be able to claim that he’s trying to achieve a change of paradigm” underpinning Israel’s Gaza policy. “It’s crucial to his campaign,” said Tal Schneider, a veteran Israeli political correspondent. “It’s helpful when you have more of a military activity experience when you go into an election.
Biden Visits Israel
On July 13, just before US President Joe Biden landed in Israel, MC hosted Maj. Gen. (res.) Amos Yadlin to discuss the visit, Jerusalem’s expectations, and the opportunities ahead. Yadlin discussed the expected historic “strategic partnership,” its significance for Israel, the US and other players in the region.
The technology initiative, called a “strategic dialogue,” will focus on fields including artificial intelligence, quantum information science and solutions to global challenges such as climate change and improving pandemic preparedness, according to a joint announcement.
Amos Yadlin, a former head of Israel’s military intelligence directorate, told reporters that the move “means that the United States recognizes Israel as a science and tech superpower,” and that it was important for the United States that “Israel will cooperate with it, and not with China.”
MediaCentral also hosted Aaron David Miller, Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Adbel Aziz al-Khamis, Senior Saudi Journalist and Expert on Middle East Politics on the question of “How Will Biden’s Middle East Visit Impact US-Saudi Relations?”
Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and former U.S. State Department official, said Biden is looking forward to visiting Saudi Arabia “like I would look forward to a root canal operation.” “You’ve got a president who is terribly conflicted about this meeting, Miller said. He can’t even acknowledge, in all of his public remarks, that he’s even going to meet with Mohammed bin Salman.
These quotes were picked up by more than 300 articles from AP, including:
He’s going to face a region that’s long on problems with very few solutions,” said Aaron David Miller, a former State Department official who is now a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Normalization of Relations With Turkey
On August 17, following years of rocky relations, Israel and Turkey announced the normalization of full diplomatic ties between the countries. Former Israeli Consul General in Istanbul Moshe Kamhi and Dr. Gallia Lindenstraus discussed the historical step and its possible impact.
Gallia Lindenstrauss, a senior research fellow at Israel Institute for National Security Studies, said Turkey’s financial crisis was likely behind the renewed relations. Turkey needs to improve its economic standing to attract foreign direct investment.
Turkey needs to improve its economic standing to attract foreign direct investments. For this, It basically is doing normalization attempts toward many countries in the region. Another issue on the agenda is the desire of Turkey to purchase F-16 jets from the United States. And there is hope that somehow the pro-Israel lobby will be more positive to such a deal if relations between Israel and Turkey return to what they were,” says Lindenstrauss. Lindenstrauss says Turkey needs Israel’s natural gas and is moving towards normalization while a favorable government is in office. Israel wants to see Turkey cool its relations with Hamas. “From the Israeli side, we know a major bone of contention between the two countries is the presence of Hamas military activities on Turkish soil. We know that this is something that Israel wants Turkey to stop,” she says.
Israel to Fight Booking.com Over Planned West Bank 'Safety Warning' Bed and Breakfast Field Tour & Presentation on Legal Aspects
At the end of September, MediaCentral took a group of journalists to visit several guest houses that would be affected by the Booking.com ‘safety warning’ to customers booking accommodation in Israeli settlements in the West Bank that they were traveling to a “disputed, conflict-affected or high-risk” area that “may pose greater risks.”
On Thursday, a day before Booking.com released its statement, JNS participated in a tour for journalists organized by the MediaCentral media liaison service in the area of the Megilot Dead Sea Regional Council (over the so-called green line), where bed and breakfast and other lodging accommodation and resort business owners said that the news of an upcoming travel warning by Booking.com, regardless of its wording, was already harming their businesses.
MediaCentral Director Addresses Jerusalem Post Conference
Finally, MediaCentral director Laura Cornfield spoke at the annual Jerusalem Post Conference in New York. Speaking on a panel alongside veteran NYTimes columnist Bret Stephens and Eric Gertler, the CEO of US News and World Report, Cornfield stressed the need for support for foreign media in Israel and shared with the audience how MediaCentral provides contacts and sources for these journalists.
