The Belly Dancer Strategy: Israeli Educational Television and its Alternatives

By the 1960s, the question of instituting a television service in Israel had become the subject of a public controversy and a political debate. Hailed as a great educational tool by some and a dangerous ‘culture bomb’ by others, television facilitated a process of cultural self-definition as Israelis struggled to set the wouldbe service apart and shield it from the cultural influences of American television on the one hand and Arab television on the other. All the while, official imaginings of television as an educational, national utility clashed with public speculations about popular entertainment and commercial content. This article traces the cultural pressures, political anxieties, public speculations and industry marketing campaigns that accompanied the initial planning stages and establishment of an Israeli educational television service. In particular, it illustrates how conceptions of television galvanized a national debate over cultural taste, national identity, political ideology and Israeli differentiation within the Arab world.