Sheldon Adelson, Jewish-American billionaire and self-described "sworn Zionist." in a seeming plan to imitate Silvio Berlusconi to  Monopolize the Media, but  in Israel. Industry observers say  with his Newly formed " Israel Today", his newspaper's pages largely reflect his right-wing politics, including a distaste for peace talks that might end in the creation of a Palestinian state and a daily diet of praise for Netanyahu.  Israel Today" that does not charge for copies, and offers far less rates for advertising to drive it's competitors "Yediot Aharonot",and "Maariv"out of business.

Adelson, hit it big in Las Vegas,Forbes magazine once ranked Adelson third on its list of the 400 richest Americans. His fortune fell with the current economic slump to about $3.4 billion in 2009 from more than $26 billion, according to Forbes, which now ranks him 178th.

 Media Titan to Rivals: Drop Dead!    That's tabloid shorthand for the Darwinian clash unfolding between Israel's three biggest newspaper barons.

The story begins with a publicity-shy publisher who built a paper so popular and powerful it was deemed a monopoly.

Nipping at his heels is a scrappy businessman who once wiretapped competitors and later destroyed an incriminating document by swallowing it.

But it didn't become a battle royal until a Jewish-American billionaire, borrowing a page from Fox News, launched a "fair and balanced" newspaper to counter what he called liberal media.

"It's turning into a jungle," said Daniel Ben-Simon, a member of Israel's parliament and a respected former journalist. "The media organizations are trying to destroy one another."

With newspaper revenue falling worldwide and two of the Israeli papers already hemorrhaging money, no one expects all three to survive. The upstart, "Israel Today", has taken aim at its rivals by low-balling ad rates and not charging readers a penny. Even home delivery is free, thanks to American billionaire Sheldon Adelson's apparent willingness to absorb steep losses.

"Yediot Aharonot", the country's most-read newspaper, and Maariv, which recently slipped to No. 3 behind "Israel Today", are crying foul, accusing Adelson of trying to drive them out of business, no matter the cost, so he can silence competing voices.

They say his main reason for launching "Israel Today" in 2007 was to support a friend: then-opposition leader and now Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. They've asked lawmakers to come to their rescue by restricting foreign ownership of media and banning free distribution.

"This is the biggest political gift given by a tycoon to any Israeli politician in the history of the country," said Nahum Barnea, senior columnist at "Yediot". "It's a hostile takeover of the Israeli press."

Israel Today editor Amos Regev brushes off the complaints as a desperate gambit by has-beens. In a recent column, Regev aimed a dart at "Yediot's" publisher, Arnon Mozes, saying he sees "himself as the true prime minister of Israel even though no one has ever cast a single ballot for him."

The stakes are high in a country whose highly educated and politically aware citizens are among the world's most voracious news consumers. Israel has seen newspaper wars before, but this one is different, Israelis say, because it's clouding journalistic judgment and fueling sensationalism in a country that has frowned on the kind of tabloid fare common in London and New York.

When Netanyahu delivered a major address last month on preserving Jewish heritage, "Yediot "and "Maariv" raised eyebrows by ignoring it. "Israel Today" celebrated it as one of the best political speeches in 25 years.

When Netanyahu slipped and fell while boarding a naval vessel, "Yediot" and "Maariv" splashed the photos on their front pages; "Israel Today" ran a shot of the prime minister looking resolute and statesmanlike.

Then there's the matter of Netanyahu's wife. When a disgruntled housekeeper accused Sara Netanyahu of verbal abuse and withholding pay, "Yediot" devoted two-thirds of its front page to the quarrel, with headlines that rivaled the size of those about the devastating earthquake in Haiti. "Sara Abused Me, Humiliated Me, Exploited Me," said one. "Maariv's" political correspondent said the prime minister was "unfit" to serve and "trembles in fear of his wife's shadow."

"Jerusalem Post" editor David Horovitz said the housekeeper's lawsuit was a legitimate story, but hardly earth-shaking.

"It was clear something was skewing the news judgment," he said. "There's something foul here."

"Israel Today" responded with a puff piece on Sara Netanyahu, detailing her warm relations with her household staff. According to the paper, Sara once hand-delivered a Passover gift of candlesticks to the home of the now-estranged housekeeper, who was so moved that she wept.

