The Comper Center is involved in organizing conferences, seminars, and workshops. The staff of the Center presents academic knowledge accumulated through its activities, to government officials, educators, researchers, public bodies, local communities and many others. This is done in order to raise public awareness of the new anti-Semitism and delegitimization of Israel and to promote the fight against them.
The center's accumulated experience shows that conferences and research workshops effectively promote these goals. Our intention is to continue to hold these events in various formats, in cooperation with outside parties.
Here are some of the center's activities:
- A ceremony honoring members of the Druze community (January, 2017): The awarding of the "Comper-Ambassadors online" Award to activists from the Druze community in Israel, promoting Israeli advocacy.
- The Ambassadors Online Annual Conference – “Initiating Future Hasbara”: On the last day of the 2015-2016 academic year, our Ambassadors Online program marked five years of activity. This milestone was celebrated together with the graduation of our fifth class, at which students presented their advocacy projects and research. The event also featured a fascinating panel of experts addressing the various exigent challenges facing Israel today. The panel included a fruitful discussion in different fields: tourism, communication, culture, education and diplomacy as tools and instruments to confront the de-legitimization, and demonization and anti-Semitic campaigns against the state if Israel.
- Meeting with AP Journalist, Mr. Matti Friedman: as part of our struggle against the distorted and biased information conveyed by major foreign news networks, we introduced our students to some of the people working behind the scenes, in order to provide first-hand information. The Ambassadors Online students met with former AP (Associated Press) Jerusalem bureau reporter Matti Friedman, who discussed the systematic tendency in foreign media channels to depict Israel in an adverse manner, thereby contributing to its negative public image across the world.
- “Rethinking the Challenges of Israel’s PR” (December 2015): The conference gathered more than 20 speakers and over 100 participants from different organizations active in the combat of new anti-Semitism and the delegitimization of Israel. Our guest of honor was the honorable Prof. Irwin Cotler, who gave the key-note speech. Among the participants were Dr. Einat Wilf (Senior Fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute), Eldad Beck (correspondent for Yedioth Aharonot in Berlin), Hillel Neuer (executive director of UN Watch), Nitzana Darshan-Leitner (Chair of Shurat ha-Din, Israel Law Center), and Prof. Gerald Steinberg (president of NGO Monitor). The great success of the conference, which was covered widely in the Israeli press, led to focus on two main aspects of new anti-Semitism, including Israel’s image in the media and the perception of Israel in the world of human rights.
- Research seminar on the “New Anti-Semitism”: In cooperation with the Herzl Institute (May, 2015), we have invited junior scholars from Israel and Europe, including Spain, Belgium, France, and Austria, who are involved in the study of anti-Semitism. The goal of the workshop was to create a network of scholars on anti-Semitism and promote the study of contemporary forms of Jew-hatred.
- A public discussion on the academic boycotts of Israel (December 2014): organized in corporation with the Chaikin Center of the University of Haifa. The discussion was conducted by two keynote speakers from the US, who edited an academic book on this important subject.
- A public discussion on the human rights issue in the Israel-Arab conflict (April 2014): organized in cooperation with the Ambassadors Online program.
- A public discussion on the book Industry of Lies (June 2014): held in cooperation with the Ambassadors Online program and the author, Ben Dror Yemini.
- A public discussion on Holocaust denial (May 2014): organized in cooperation with the Strochlitz Institute’s MA program on Holocaust Studies at the University of Haifa.
- “Public Diplomacy during Operation Pillar of Defense” (spring, 2013): this conference was organized in cooperation with the Ambassadors Online program and was designed to analyze the attitude of the media regarding the events of Operation Pillar of Defense, the response of public diplomacy agencies in Israel to the media coverage and the attempts made by these agencies to influence the patterns of media coverage and to operate a public relations and public diplomacy network.
- “Lech Tasbir” (“Go Explain”) (Spring, 2013): A public discussion organized in cooperation with the Ambassadors Online (“Shagririm Bareshet,” in Hebrew) program, which brought together central players in Israel’s public diplomacy efforts in an attempt to understand the challenges and strategies of these players and to learn what advice they could give to students involved in the struggle against the new forms of anti-Semitism.
- Jewish-Muslim relations in Israel (Winter, 2013): The conference organizers invited scholars from Israel and the world who study anti-Semitism and asked them to discuss the fabric of the relationship between Judaism and Islam, the factors shaping these relations and their projections regarding developments in the future. The seminar is part of an international project (please see the section on cooperation with counterpart organizations in the world) intended to promote the activities of counterpart research institutions in the world.
- The coverage of the Middle East conflict in the media (spring 2012): This conference focused on the patterns of coverage of the Middle-East conflict in the world media, on how Israel promotes its image around the world and on the effectiveness of the marketing efforts made by central players in Israel’s public diplomacy campaigns. The conference was very successful and was attended by hundreds of participants, including representatives of the media and government ministries as well as scholars and the initiators of public diplomacy projects.
