All these considerations were overcome when, following the 1967 Six Day War, Israel found itself in charge of two million Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. The establishment of television was originally conceived by the government as a bridge to the Arab population in the occupied territories, which had previously been exposed only to broadcasts from Arab nations.

     Until the introduction of television, radio was the central medium of national integration, serving as a Hebrew teacher to the masses of new immigrants, and providing a focus for the development of a shared Israeli culture, and for the celebration of holidays. Radio also played a crucial role in surveillance of the Arab­ Israeli conflict. Kol Yisrael ("Voice of Israel") started transmitting illegally during the last years of British Mandatory Rule as a means of mobilizing for the national struggle. In 1965, however, Israel Radio became a public authority, modeled on the BBC, administered by a largely independent board, and financed by a user's license fee.

     A decision to incorporate television into the existing authority for Public Broadcasting had a significant impact on its development. Television staff were recruited from radio, and moved into television with their already tenured positions. This caused a lack of mobility, and made it almost impossible to recruit new talent. Moreover, cultural conflicts added to these industrial problems. Israel Television's first challenge in this arena, brought by the National Religious Party over the violations of the Sabbath, was in the very fact of broadcasting on Friday nights and Saturdays. The controversy was overcome (in favor of broadcasting) in an appeal to the Supreme Court.

     For the next 25 years Israel had only one television channel. During the day, it showed educational programs and public broadcasting initiatives, starting transmissions in the late afternoon, and ending with the national anthem at midnight. As with the radio service, television in Israel was modeled on the BBC, but a number of significant deviations from the British model made it more politicized, and more dependent on Parliamentary control. In the U.K., the Queen, on the advice of the government, appoints the Board of Governors, who appoint the director general. In Israel, the government appoints the director general directly, on the recommendation of the Board of Governors.

     Moreover, the Board of Governors in Israel consists of representatives of the various parties, and does not follow the British precedent according to which its members should represent "the great and the good." In Israel, the Ministry of Finance retains indirect control of the license fee (as it is in charge of approving Public Broadcasting's annual budget), decides on the amount of the license-fee increase (to keep up with inflation), and finances the budgetary deficits. Television's income also suffers from the tendency of Israelis (the number varies in different periods) to escape paying the license fee. Revenues from corporate-based "sponsorship" slowly crept into the system, but then decreased to almost nothing with the establishment of a second commercial channel.

     The second television channel started its official existence only in 1991. Again following the British example, it was also public, but financed by advertising rather than by a license fee. Broadcasting on the second channel is divided among three companies, each of which broadcasts two days a week in rotation, and a news company, financed jointly by the three other companies.

      Channel 2 functioned as a purely commercial channel, signaling the beginning of a new media era characterized by an explosion in the number of cable and satellite channels. Increased sales of video cassette recorders, the establishment of video rental libraries, the installment of roof satellite dishes to receive broadcasts from Europe and the U.S., and the infiltration of pirate cable channels, all offered easy alternatives to national television for segmented audiences. It also sped up the legislation of cable television, first established in 1990. By 2001, 90 percent of Israeli households were connected to cable television. Segmentation was further increased with the introduction of satellite television in 2000. The new technology facilitated interactive forms of consumable television (such as video games and "movies on demand"). A third nationwide commercial channel, Channel 10, was established in 2002, and presented as an alternative to the more mainstream offerings on the other channels (Channel 10 was modeled on the British Channel 4). However, it turned out to be little more than a pale copy of the commercial Channel 2, and has fared poorly in the ratings race.

     By 2002, more than 90 percent of Israeli households were connected to multi-channel (cable or satellite) television services, offering altogether more than 50 channels. This positions Israel (with a population of 6 million) as second only to the U.S. (with its nearly 300 million) in the number of channels available to the majority of the population (Adoni and Nossek).

     The numerous television and radio channels address various target audiences, dividing Israelis according to age, gender, culture/ethnicity, and nationality, and according to self-selective community categories. Thus, public broadcasting is viewed by older Israelis, the telenovela channel is viewed mostly by women, Russians view Russian-speaking channels, and so on. Channels for children, family, sports, films, science, and shopping are assembled by the local companies, who also provide Hebrew subtitles, announcements, promos, and originally produced programs. Local productions consist of sports, children's programs, documentaries, reality programs, soap operas, and drama series, and time is allocated for public access programs.

     Channel 2, originally defined as public, has gradually distanced itself from this categorization and behaves like a commercial channel. In order to increase advertising profits, it started a ratings war with Chan­ nel l in which the latter, by its adherence to its aims as a public service, by inferior financing, and by increasing political control, was bound to be the loser.

     By 2002, according to the data gathered by the Israel Audience Research Board, the multiplicity of channels resulted in the three nationwide channels together having only a 29 percent share of viewers: 17 percent went to Channel 2, 10 percent to Channel 1, and 2 percent to Channel 10. (The Russian-speaking Israel Plus channel, going on air in 2001, managed better than Channel 10, with a 2.2 percent share.)

