This article addresses media coverage of soft-power threats, which are typical in modern wars bet... more This article addresses media coverage of soft-power threats, which are typical in modern wars between state and non-state actors. In doing so, the authors depart from the vast literature on the ‘rally ’round the flag’ phenomenon coined in relation to conventional military threats. They base their case study on the interplay between Israel and the global Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) civil society movement that utilizes soft-power tactics with the aim of isolating Israel internationally. To assess the way the Israeli media relate to BDS, determine the absence or existence of a ‘rally ’round the flag’ phenomenon vis-à-vis BDS, and assess coverage characteristics, the authors conducted a qualitative and quantitative analysis of ( N = 209) articles covering BDS in the Israeli media over the course of three years (2015−2018). Their findings suggest that coverage of the soft threat follows similar patterns to those coined on conventional military threats.
The media plays a crucial role in contemporary conflicts because an image war is occurring alongs... more The media plays a crucial role in contemporary conflicts because an image war is occurring alongside the military confrontation. The Islamic state of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) sets a prime example for the usage of image as part of its fighting strategy, using various platforms to communicate its narrative. This study evaluates ISIS’s image front by analyzing its messages promoted through various online communication platforms: audio statements made by ISIS leaders, official videos, Dabiq and Rumiyah magazines, Islamic chants ( nasheeds), and Amaq news reports. The findings indicate that ISIS uses messages strategically in an attempt to create and maintain its image as a powerful organization. The three main themes are power projection, violence, and Islamic religious messages (while different emphases are placed on various platforms). Most messages target Muslims, while others (usually threats) target the organization’s various enemies. It appears that ISIS invests considerable resour...
The notion of soft power suggests that actions that contradict international standards will harm ... more The notion of soft power suggests that actions that contradict international standards will harm a country's international image. The current study focuses on the impact of anti-democratic action taken by Israel during 2015 on its international image, as projected in the foreign press (N = 4,425 articles) and on social media (N = 23,797 tweets). The findings indicate that anti-democratic actions did not have an immediate or longterm effect on the tone of coverage toward Israel, while other factors, such as the circumstances and the topics discussed, did influence the tone of coverage.
Communications, and the Co-head of the Public Diplomacy program at the Interdisciplinary Center (... more Communications, and the Co-head of the Public Diplomacy program at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya, Israel. Her main fields of research are political communication, public diplomacy, media coverage of conflicts and terrorism, and new media. A substantial part of asymmetric conflicts is the 'image war' that takes place in the foreign media. This study examines the circumstances that explain the degree to which political actors successfully promote their preferred frames regarding the conflict in which they are involved to the foreign press. The study examines Israel and the Palestinians' ability to promote their messages in various events over the last decade. Seven factors were examined, divided into three groups: focal event factors, political context factors, and message context factors. Separate examination of each predictor, followed by analysis of their shared effect, reveals that most factors have an impact on how successful political actors are at promoting their preferred frames to the foreign press. Our findings suggests that the media place greater
ABSTRACT What is covered (and what is not covered) by the media can shape the way the public perc... more ABSTRACT What is covered (and what is not covered) by the media can shape the way the public perceives an issue. This is especially important with regards to foreign events where most people have little knowledge and are therefore dependent on the media for information. Most existing work on coverage of foreign issues focuses on events and therefore fails to assess coverage over time. The current study offers a more systematic analysis of news coverage in the US by examining the coverage of one country – Israel – over three decades (1981–2013): Analysing the intensity of the coverage and the topics discussed. The findings indicate that events have a significant impact on foreign news coverage. We suggest that this pattern of coverage may have an important effect on how Americans view Israel and the Arab–Israeli conflict and their attitudes about it.
