Abstract
Deeply divided societies have a difficult departure point for their public and cultural diplomacy efforts. The classic nation branding axioms about "a simple message" and "synergy" (Anholt 2006; Shenhav, Sheafer, Gabay 2010) is not applicable in this context for two major reasons: First, the divide is likely to be reflected in the country's artistic production.
Second, the conception of the image projected abroad will be contested by various groups. The research question of this paper is: Is the domestic debate about cultural diplomacy and the image projected through culture abroad exacerbating the division, or can it be a ground for a democratic discussion that helps the parties to better understand each other? The paper examines this issue on the case of Israel which indeed is a deeply divided society (Yaish 2001) not only along the Jewish - Arab line, but also along several other cleavages.
Arts express a strong cultural identity of multiple groups in Israel, delineating them from the others; and each of these groups has its cultural ambassadors or art forms representing them in international context: from the mainstream Jewish Israeli culture (Appel, Irony, Schmerz, Ziv 2008) to the arts representing minorities such as Ethiopian immigrants (Webster-Kogen 2014), Arab Jews (Saada-Ophir 2006), Israeli Palestinians (Sherwood 2010) and others (Talmon, Peleg 2011). The paper describes domestic debate about foreign cultural representation of Israel between these groups and their representatives, and shows the impact of this debate on the tensions in the society as a whole.