How Israel uses digital diplomacy to improve its image in Arabic

Thanks to the internet and communications revolution, many countries and their foreign ministries have migrated to social media platforms to rebrand their image and build channels of communication with a wider audience. Indeed, social media has opened new avenues for governments and organizations to engage with foreign audiences. However, governments in developing countries have yet to realize the potential of social media. Israel is one of the countries investing most in digital diplomacy to improve its image internationally and in the Middle East. It's efforts in digital media have combined with the Arab revolutions that broke out in 2010 to communicate with Arab publics for the first time in its history. As a result, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) has set up a special digital diplomacy unit that manages dozens of digital pages in several languages, including Arabic, English, Persian, Kurdish, Hindi, Chinese and others. This thesis examines Israel's digital efforts to communicate with Arabs during conflict and non-conflict periods by analyzing (764) posts published on the "Israel speaks Arabic" Facebook page. Considering Nye's theory of soft power, as well as framing and agenda setting theories, the findings of the paper indicate that Israel uses soft power tools and political propaganda strategies to improve its image and to present itself as a democratic and peace-loving country to its Arab neighbors. Moreover, the results show that the page uses many interaction elements to simulate Arab emotions to change their beliefs and attitudes towards the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and to accept the idea of Israel's existence and normalize relations with it.