ABSTRACT:Israel is covered extensively by the American press. Several studies have examined US ne... more ABSTRACT:Israel is covered extensively by the American press. Several studies have examined US news coverage during specific events, yet a systematic analysis of the nature of this coverage is still lacking. This article provides an in-depth investigation of the coverage of Israel from 1981 to 2013 in three leading newspapers in the United States. Using computer-based content analysis of 56,490 news articles, we examine how the intensity of the coverage and the specific topics discussed vary over time. Our empirical findings demonstrate a relative decline in coverage of Israel, and confirm existing theories about media coverage of foreign events—mainly that coverage increases during periods of tumult, especially instances of armed conflict resulting in military action, and decreases during periods of heightened peace talks.
ABSTRACT In the last few decades, terrorism has become a global threat and challenge, which many ... more ABSTRACT In the last few decades, terrorism has become a global threat and challenge, which many countries have had to face and fight. Conflicts involving terror organizations are, to a large extent, battles of ideas, and are not focused only on physical violence or military confrontation. This reality creates a need to better understand the tools through which terror organizations promote their messages, and to distinguish between different types of terror organizations. The current study examines different types of terror organizations' messages targeting foreign audiences. The analysis focuses on the organizations' usage of public diplomacy in promoting their messages and distinguishes between the different types of organizations (limited- versus total-conflict). Messages promoted by four terror organizations—Hamas and Hezbollah (limited-conflict organizations) and Al Qaeda and the Islamic State (total-conflict organizations)—are analyzed. The findings reveal that while limited-conflict organizations communicate with the international community, and use public diplomacy to try to change the international environment in which they operate, total-conflict organizations do not use public diplomacy; they talk about the international community rather than communicating with it.
In their 2014 article in Terrorism and Political Violence, Ayalon, Popovich and Yarchi proposed a... more In their 2014 article in Terrorism and Political Violence, Ayalon, Popovich and Yarchi proposed a different strategy for states to better manage asymmetric conflict, presenting the notion of ‘imagefare’ – ‘the use, or misuse, of images as a guiding principle or a substitute for traditional military means to achieve political objectives’ (p. 12). The current study tests their theoretical framework, and examines whether the use of imagefare as part of a political actor’s conflict strategy improves its foreign image as presented by its ability to promote its preferred frames to the foreign press. The study compares the foreign media’s coverage of two recent rounds of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, in one of which (operation ‘Pillar of Defence’) image considerations played a significant role in the Israeli policy-making process. Findings suggest that whenever a country uses imagefare as part of its strategy, it increases its ability to promote its preferred messages to the foreign pr...
ABSTRACT Political actors often use public diplomacy in an attempt to promote their messages. Thi... more ABSTRACT Political actors often use public diplomacy in an attempt to promote their messages. This study deals with the frame-building process and presents the frames on terror used by political actors involved in three conflicts that utilize terror as a weapon: the conflict between the United States and Al Qaida, the conflict between the United Kingdom and Islamic groups, and the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Each political actor’s story is divided into three elements (compatible to Entman’s ‘framing’ definition): problem, cause, and solution. Differences among the frames promoted by the actors are explained by variations in cultural values and a country’s role in the international arena and in its previous experience in conflicts.
ABSTRACT The study examines the effect of female suicide attacks on foreign media framing of conf... more ABSTRACT The study examines the effect of female suicide attacks on foreign media framing of conflicts. Examining the Palestinian–Israeli conflict, 2,731 articles were sampled that covered terrorist events (American, British, and Indian press); 625 appeared in the week following a female's suicide attack, 97 reported an attack by a female perpetrator. The findings suggest that foreign media discourse around female suicide bombers promotes more messages about the society within which the terrorists are embedded. Since the coverage of female terrorists tends to provide more detailed information about the perpetrator, it focuses more on the terror organizations’ side of the conflict's story.
Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 2017
Much is known about the negative consequences of exposure to ethnic/racial stereotypes in the med... more Much is known about the negative consequences of exposure to ethnic/racial stereotypes in the media, on White audiences. However, there is substantially less research addressing the effects of such media content on members of racial/ethnic minority groups. The present study examines this question using repeated cross-sectional national level data alongside a content analysis of top prime time shows between 1987 and 2008. Multi-level modeling analyses reveal that media representations of Latinos and Blacks were associated with Latinos’ and Blacks’ ingroup attitudes, however effects on attitudes towards Whites were not significant.
