2014 Hasby Award winners announced

NEW YORK - Feb. 2, 2014 - PRLog -- The Elder of Ziyon blog has announced the winners of the annual Hasby Awards, given to the best examples of hasbara (explaining Israel's viewpoint) for the year.

This year awards were given in ten categories.

The nominees for Best Pro-Israel Media Outlet/Writer Not Exclusive to Israel were Douglas Murray, Melanie Phillips, Gatestone Institute, Charles Krauthammer, Walter Russell Mead and Bret Stephens. Melanie Philips was the winner, "for per clear vision, consistency and volume of output. "

The nominees for Best English-Language Pro-Israel Online Media Outlet were Algemeiner, Israel HaYom, Jewish Press, Tablet, Jerusalem Post, The Tower and Israel21c. The winner was The Tower, "a very attractive, well-done news site, and for that alone it deserves kudos - but one of the reasons it won was because of the great things happening at its parent organization, The Israel Project."

The nominees for Best Mainstream Media Watchdog were CAMERA, BBC Watch, CiF Watch, Mideast Media Sampler at Legal Insurrection, and Huffington Post Monitor. The winner was CAMERA, which "had a stellar year with dozens of articles showing bias in the New York Times alone (and forcing many corrections)."

The nominees for Best Pro-Israel Commentator Exclusive to Israel/ME were Caroline Glick, Martin Kramer, Daniel Gordis, Evelyn Gordon, Sarah Honig and Khaled Abu Toameh. The winner was Sarah Honig, who "contextualizes today's headlines in terms of history, much of which she witnessed firsthand."

The nominees for Best Watchdog (Arabic Media or NGOs) were MEMRI, Palestinian Media Watch, NGO Monitor and UN Watch. The winner was Palestinian Media Watch, because "PMW has made inroads this year into bubbling up the issue of Palestinian Arab incitement to the masses."

The nominees for Best Pro-Israel Video were Pat Condell - Patronizing the Palestinians, "I'm an Israeli Soldier" (Latma), Naftali Bennett on CNN and Boycott Israel by Ari Lesser. The winner was Boycott Israel by Ari Lesser/Here Is Israel, "a fresh take on an old (but still valid) argument, pointing out the hypocrisy of the boycotters. "

The nominees for Best Pro-Israel Tweeter were Arsen Ostrovsky, Margie in Tel Aviv, CiFWatch, No Camels and William Daroff. The winner was No Camels, "dedicated to good news from Israel, especially in covering high tech."

In the much-anticipated Best Blog category, the nominees were Israellycool, Israel Matzav, This Ongoing War, Jews Down Under, Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers, 5 Minutes for Israel and IsraelSeen. The winner was Israellycool, which "has always been a tremendous blog, with great analysis and a wonderful sense of humor" and a "must read daily."

The winner for Best Article was "An Israeli Soldier to American Jews: Wake up!" by Hen Mazzig, writing in The Times of Israel. The article was "the best example of hasbara in the classic sense: explaining things to  readers they might not know about, heightened by the first person account of his experiences." The other nominees were Howard Javobson and Brendan O'Neill.

The winner for Best Individual Example of Hasbara went to Ed Kilnger's note on a BDS MacBook, a photo that went viral, which "struck a chord in thousands of ordinary people, seeing how hypocritical the Israel-haters are."

Finally a special achievement Hasby Award for grassroots activism was given to Sussex Friends of Israel. As EoZ wrote, "As far as I can tell, this is a completely grassroots effort. There is no help from the organized British Jewish or Zionist community, and one gets the impression that the lack of an organized response is what helped create SFI."

All of the details, with links to the nominees and the full awards, can be seen at http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/search/label/Hasby%202014 .

Elder of Ziyon, a popular pro-Israel blog in its tenth year, congratulates all the winners.