Eydar - Welcome to the Politburo

Dror Eydar
Israel Hayom
09 December '11

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=988

1. When the Eilat conference on Israeli media ended and people began to leave, a certain veteran "Mr. Television" left the stage and quipped sarcastically, "Hilltop Youth for government," addressing several conservative journalists who stood there. When I heard his words, a Latin phrase came to mind: "Sic transit gloria mundi." Thus passes the glory of the world.

The journalism conference in Eilat this week provided another opportunity for people of the old order and their spiritual descendents to come face to face with the Israeli reality, a reality that is asking for change in the traditional power bases in which the general public never had a say - in the media.

It would have been interesting to see the journalists' reactions to the results of surveys organized by the conference sponsors. A majority of the Jewish public in Israel views the large media outlets - including Channels 2 and 10, Army Radio, Israel Radio, and most newspapers - as Left-leaning, and even extremely left-leaning. The average reaction to that would surely be, "That can't be true," "They don't understand," and "We need to replace the nation."



Many journalists lamented the economic crisis plaguing journalism, but lower-rated channels could have learned a lesson from the conservative Fox News network in the U.S. The network was founded to compete with the liberal networks that did not consider the views of a vast public whose values were not the same as those of the journalists on the East and West Coasts. In a short time, Fox News became more popular than the people who made up the old order. The latter, of course, tried to taunt and delegitimize Fox News reporters, in accordance with their tradition, but as a colleague, Boaz Bismuth, said at the Eilat conference concerning our newspaper, "We relate to the public, not the guilds."

2. Apropos delegitimization, throughout the conference one could clearly hear - and not between the lines - who was considered an enemy of the media and the imaginary old order democracy: Israel Broadcasting Authority (IBA) and Israel Hayom. I have not yet seen the great change in the IBA that is so feared by some, and that so many others are looking forward to, but the hypocritical fear and loathing over Israel Hayom reveals the widespread intellectual disgrace that Israeli journalism is in.

Like Louis XIV, when he declared "I am the nation," journalists band together and declare in one version or another, "I am democracy" and "I am freedom of expression."

Those who, for ages, silenced the majority of the Israeli public and did not bring Ariel Sharon to justice because he fulfilled their political dreams by destroying settlements, those who did not gather at conferences to protest the disgrace of our democracy when Sharon shunned his own promises to those who elected him, as well as the Likud's referendum and more, dare to rise up now and teach us morality and speak about a "tyranny of the majority."

Let us understand this. Isn't a "tyranny of the majority" a reliable phrase that relates to the disengagement from Gaza and Oslo Accords? Where were you then?

3. Another element was emphasized and reached its peak in [veteran investigative journalist] Ilana Dayan's speech to the conference. The main gist was that there, in Jerusalem, reside the bad people. Here, among the guilds, reside the righteous. On one panel at the conference I said that having a view of the world as a dichotomy is like shooting themselves in the foot, because you can't buy a claim that is so polarized from someone who himself belongs to those who are unwilling to accept changes in various systems, even when the changes involve corrections of failures.

I would expect Ilana Dayan to say as well, "Friends, it is time to make space for others who have totally different views than the political bon-ton we’ve been used to in our closed society." Dayan quoted poet Nathan Alterman for support. Personally, I would have chosen the poems of "The Little Clericalist," because the opposition expressed by most journalists at the conference to personal and cultural changes taking place right under their noses reminded me of the Catholic Church on the eve of the Protestant Revolution.

4. One evening, I spoke with a senior media personality who worked with all the "great ones" (she provided an impressive list of names and programs). I gave her my pitch about the exclusion of the conservative public (rightists, the observant, Likud, settlers, and others) from radio and television studios for ages. I explained that I wasn't referring to the interviewees, but to the interviewers, hosts, those who formulate the questions, those who hold the microphones. I told her that I grew up in a reality in which I, and others with similar views, had no voice in the media. If we review election results over the past decades, we can see a pattern of a tyrannical minority silencing the majority.

The lady was not confused, and in a few sentences revealed the ethos according to which the media has operated for too long. She said that right-wing and observant Jews are not "enlightened" and "have a moral dilemma" because they do not appreciate their fellows - the Palestinians - and therefore "do not deserve to be given the microphone." The word "occupation" was used a lot as well. How could it not be so?

Her colleagues will come now and say she spoke foolishly, she is wrong, etc. But she spoke innocently, and that is the most genuine type of testimony. Moreover, the fact that she was not sophisticated and deep revealed her true sources of influence and the environment in which she worked.

This is similar to a study of influential sources among artists. Great artists know how to integrate their influential sources and create a style of their own. That is why one has to work hard in order to reveal who they were influenced by. On the other hand, average or below-average artists are recognized by their obviously shoddy designs which indicate their non-integrated influential sources. They tend to subconsciously copy the styles of greater artists who influenced their work. A good researcher looks to the artistic periphery, and through it develops a comprehensive and reliable picture of an entire era from which the great artists drew their strengths as well.

5. Two talented spokespersons of the Israeli Left, Haaretz commentators Gideon Levy and Yossi Sarid, had opposing views concerning the survey that determined that the Israeli media is left-leaning. To support their views, they both cited the most common national crisis in which the media is tested - war. As Alterman once wrote: "Time of war, even the image of these things was its image." Both Levy and Sarid said the media was actually right-leaning, because during a war it unites in a perplexing patriotism and sides with Israel. Well, let's assume.

But even a time of peace or "peace process" is a time of crisis. Take for example the Oslo Accords, the disengagement from Gaza, the social protests, Rabin's assassination, and more. The media banded together as one during those times, just like editors on the first evening of the conference who presented united viewpoints.

A French journalist who was experiencing culture shock sat next to me. "How can it be that everyone is in agreement here," she asked. "Here's your lesson in Israeli journalism," I thought. "Look at the stage and you will see the Politburo of the party that no one elected, but nonetheless takes the liberty of setting our daily agenda."

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