BBC Monitoring

Text of report in English by Israeli Government Press Office on 8 July

    [Report by Foreign Ministry Spokesman: "MFA Launches Persian-Language Website"]

    The web-launching ceremony of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' new Persian-language website will take place tomorrow (Monday 9-Jul) at 12:00 P.M. Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Tzipi Livni and MFA Director-General Aharon Abramovitch will both attend the ceremony.

    The website constitutes part of the MFA's diplomatic effort to reveal the true Israel to the Iranian public, who for many years has been denied any unbiased information about the country, while at the same time being exposed to hateful, distorted and deceptive information by the Iranian regime.

    The new website, named HAMDAMI -which in Persian means "camaraderie" -is located at: https://hamdami.com.

    The launching ceremony marks the end of a prolonged process that took most of a year. The project was initiated by Israel's ambassador to Dublin, Dr Zion Evroni, in his previous position as head of the Political Planning Division.

    The website will be managed by the Arabic Communications Department of the MFA's Information and Media Division. Mr Menashe Amir, formerly head of the Israel Broadcasting Authority's Persian language division, was appointed as chief editor of the new website.

    Source: Government Press Office, Jerusalem, in English 8 Jul 07