     A major consequence of the increased number of channels is the marginalization of television news. Until the establishment of the second channel, an evening news program was broadcast at 9:00 P.M., serving as the sole focus for prime-time viewing and providing a common agenda for public debate. Over 60 percent of Israelis watched regularly, and in consequence, the medium of television was regarded as supplying more information than entertainment (Katz, Haas, and Gure­vitch). One side-effect of the focus on news production was that locally produced entertainment shows remained underfunded, and local drama was virtually nonexistent. This made the news even more central.

     During the first 25 years of Israel Television, drama series consisted mainly of American, but also British, imports. Usually, only one such series was aired on prime time. Kojak, Starsky and Hutch, Dallas, and Dynasty, and the British dramatic serial Upstairs, Down­ stairs, were popular. Dallas exceeded all others in popularity (Liebes and Katz). British comedies (Yes, Minister; Are You Being Served?) and detective series (Inspector Morse) were popular, but imports of more highbrow series were stopped, following the failure in Israel of the prestigious Brideshead Revisited, based on the Evelyn Waugh novel. Programs such as Hill Street Blues, The Cosby Show, and Northern Exposure, representing a plurality of American television genres, were successfully shown. Cheers is the only program in the public channel's history which was rejected by the Israeli audience to the extent that it was taken off the screen.

     American programs have gained more popularity than their British counterparts, as the abundance of American shows has increasingly socialized viewers to American conventions and styles of production. With the impoverishment of the public channel, new U.S. series (and new films) are now bought by the second channel and cable networks. Israel Television produced high-quality current-affairs programs (Ma­ bat Sheni) often based on investigative reporting, and a few sitcoms (such as Krovim krovim), which were popular. Highlights in the history of Israel Television include the documentary series on the history of Zionist settlement in Israel, Amud Haesh; an inventive series of political satire, Nikuy Rosh, which drew heavy attack from the political establishment and launched the careers of a number of Israeli comedy stars; and made-for-television films, which touched on central controversies in Israeli society, notably by prize­ winning television director Ram Levi (whose film Hirbat Hiza, showing Israeli soldiers evacuating an Arab village during the 1948 war, was broadcast only years after its production).

     Beyond creating an integrative focus for daily life, Israel Television also took an active part in the shaping of holidays, creating secular alternatives to traditional rituals (for example, by showing a classic movie); complementing the traditional content (such as by dramatizing the Passover Seder); taking the viewers to the event (the public reading of the book of Esther on Purim, or the Holocaust observance ceremony); or by creating the event itself (such as the annual Bible Quiz, invented for the Day of Independence).

     The ten most popular prime-time series broadcast­ on the three nationwide channels in 2003 were all Israeli-made productions in a variety of genres: telenovelas, reality television, investigative reporting, soft­ satire, and public folk-singing. The winner in a Channel 2 competition for the most popular program of the decade was A Star is Born, a series in which amateur singers competed for fame and recognition. Political or quasi-political talk shows, the most popular genre of the 1990s, had almost disappeared.

     Throughout Israel's history, in moments of crisis, broadcasting has taken over the function of surveillance and social integration. Radio is still listened to in cars and public buses (in total silence at moments of crisis). It is used by the army (now as an adjunct to television) for fast mobilization of its reserve forces, and stands in for the outdated alarm system, announcing when it is time to go to the air-raid shelters (the "sealed rooms" of the Gulf War).

     While television took over as the ceremonial medium of integration, radio adapted itself by switching to open-ended programming, always interruptible by the latest news of any conflict, perhaps relaying regards from soldiers away from home to their families, perhaps instructing the people in Northern Kiryat Shmona to spend the night in shelters, perhaps summoning soldiers to their reserve units by reading out the appropriate code phrases for rehearsing an emergency mobilization, or for enacting a real one.

     In critical moments, however, television also interrupts its schedule, switching to "open" live broadcasting, and becomes the focus for sharing national trauma, and for reflecting on its meaning. Thus, during the week following the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, in November 1995, Israelis could not disconnect themselves from the television set. Television acted as a locus for sharing grief, pointed out the various "sacred" arenas for people who wanted to go out and mourn in public, and provided a forum for debating the ideological rift in which the assassination was rooted.

     Television has also been a central factor in historic events which became landmarks in the collective memory of Israelis. The live broadcasting of Egyptian President Sadat's visit to Jerusalem in 1977 is the best example for illustrating the crucial part played by television in influencing public opinion (Liebes, 1997). The various stages of development toward achieving a lasting peace with Jordan and the Palestinians, from 1993 to 1995, were celebrated by media events which endowed them with (various degrees of) public legitimacy, reuniting the segmented television audience. By 2003, the dominant genre of live television was the "Disaster Marathon," in which the television schedule was interrupted following the latest terrorist attack (Liebes, 2002). Whereas at the time of the Oslo process these were the moments in which political debates flourished, and opposition voices were given the stage, in the early 21st century there was only the mourning with the victims, and the momentary creation of a personalized, apolitical, national unity.