To contribute to the mapping of negative campaigns effects, this study examines the engagement (s... more To contribute to the mapping of negative campaigns effects, this study examines the engagement (shares and comments) and likeability (likes) effects of negative campaigning strategies on Facebook during Israel's 2013 elections. The analysis shows that attacks, contrasts, and responses to negative messages are highly shared and commented on, illustrating the engaging nature of negative campaigning in Israel. In terms of likeability, results were mixed, as responses to negative messages were more liked than other messages, but attacks and contrasts were not. The 20 most-liked posts were analyzed and responses of the leader of the religious party Habayit HaYehudi to alleged attacks against modern orthodoxy attracted likes in dramatic numbers, riling followers who objected to the growing tensions between religious and secular Jews in Israel. The study provides the first mapping of the effects of an online negative campaign in Israel and illuminates the relevance of its political and...
ABSTRACT Given the scale of digital communication, researchers face a painful trade-off between p... more ABSTRACT Given the scale of digital communication, researchers face a painful trade-off between powerful, scalable computational strategies, and the theoretical sensitivity offered by small-scale manual analyses. Especially in the study of natural discourse on digital media, the interactive, ever-evolving stream of conversations across multiple platforms regularly defies efforts to obtain well-defined samples of manageable size, while their linguistic variability imposes major limitations upon the accuracy of automated tools. In this paper, we draw upon recent advances in computational text analysis to develop a hybrid approach to the deductive analysis of large-scale digital discourse, which combines the algorithmic extraction of coherent, recurrent patterns with a manual coding of identified patterns. The approach scales up to treat millions of texts at minimal added human effort, while affording researchers close control over the process of theory-guided classification. We demonstrate the power of Hybrid Content Analysis by studying polarization in a quarter of a million contributions from cross-platform interactive social media discourse about a controversial incident.
This article addresses media coverage of soft-power threats, which are typical in modern wars bet... more This article addresses media coverage of soft-power threats, which are typical in modern wars between state and non-state actors. In doing so, the authors depart from the vast literature on the ‘rally ’round the flag’ phenomenon coined in relation to conventional military threats. They base their case study on the interplay between Israel and the global Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) civil society movement that utilizes soft-power tactics with the aim of isolating Israel internationally. To assess the way the Israeli media relate to BDS, determine the absence or existence of a ‘rally ’round the flag’ phenomenon vis-à-vis BDS, and assess coverage characteristics, the authors conducted a qualitative and quantitative analysis of ( N = 209) articles covering BDS in the Israeli media over the course of three years (2015−2018). Their findings suggest that coverage of the soft threat follows similar patterns to those coined on conventional military threats.
The media plays a crucial role in contemporary conflicts because an image war is occurring alongs... more The media plays a crucial role in contemporary conflicts because an image war is occurring alongside the military confrontation. The Islamic state of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) sets a prime example for the usage of image as part of its fighting strategy, using various platforms to communicate its narrative. This study evaluates ISIS’s image front by analyzing its messages promoted through various online communication platforms: audio statements made by ISIS leaders, official videos, Dabiq and Rumiyah magazines, Islamic chants ( nasheeds), and Amaq news reports. The findings indicate that ISIS uses messages strategically in an attempt to create and maintain its image as a powerful organization. The three main themes are power projection, violence, and Islamic religious messages (while different emphases are placed on various platforms). Most messages target Muslims, while others (usually threats) target the organization’s various enemies. It appears that ISIS invests considerable resour...
The notion of soft power suggests that actions that contradict international standards will harm ... more The notion of soft power suggests that actions that contradict international standards will harm a country's international image. The current study focuses on the impact of anti-democratic action taken by Israel during 2015 on its international image, as projected in the foreign press (N = 4,425 articles) and on social media (N = 23,797 tweets). The findings indicate that anti-democratic actions did not have an immediate or longterm effect on the tone of coverage toward Israel, while other factors, such as the circumstances and the topics discussed, did influence the tone of coverage.