Until the 1990s, Israeli newshounds kept several dozen daily newspapers in business, mostly partisan publications, union-backed newspapers and several serious-minded broadsheets.

Most of those publications collapsed as readers turned to websites and TV for their news and gravitated toward the lighter, shorter articles offered by "Yediot" and "Maariv", which tried to avoid any ideological slant.

Now, coverage in the two papers and in "Israel Today" appears to be shifting to reflect political and personal agendas.

"Israeli newspapers are getting yellower," said Yoram Peri, a longtime Israeli media analyst who serves as director of the Gildenhorn Institute for Israel Studies at the University of Maryland. "This is a dangerous phenomenon. For a strong democracy, you need strong newspapers."

Despite their feud, the three tabloids have formats and audiences that are quite similar. All three aim for mainstream readers and focus largely on politics (no sex scandals or alien abductions). Their political columnists often set the nation's agenda and can make or break political careers.

Mozes, the 56-year-old publisher of "Yediot", heads one of Israel's most powerful media families, with stakes in the HOT cable provider and popular Ynet news website. One of his sisters is married to a former foreign minister and another married into the family that controls El Al Airlines.
After "Yediot's" market share surged above 50% in the 1990s, government antitrust regulators accused Mozes of using his clout to bully newsstands into giving "Yediot" better display.
Though he keeps a low profile, he's seen as active behind the scenes in government affairs, most recently accused -- in the pages of "Israel Today" -- of trying to interfere in the appointment of the attorney general. A former employee accused him of spiking stories that would have hurt his family's business interests.

"He's very discreet," said Li-Or Averbach, who covers the newspaper industry for the business publication Globes. "Nobody sees him. Nobody is his friend. He doesn't speak to the media, so you never know what's going on."

Today "Yediot" remains the most widely read paper, though its exposure rate, a measure of how many people saw copies of the paper during a month, has slipped to 33.9% of those surveyed, according to TGI Israel, a market research firm.

"Israel Today" has surged to 26.6%, followed by "Maariv" at 13.6%. 
Ofer Nimrodi is fighting to keep "Maariv", once the country's top-read paper, alive.

The "Maariv" chairman's cutthroat tactics rattled Israel's newspaper industry and landed him in prison for several months in the mid-1990s, after he tapped Mozes' phone. He was briefly accused of trying to hire a hit man to kill a government witness in the wire-tapping case, but the charge was dropped.

He was, however, caught on a police surveillance video that has been immortalized on YouTube. Left alone briefly in an interrogation room, Nimrodi reaches into a notebook, tears out a page and stuffs it into his mouth.

The 52-year-old claims to have "matured" since then. With losses of $15 million during the first nine months of 2009, Nimrodi is reportedly looking to sell a stake in his paper.

Now Mozes and Nimrodi are squaring off against Adelson, a casino mogul and self-described "sworn Zionist." Son of a cab driver and someone whose only experience with newspapers was delivering them as a boy, Adelson hit it big in Las Vegas, first by helping to found the Comdex computer trade show and later by selling his shares in Las Vegas Sands, which developed hotels, including the Venetian.

Forbes magazine once ranked Adelson third on its list of the 400 richest Americans. His fortune fell with the current economic slump to about $3.4 billion in 2009 from more than $26 billion, according to Forbes, which now ranks him 178th.

Adelson, 76, who is married to an Israeli physician, donated tens of millions of dollars to conservative Jewish philanthropies before turning his sights on Israeli newspapers. After trying to buy "Maariv" from Nimrodi, he founded "Israel Today". As other papers slash costs and lay off staff members, employees at "Israel Today" say they are getting raises and flying business class.

Industry observers say his newspaper's pages largely reflect his right-wing politics, including a distaste for peace talks that might end in the creation of a Palestinian state and a daily diet of praise for Netanyahu.

Like most private media companies, "Israel Today" does not release financial statements, but outsiders say it could be losing $20 million a year....

"The fighting is going to get tougher and tougher until maybe there is only one remaining newspaper," said Yehiel Limor, a media studies professor at Tel Aviv University. "For democracy in Israel, that's terrible news."

edmund.sanders @latimes.com

http://www.latimes.com/news/
nation-and-world/la-fg-israel-press-
wars10-2010mar10,0,7131964.story
 

The ANNOTICO Reports Can be Viewed (With Archives) on:
[Formerly Italy at St Louis]