Military Public Diplomacy 2.0: The Arabic Facebook Page of the Israeli Defense Forces’ Spokesperson

in The Hague Journal of Diplomacy
Authors: Tal Samuel-Azran 1 and Moran Yarchi 1
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1 Sammy Ofer School of Communications, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya, Herzliya 4610101, Israel
Online Publication Date:
07 Aug 2018
Volume/Issue:
Volume 13: Issue 3
Article Type:
Research Article
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1163/1871191X-11303005
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Summary

The Arabic-language Facebook page of the Israeli Defense Forces’ spokesperson has attracted a massive following in the Arab world and serves as an interesting and unique case study towards understanding the effect of a military public diplomacy initiative. Content analysis of the Facebook page reveals a mixture of power and deterrence messages, with posts designed to emphasize shared values. Analysis of audience engagement with those messages — measured by ‘likes’, ‘shares’, comments and negative feedback — surprisingly reveals that shared values’ messages generated a similar level of engagement to other messages, which may show that the content does not play a significant role in users’ engagement. In addition, the analysis reveals that during periods of heightened intensity in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, followers’ engagement and negative feedback rose dramatically. This study provides a unique perspective of the relevance and effectiveness of military public diplomacy in the era of online social networks.

Military Public Diplomacy 2.0: The Arabic Facebook Page of the Israeli Defense Forces’ Spokesperson

in The Hague Journal of Diplomacy
E-ISSN:
1871-191X
Print ISSN:
1871-1901
Publisher:
Brill | Nijhoff
Cover The Hague Journal of Diplomacy

Sections

Figures

  • View in gallery
    Daily likes and unlikes on the IDF spokesperson’s Arabic Facebook page
  • View in gallery
    Frequency of the topics appearing in the posts of the IDF spokesperson’s Arabic Facebook page
Daily likes and unlikes on the IDF spokesperson’s Arabic Facebook page
Frequency of the topics appearing in the posts of the IDF spokesperson’s Arabic Facebook page

Index Card

Page Count:
323–344
Subjects:
International Relations, International Relations, Economics & Political Science, Social Sciences
Copyright:
Copyright 2018 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands 2018

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