Communications, and the Co-head of the Public Diplomacy program at the Interdisciplinary Center (... more Communications, and the Co-head of the Public Diplomacy program at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya, Israel. Her main fields of research are political communication, public diplomacy, media coverage of conflicts and terrorism, and new media. A substantial part of asymmetric conflicts is the 'image war' that takes place in the foreign media. This study examines the circumstances that explain the degree to which political actors successfully promote their preferred frames regarding the conflict in which they are involved to the foreign press. The study examines Israel and the Palestinians' ability to promote their messages in various events over the last decade. Seven factors were examined, divided into three groups: focal event factors, political context factors, and message context factors. Separate examination of each predictor, followed by analysis of their shared effect, reveals that most factors have an impact on how successful political actors are at promoting their preferred frames to the foreign press. Our findings suggests that the media place greater
ABSTRACT What is covered (and what is not covered) by the media can shape the way the public perc... more ABSTRACT What is covered (and what is not covered) by the media can shape the way the public perceives an issue. This is especially important with regards to foreign events where most people have little knowledge and are therefore dependent on the media for information. Most existing work on coverage of foreign issues focuses on events and therefore fails to assess coverage over time. The current study offers a more systematic analysis of news coverage in the US by examining the coverage of one country – Israel – over three decades (1981–2013): Analysing the intensity of the coverage and the topics discussed. The findings indicate that events have a significant impact on foreign news coverage. We suggest that this pattern of coverage may have an important effect on how Americans view Israel and the Arab–Israeli conflict and their attitudes about it.
ABSTRACT:Israel is covered extensively by the American press. Several studies have examined US ne... more ABSTRACT:Israel is covered extensively by the American press. Several studies have examined US news coverage during specific events, yet a systematic analysis of the nature of this coverage is still lacking. This article provides an in-depth investigation of the coverage of Israel from 1981 to 2013 in three leading newspapers in the United States. Using computer-based content analysis of 56,490 news articles, we examine how the intensity of the coverage and the specific topics discussed vary over time. Our empirical findings demonstrate a relative decline in coverage of Israel, and confirm existing theories about media coverage of foreign events—mainly that coverage increases during periods of tumult, especially instances of armed conflict resulting in military action, and decreases during periods of heightened peace talks.
ABSTRACT In the last few decades, terrorism has become a global threat and challenge, which many ... more ABSTRACT In the last few decades, terrorism has become a global threat and challenge, which many countries have had to face and fight. Conflicts involving terror organizations are, to a large extent, battles of ideas, and are not focused only on physical violence or military confrontation. This reality creates a need to better understand the tools through which terror organizations promote their messages, and to distinguish between different types of terror organizations. The current study examines different types of terror organizations' messages targeting foreign audiences. The analysis focuses on the organizations' usage of public diplomacy in promoting their messages and distinguishes between the different types of organizations (limited- versus total-conflict). Messages promoted by four terror organizations—Hamas and Hezbollah (limited-conflict organizations) and Al Qaeda and the Islamic State (total-conflict organizations)—are analyzed. The findings reveal that while limited-conflict organizations communicate with the international community, and use public diplomacy to try to change the international environment in which they operate, total-conflict organizations do not use public diplomacy; they talk about the international community rather than communicating with it.
In their 2014 article in Terrorism and Political Violence, Ayalon, Popovich and Yarchi proposed a... more In their 2014 article in Terrorism and Political Violence, Ayalon, Popovich and Yarchi proposed a different strategy for states to better manage asymmetric conflict, presenting the notion of ‘imagefare’ – ‘the use, or misuse, of images as a guiding principle or a substitute for traditional military means to achieve political objectives’ (p. 12). The current study tests their theoretical framework, and examines whether the use of imagefare as part of a political actor’s conflict strategy improves its foreign image as presented by its ability to promote its preferred frames to the foreign press. The study compares the foreign media’s coverage of two recent rounds of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, in one of which (operation ‘Pillar of Defence’) image considerations played a significant role in the Israeli policy-making process. Findings suggest that whenever a country uses imagefare as part of its strategy, it increases its ability to promote its preferred messages to the foreign pr...
