Television was late in coming to Israel. By introducing television only in 1968, the nation lagged long behind most Western countries and even the neighboring Arab countries. Establishment opposition to television during the two preceding decades (since the founding of the state) was strong enough to prevent earlier initiatives and suspicion of television was manifold. There was the fear that book reading would decline; that newly developed Israeli culture and language, still in need of nurturing, would be swamped by imported, mostly U.S. junk; that national integration would be weakened by entertainment; and that politics would become less ideological, that is, less oriented to issues, more to charismatic personalities (Katz, 1971). All these considerations were overcome when, following the Six Day War, Israel found itself in charge of two million Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. The establishment of television was originally conceived by the government as a bridge to the Arab population in the occupied territories, which theretofore had been exposed only to broadcasts from the Arab countries. That this was indeed the overriding reason may be shown in the (unrealistic and un-realizable) decision whereby nascent Israel television was supposed to broadcast more hours in Arabic than in Hebrew.

Until the introduction of television, radio was the central medium of national integration, serving as a Hebrew teacher to the masses of new immigrants, providing a focus for the development of a shared Israeli culture, and for the celebration of holidays, and playing a crucial role in the surveillance of the Arab-Israel conflict.

The history of Israeli broadcasting began underground. Kol Yisrael (Voice of Israel), the Hebrew Radio, started transmitting illegally during the last years of British Mandatory Rule, as a means for mobilizing for the national struggle. With the founding of the State, radio was installed in the Prime Minister's office, to act in the service of Government information. The listening public was spoonfed, as the new State was considered still vulnerable, still fighting for the full realization of Zionism, and the political establishment was used to secrecy from its pre-state struggle of fighting with the British.

In 1965, however, Israel Radio became a public authority, modeled on the BBC, administered by a largely independent Board, and financed by a user's license fee. According to the new rules, it gained a much more independent status, but it remained, nevertheless, under constant pressure to "behave." Its directors preserved the notion of responsibility toward the public, focusing mainly on information and enrichment, not on entertainment.

In addition to its national networks, Israel Radio broadcast to two kinds of communities outside Israel. A channel of News programs and commentary in Arabic--prepared in Egyptian, Syrian, and Iraqi dialects--was directed to the neighboring countries, engaging in propaganda wars with the Arab counterparts. The Voice of Zion to the Diaspora (which started in Hebrew, English and Arabic, expanding to many other languages) addressed the Jewish public abroad. In the early seventies, the placid monopolism of Israel Radio was shaken. Unexpected competition took the form of a pirate radio station--"the Voice of Peace"--which adopted a light informal style, very different from the buttoned-up British tradition of Public Radio. The Israel Army Radio--a channel in which professionals and young soldiers cooperate during their army-service in producing spirited and inventive programs--had expanded during this period, starting its own news and current events department. Above all television was going to steal radio's centrality in the society. In response, Israel Radio branched out into a number of channels, adding a light channel for young listeners, a classical music channel (in FM), and keeping its main channel, for news and current events, always open to live reporting. While radio remained the focus of society in times of crisis it had to hand over centre-space to television.

The first television in Israel was Educational, founded in 1966, with programs for schools only. This project had no problem winning government approval because making use of the medium for an instrumental function was ideologically acceptable. Television for the general public (as mentioned above) was sneaked in only following the Six Day War, when it could be justified as a means to fill the indisputable role of telling the Israeli version of the Arab-Israel conflict to the Palestinians under occupation. Not quite in line with this definition, its opening assignment was the broadcasting of the military parade on Independence Day.

A decision to incorporate television into the existing authority for Public Broadcasting carried severe consequences for its development. Because manpower was recruited from the radio, professionals earned the same low wages, and moved into television with their already tenured positions. This caused a lack of mobility, and made it almost impossible to recruit new talent. Moreover, cultural conflicts added to these industrial problems. Israel Television's first challenge in this arena, brought by the National Religious Party over the violations of the Sabbath, lay in the very fact of broadcasting on Friday nights. The controversy was overcome in a citizen's appeal (for relief) to the supreme Court.

For the next 25 years Israel had only one television channel, which divided its time between daytime Educational Television and Public Broadcasting, which started transmissions in the late afternoon (children's and Arabic programs), ending with the National Anthem at 12:00.

Publicly owned and managed, and financed by the license fee, the new television was modeled on the BBC. A number of significant deviations, however, make it more politicized, and more dependent on Parliamentary control than its British model. In Britain, the queen, on the advice of the government, appoints the Board of Governors, who appoint the director general. In Israel, the government itself appoints the director general, on the recommendation of the Board of Governors. Moreover, the Board of Governors in Israel consists of representatives of the various parties, and does not follow the British precedent according to which its members should represent "the great and the good". In Israel, the Ministry of Finance retains indirect control of the license fee (as it is in charge of approving the annual budget), decides on the amount of license-fee increase to keep up with inflation, and finances the budgetary deficits.

Television's income suffers from the fact that 20% of Israelis escape paying the license fee. External financing from "public service advertisements" and corporate "sponsorship" slowly crept into the system, eventually amounting to 50% of the revenues. But these corporate-based revenues shrunk to almost nothing with the establishment Of a second commercial channel.

The second television channel started its official existence only in 1991 (although unofficially it went on air in 1986, with the excuse of "occupying" a wavelength). Again, following the British example, it was also public, but financed by advertising rather than by license fee. Broadcasting on the second channel is divided among three companies, each of which broadcasts two days a week in rotation, and a news company, financed by the three.

The monopoly of Public Broadcasting was undermined also by the various technological changes, offering easy alternatives to national television for segmented audiences. Video cassette recorders diffused at a high speed (2/3 of the population by 1996), giving rise to ubiquitous video rental libraries. Satellite broadcasts from Europe and the United States are received by roof "dishes," and pirate cable channels speeded the legislation of cable television.

