Something Good: "Media" Sure Changing in Israel

Dancing to Jewish music during a morning talk show

Here in Israel it wasn't all that long ago, when the only time you'd see an obviously religious Jew on Israeli television news was when  one was being interviewed. Those holding the microphone were uniformly bareheaded.

In the days when I was a young mother, we'd advise each other to encourage our children to "go into the media" as careers. It was a very sturdy "double-glazed glass ceiling" in terms of both religious observance and politics. Until not all that long ago, the Israeli media was strictly secular-Left. If anyone didn't "fit in," he or she'd be relegated to technical staff at best.

The Israeli media, first radio and later on television, shaped opinion and had a lot of influence. So when we talked of encouraging our children to break in and make careers in the media, it seemed rather revolutionary, more Don Quixote, than a practical profession like teaching, nursing, engineering and computers.

A few years ago, Bibi Netanyahu's Likud Government disbanded the old Leftist government Israel Broadcasting Authority and established a few "private," though government backed television/radio companies. Even though some of the old veteran media stars are still featured, there are many new ones. This new media revolution broke the hold the Histadrut, Israel's powerful labor union, had on the media.

Today, Channel 11 seems to be dominated by men who wear kippot, and many of those kippot are cloth, usually black, not the crocheted favored by the religiously moderate Bnai Akiva, NRP.

True change is always slow, and of course nothing will ever be perfect. But I think that we're going in the right direction. Religious women, married with hair covered in various styles, are also now seen on television even giving opinions. Gd willing I'll try to take photos and write about them, too.

Yes, I see wonderful changes and improvement here in Israel. This isn't the way things were half a century or even twenty years ago, Baruch Hashem, Thank Gd.

Israeli TV News Campaigning Against Bibi

If you watch Israeli television news, you'd think that Israel was the worst country in the world. There seems to be street protests and riots all over all the time.

According to the news:

• You'd think that Israel was the most racist country in the world.
• The Israeli Government hires cruel, sadistic childminders.
• Price of real estate can be controlled by the government.
• Everything can be remedied by the government if the correct people are elected to the Knesset.
• OBVIOUSLY IT'S BIBI'S FAULT!

I am using pictures of the so-called anti-racist protests to illustrate this post, because it's very clear that white agent provocateurs have been leading the movement/riots. They began with the death of an Israeli of the Jewish Ethiopian community by an off-duty policeman. The media has been ignoring the fact that all the evidence shows is that the policeman and his family had been in danger, and the death was totally accidental. The orchestrated violence, anti-police and anti-government acts did not come initially from the community. They are being led by white Leftists. Follow the money.

Although early childhood care, daycare centers have their problems, the solution is far from simple. Who's going to enforce better workers? Those loud, nasty-mouthed demonstrators? Around the country there's a terrible shortage of people willing to work as caregivers. It's hard work, and the pay is low. Even if there are cameras all over, how could that help? Who's going to look at the films? Men hoping to see breastfeeding mothers? And no matter how carefully the "authorities" are in supervising official daycare centers, there will still be people who prefer sending to the unofficial ones.

And lastly, for now, about the high price in housing. The principle is Supply and Demand, which exists all over the world. Some of the repeated news items I caught on television told of hard to believe housing rip-offs in Tel Aviv. In one case, what must be a humongous apartment was divided into fifteen 15 rooms, which people rented individually for an outrageous sum. To make it even less believable, they share the one kitchen. I can't really imagine anyone living like that; maybe this is office space. Besides that, nobody forces anyone to shell out large sums for small spaces, unless the people have the money and don't care about the space. That's what Supply and Demand is all about.

Every day and night, newscasts concentrate on how terrible it is to live here in Israel. Considering that we're having elections again in a few weeks, and it's no secret that the media hates Bibi, I'm convinced that they're working hard to galvanize the votes for anyone but Bibi.

I Finally Heard Mention of the Kidnapped Teens on a Foreign News Channel! Guess Which!

OK, I must admit that I don't have too much time to watch television. And of course, being a saleswoman, I don't see TV at work, and I don't have one next to the computer, so it's not like I've been looking for news many hours each day.

I do know Hebrew, and I do understand the news on Israeli TV, so it's not that I needed to find an international news channel for the information. There were a couple of other reasons.

• One is that I'm curious. I'd like to know if the world knows that Arab terrorists have kidnapped three Jewish Israeli teenagers and how they are playing it.
• Israel's Channel One, which should be the main source of news has decided not to waste the money it had spent for its World Cup coverage and therefore is showing soccer most of the time.
• I was sick and disgusted that Israel's Channels 2 and 10 kept on showing how the Arabs are suffering sic to help "balance" their broadcasts.

We have one of these satellite receiver thingies that gives us a "package" of hundreds of stations, mostly in Arabic or other languages I don't understand. We do get a few foreign news channels, such as BBC, CNN and Bloomberg. A number of times the past few days I tried listening to them while in the kitchen or folding laundry or doing other chores near the TV, but never did I hear even a hint of a mention that Israel is searching and praying for three teenage boys who had been kidnapped by Arab terrorists.

A couple of hours ago, again I went through the channels with the remote control, and I noticed a channel I had never ever watched, TV France 24 English. After a few minutes, they suddenly came out with a news report about the kidnapped boys from Israel. I'm pretty sure that the news article, Israel aims to break Hamas as hunt for missing youths intensifies I just found via Professor Google is from that channel. It was the very first time I watched that channel, and I will definitely watch it again when I'm looking for news.

I'd like to know from where you're getting your news. Please let me know in the comments, thanks.