ABSTRACT Political actors often use public diplomacy in an attempt to promote their messages. Thi... more ABSTRACT Political actors often use public diplomacy in an attempt to promote their messages. This study deals with the frame-building process and presents the frames on terror used by political actors involved in three conflicts that utilize terror as a weapon: the conflict between the United States and Al Qaida, the conflict between the United Kingdom and Islamic groups, and the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Each political actor’s story is divided into three elements (compatible to Entman’s ‘framing’ definition): problem, cause, and solution. Differences among the frames promoted by the actors are explained by variations in cultural values and a country’s role in the international arena and in its previous experience in conflicts.
ABSTRACT The study examines the effect of female suicide attacks on foreign media framing of conf... more ABSTRACT The study examines the effect of female suicide attacks on foreign media framing of conflicts. Examining the Palestinian–Israeli conflict, 2,731 articles were sampled that covered terrorist events (American, British, and Indian press); 625 appeared in the week following a female's suicide attack, 97 reported an attack by a female perpetrator. The findings suggest that foreign media discourse around female suicide bombers promotes more messages about the society within which the terrorists are embedded. Since the coverage of female terrorists tends to provide more detailed information about the perpetrator, it focuses more on the terror organizations’ side of the conflict's story.
Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 2017
Much is known about the negative consequences of exposure to ethnic/racial stereotypes in the med... more Much is known about the negative consequences of exposure to ethnic/racial stereotypes in the media, on White audiences. However, there is substantially less research addressing the effects of such media content on members of racial/ethnic minority groups. The present study examines this question using repeated cross-sectional national level data alongside a content analysis of top prime time shows between 1987 and 2008. Multi-level modeling analyses reveal that media representations of Latinos and Blacks were associated with Latinos’ and Blacks’ ingroup attitudes, however effects on attitudes towards Whites were not significant.
To contribute to the mapping of negative campaigns effects, this study examines the engagement (s... more To contribute to the mapping of negative campaigns effects, this study examines the engagement (shares and comments) and likeability (likes) effects of negative campaigning strategies on Facebook during Israel's 2013 elections. The analysis shows that attacks, contrasts, and responses to negative messages are highly shared and commented on, illustrating the engaging nature of negative campaigning in Israel. In terms of likeability, results were mixed, as responses to negative messages were more liked than other messages, but attacks and contrasts were not. The 20 most-liked posts were analyzed and responses of the leader of the religious party Habayit HaYehudi to alleged attacks against modern orthodoxy attracted likes in dramatic numbers, riling followers who objected to the growing tensions between religious and secular Jews in Israel. The study provides the first mapping of the effects of an online negative campaign in Israel and illuminates the relevance of its political and...
ABSTRACT Given the scale of digital communication, researchers face a painful trade-off between p... more ABSTRACT Given the scale of digital communication, researchers face a painful trade-off between powerful, scalable computational strategies, and the theoretical sensitivity offered by small-scale manual analyses. Especially in the study of natural discourse on digital media, the interactive, ever-evolving stream of conversations across multiple platforms regularly defies efforts to obtain well-defined samples of manageable size, while their linguistic variability imposes major limitations upon the accuracy of automated tools. In this paper, we draw upon recent advances in computational text analysis to develop a hybrid approach to the deductive analysis of large-scale digital discourse, which combines the algorithmic extraction of coherent, recurrent patterns with a manual coding of identified patterns. The approach scales up to treat millions of texts at minimal added human effort, while affording researchers close control over the process of theory-guided classification. We demonstrate the power of Hybrid Content Analysis by studying polarization in a quarter of a million contributions from cross-platform interactive social media discourse about a controversial incident.
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Papers by Moran Yarchi