By 1995, the penetration of cable reached 60% of Israeli households, with about 30% share of viewing (Nossek and Adoni, 1996). Cable television offers 40 channels, six of which--children, family, sports, films, science, and shopping--are assembled by the cable companies, who also provide Hebrew subtitles, announcements, promos, and a small number of originally-produced programs. Local production consist of sports and children's programs, and time is allocated for public access programs.

The second channel, originally defined as public, has brushed aside this definition and behaves like a commercial channel in every way. Aiming for the lowest common denominator, in order to increase advertising profits, it has started a ratings war with the first channel, in which the latter, restricted by its adherence to its aims as public service as well as by inferior financing is bound to be the loser.

A major consequence of the multiplication of channels is the marginalization of television news. Until the establishment of the second channel an evening news program was broadcast at 9:00 P.M., serving as the sole focus for prime time viewing, and providing a common agenda for public debate. Over 60% of Israelis watch regularly, and, in consequence, the medium of television was regarded as supplying more information than entertainment (Katz and Gurevitch, 1976). Indeed, one side effect of the focus on news production was that locally produced entertainment shows remained poor, and local drama was virtually nonexistent. This made the news even more central, the best drama in town.

During the first twenty-five years of Israel Television, actual drama series consisted mainly of American, but also British, imports. Usually, only one such series was aired on prime-time. Kojak, Starsky and Hutch, Dallas, and Dynasty, and the British dramatic serial Upstairs-Downstairs, may be listed among the "best-sellers." The attraction of Dallas--which acceeded all others in popularity (Liebes and Katz, 1993)--may be understood in terms of its concerns with family relations and primordial themes. British comedies (Yes, Minister, Are You Being Served?) and detective series (Inspector Morse) were popular, but imports of more high-brow series were stopped, following the major failure of the prestigious Brideshead Revisited, based on the Evelin Waugh novel. More recently, programs such as Hill Street Blues, The Cosby Show, and Northern Exposure, representing a plurality of American TV genres, were successfully shown. Cheers is the only program in the Public Channel's memory which was deemed as rejected by the Israeli audience and taken off the screen.

In recent years American programs have gained more popularity than their British counterparts, as the abundance of American shows have increasingly socialized viewers to American conventions and styles of production. Unlike most European countries, which use dubbing for the translation of imported programs, Israeli Television continues to use Hebrew subtitles. In defence of subtitles, television's policy makers argue that a considerable number of Israelis understand foreign languages, that there is virtually no illiteracy in Israel, and that dubbing "looks bad." The harsh competition imposed on the public channel limited its capacity to buy new series (and new films), and these are now shown on the second channel and on cable.

Israel Television did produce high quality current-affairs programs (Mabat Sheni) often based on investigative reporting, and made various attempts at producing Israeli sitcoms (such as Krovim krovim), which were not very successful but nevertheless popular. Highlights in the history of Israel Television include the documentary series on the history of Zionist settlement in Israel (Amud Haesh) modeled on the British The World at War; an inventive series of political satire (Nikuy Rosh), which drew heavy attack from the political establishment, and gave rise to a number Of Israeli comedy stars; and one-time television films, which touched on central controversies in Israeli society, notably by prize-winning television director Ram Levi (whose film Hirbat Hiza, showing Israeli soldiers evacuating an Arab village during the 1948 war was broadcast only years after its production).

Beyond creating an integrative focus for the society in daily life, Israel Television also took en active part in the formation of holidays--creating secular alternatives to traditional rituals (for example, by showing a classical movie); complementing the traditional content (dramatizing the Passover Seder); taking the viewers to the event (the public reading of the book of Esther, on Purim, or the holocaust observance ceremony); or by creating the event itself (such as the annual Bible Quiz, invented for the Day of Independence) (Katz , 1988).

In times of crisis broadcasting takes over the function of surveillance and social integration. As the more accessible of the two media, radio is still being listened to in public buses--in total silence at moments of crisis; it is used by the a Army for fast mobilization of its reserve forces, and stands in for the outdated alarm system on the rooftops when it is time to go to the air-shelters (the "sealed rooms" of the Gulf War). While television took over as the ceremonial medium of integration, radio adapted itself by switching to open-ended programming, always interruptable by the latest news of any conflict, relaying regards from soldiers away from home to their families, instructing the people in Northern Kiriat Shmona to spend the night in shelters, summoning soldiers to their reserve units by reading out the appropriate slogans for rehearsing an emergency mobilization, or for enacting a real one.

In critical moments, however, television also becomes the focus for sharing the national trauma, and for reflecting on its meaning. This may be best illustrated by the role it played during the week following the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, in November 1995. Similar to Americans in the wake of the Kennedy assassination, Israelis could not disconnect themselves from the television set.

Television acted as a locus for sharing the grief, pointed out the various "sacred" arenas for people who wanted to go out and mourn in public, and provided a forum for debating the ideological rift in which the assassination was rooted. Television has also been a central factor in historic events which became landmarks in the collective memory of Israelis. The live broadcasting of Egyptian President Sadat's visit to Jerusalem in 1977 is the best example for illustrating the crucial part played by television in influencing public opinion (Liebes-Plesner, 1984; Dayan and Katz, 1993). Israelis fell in love with Sadat, thus making peace (and the sacrifice of territories and strategic distance) possible. The various stages towards peace with Jordan and the Palestinians, in 1993-1995, were celebrated by media events, which endowed them with (various degrees of) public legitimacy, reuniting the by-now segmented audiences from a multiplicity of channels to sharing one vision and reinstating themselves as members of one society (Liebes and Katz, 1995).

Tamar Liebes