Israeli LGBT Public Diplomacy: Progress or Diversion?

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2024-08-21

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en

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Israel uses public diplomacy to broadcast the message to other western liberal democracies that it has advanced LGBT rights in order to gain and maintain closer ties with these states. However, this public diplomacy strategy has become contested as allegations are raised that Israel is merely using this strategy as a way to divert from its human rights violations in Palestine. The goal of this research is to investigate what the extent and the e􀆯ect of this public diplomacy are and to what degree the contestation thereof has damaged the e􀆯ectiveness of it. Two research questions have been formulated: “To what extent and how does Israel engage in public diplomacy concerning LGBT rights in order to gain and maintain support from the Benelux and to what extent does that improve its public diplomacy?” and “To what extent and how is the Israeli LGBT public diplomacy contested in the Benelux and to what extent does this damage its public diplomacy?”. To answer these research questions, Israel’s LGBT public diplomacy has been contextualised and a content analysis of publications and statements by LGBT organisations, political parties in the Benelux has been conducted. Furthermore, the tool Google Trends has been used to analyse whether the Israeli LGBT public diplomacy and the contestation thereof have been actively looked up by individuals in the Benelux. The research, however, shows that neither the Israeli LGBT public diplomacy nor the contestation thereof seem to have any desired e􀆯ect in the Benelux as the topic remains largely uncovered.

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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen