Help Israel in 30 seconds, without leaving your couch – Danny Rod
We begin a new era in the Australian Jewish community by having the first ever column dedicated to the activities of students on a campus level. After all, the future leadership of the Jewish community in Australia is currently either sitting in UNSW, Monash or UWA (and every university in between) making each second of their midyear break count. We’re young but we still want to have a say in matters of importance to the Jewish community and broader life.
As Jews most of us want ways to help Israel. You see the Socialist Alternative, smelly and unkempt screaming lies about the country you love and you get angry. But you can’t do anything about it because you feel you don’t have the knowledge or the confidence to do something. It’s time we took action and started to do something about it. Something proactive. Starting this week, we’ve decided to show you how to advocate for Israel in 30 seconds and without leaving your couch as part of a new initiative from AUJS.
Twitter was launched in 2006 and many of us still don’t understand why something that involves 140 characters can be so popular? Who wants to hear about the chocolate muffins you’ve just made? One certainly doesn’t want to see every little detail of your daily life put into something no one else is going to read.
As was reported in last week’s AJN we noted that Ashton Kutcher has over 5 million followers, the Sydney Morning Herald has 1 million +/-. The potential for messages on twitter to reach an audience that is hanging on every character is limitless, especially given the rise of twitter on mobile phones, and the widespread availability of 3G internet.
2006’s Lebanon war, lead to startling revelations about the way Israel handled itself in the media especially with reports coming from the Winograd Report. Israeli Hasbara was slow, inefficient and had many conflicting messages which were released too late.
Let’s go to 2009, and look at our friends in Iran. The election had just been held, rigged and subsequently we have a repressive government reinstated at the helm and is stifling opposition debate. Twitter was the tool used by the masses in Iran to demonstrate against the government and subvert the state sanctioned media blackouts. It is though Twitter that the world was able to find out what was happening to protesters and find out how the government was brutally repressing protesters.
Now to Operation Cast Lead in 2009 and Israeli Diplomat David Saranga held the first live Twitter media conference, answering questions from around the world and providing the first baby steps for what is an Israeli leap forward in Hasbara.
The IDF has an IDF Spokesperson dedicated to online hasbara and the MFA who ensure that the Israeli message is released quickly, officially and in a manner that will be noticed by the media.
So that being said how can we as students or as members of the community advocate for Israel in 30 seconds.
It’s really simple and involves only a few steps:
Join Twitter.
Add Twitter to your iPhone, Android, compatible Nokia phones or Blackberry using their free applications.
Add the following people:
http://twitter.com/IDFSpokesperson
http://twitter.com/FriendsofIsrael
Read an article that is supportive of Israel
Tweet it by posting a link to the article on twitter.
If you see a pro-Israel article, re-tweet it.
Repeat steps 4-6 daily (should only take 30 seconds) and you’re effectively supporting Israel.
While tweeting use the hashtag #Israel at the end of your message so that other people looking for topics about Israel can see it.
How does this support Israel? Messages are usually unedited, reach a large audience and are grouped together in topics, called trending topics that represent people’s views on a given subject on any given time of the day. There is a distinct lack of pro-Israel support on these networks compared to that of the anti-Israel side and this needs to change.
This is a way we can tangibly work to helping Israel on a daily basis, while we commute to work or sit watching tv we can actively do something to help Israel. There is something powerful about a collective group of people working together for a common cause and you can sit on your iphone and retweet 10 messages in 30 seconds. That’s 10 small but highly effective actions you’ve taken to help Israel, and you haven’t even left the couch.
How about you TRY to get more young people involved politically and also support the JIDF
I dont twitter, (only have a prepaid basic mobile which I dont use) but I try to do at least ONE thing, even small, every day against this ugly ugly misrepresentation of Israel and the Jew-hatred that is found online, on campus and just about everywhere. Even if it is only posting on a forum, sending emails to friends about yet another anti-jewish incident or simply buying a little salad bowl made in Israel.
love the article about twittering……I need help 1) My current phone is a Motorolla about 2.5 yrs old, can I twitter on that 2) Am legally blind, so find texts etc. difficult to read 3.) Can I use the comp which is a touch screen, and I can enloarge print to twitter 4) I live not far from UNSW perhaps I could meet someone from AUJUS there, who could help me…5) I could make it to Shalom College to meet someone….6) Do I need to actually read every word to re-twitter….etc etc a thousand questions, well, maybe 10. but would love to do my bit. The easiest would be the comp if one can twitter on the comp.
I AM SO GLAD I HAVE J-WIRE….HAVE RECOMMENDED IT TO ALL MY FRIENDS…CAN NOT GUARANTEE THEY JOIN, BUT AT LEAST I HAVE RECOMMENDED IT.
Sorry , I just remembered, caps are like shouting….I just used them as u do in a letter. 🙂 forgive me.
I have am the former AUJS W.A president and now the Hagshama Director. Since I took up the Hagshama role in February I set up a advocacy blog called speakup4israel.com and a twitter page called speakup4israel. Look me up become a follower. We can starting winning the war on the web!!!!!