Everybody’s Doin’ It

October 25, 2007 - 5:14 PM by Liza

I’ve always found the Israeli blogosphere to be a fascinating, complex place, comprised of a variety of sub-groups that often have very little to do with each other, and for the most part, broken down according to language. While I can’t vouch for the local Russian or Arabic language bloggers, it’s interesting to note that the Hebrew and English language bloggers not only have very little knowledge of the other group, but to some extent, each group sees itself as the “Israeli blogosphere”.

I admit that I rarely read blogs written in Hebrew, and the only one I read with any degree of regularity is one written by a close friend (who is, incidentally, also an amazing writer). I just don’t have as much time as I’d like to delve into the Hebrew language blogs, though I do try to keep my eyes open for new blogs of interest.

This morning, I discovered blogs written by channel 10 police affairs reporter Sharon Gal and channel 10 political reporter Chico Menashe. The blogs, written in Hebrew and hosted on channel 10/Nana’s Israblog portal, are just two of the blogs being written by various channel 10 news personalities, and primarily contain behind-the-scenes tidbits about life as, well, a channel 10 news personality.

Gal, who just began writing his blog yesterday, describes his blog as being “your podium and mine. From me you’ll receive spicy stories about crime matters, primarily from the backyard of the police and behind the scenes of the criminal underworld. You’re invited to respond, to criticize, to get angry, and to become enraged. The important thing is that it should be interesting.”

And it is. In his first post, aside from the usual “what this blog is for” yada yada, Gal begins by lamenting the fact that fellow blogger Menashe gets to write about behind-the-scenes goings on on the Prime Minister’s airplane, while he will rarely have the opportunity to share such stories about flying with any senior officials, given the nature of his reporting duties.

“And I, a police affairs reporter, how much can I tell you about the behind-the-scenes goings on while flying with some senior individual. But then I remembered, I do have a similar story: On the plane with (Zeev) Rosenstein. But that was a while ago. No worries. It’s still interesting. Away from the intense scrutiny that followed his return to Israel from Miami, not really a super story from behind the scenes. Aside from the fact that Olmert is also suspected of crimes and is meeting frequently with criminal investigators. Rosenstein also met frequently with criminal investigators. And the truth is that lately Olmert has been meeting with investigators a lot more than Zeev Rosenstein, who’s imprisoned in the solitary confinement wing. So we’ve got a common denominator, and also a strong first story for the blog. “Experiences from a flight with a high-ranking official (in the world of crime). Chico, I can do it too!”

And, while Gal doesn’t actually ever getting around to telling us about his flight with a crime kingpin (having felt that he’d already written enough for his first entry, he promises to write about it next time), his entry is interesting enough that I think I’ll be back for more. The same goes for his pal Chico’s blog, which promises its readers stories that didn’t make the editorial cut, small stories, and perhaps, most intriguing of all, colorful stories. “A combination that may better explain the background of events happening here, giving the feeling that everything in the political realm is stuck, and not going anywhere.”

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