The battle between the newspaper Yated Ne'eman and its younger rival Peles, which has been going on for almost two years and is tearing the Lithuanian public apart, was until recently the preserve of the ultra-Orthodox public only. However, in recent weeks, as Passover approaches, it has been escalating and literally keeping Israeli business leaders awake at night. The reason: the battle over the huge advertising budgets for the ultra-Orthodox public before the holiday.
The newspaper 'Globes' reports that in recent weeks senior executives have been harassed by dozens, and in some cases even hundreds, of phone calls and faxes that reach their offices and sometimes even their personal phones. The callers present themselves as readers of the Hapeles newspaper, and threaten that if they do not advertise in the newspaper they will stop using their services. Along with sectoral advertising agencies, among the companies that have been subjected to a barrage of harassment is the Strauss Company, including the senior management and the group's leaders - Ofra Strauss and CEO Zion Blass - who have received calls to their offices and personal phones.
A similar incident also happened to the management of Bank Hapoalim and CEO Zion Keinan, who was personally harassed, and the same happened at Bezeq, including harassment that reached the office of CEO Stella Handler and the office of VP of Marketing Ran Gurion. The same happened at Unilever, Clalit Health Fund, Biofora, and a long list of other significant companies in the economy. The calls come in at a rate of dozens per minute, and sometimes personal phones ring at 2 or 3 in the morning.
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""The conversations reach the entire chain - from customer service, through marketing managers and brand managers, to CEOs and company owners," a senior official at one of the companies tells the newspaper. Another senior official says: "The nature of the conversation varies and ranges from clarifying that if we don't advertise in Hafels they will stop using our services to crude and explicit threats. We are told that we risk a boycott from the entire Haredi public and are harming the greatness of Israel.".
""The pressure on Bezeq is bearing fruit""
Hapeles is the relatively new newspaper of those who are known as the Jerusalem faction - led by Rabbi Auerbach. The newspaper was founded after the veteran editor of the newspaper Yated Ne'eman, Natan Grossman, was removed from his position, in light of his refusal to accept the rabbinical authority of Rabbi Shteinman. In response, he founded Hapeles together with the veteran CEO of Yated Ne'eman, Yaakov Labin.
The fight over advertisers has been bloody and aggressive since the newspaper was founded, and is full of mutual accusations and boycotts. The methods of operation of the initiators of the threat rain have reached 'Globes'. Each week, a group of companies is selected and a sheet of instructions is passed on to the "soldiers" who are recruited for the harassment missions, but their number is unknown. Each of the sheets includes the phone numbers of each company - from customer service to the CEO's office and sometimes also his personal number - and instructions on how to proceed. For example, in the case of Bezeq, whose offices were attacked in a wave of threats about two weeks ago, the instructions sheet explains this way: "The pressure on Bezeq is bearing fruit. They are getting back to those who contacted and left a request to cancel the line, and are promising advertising soon. They should not be believed, but this shows that they are under heavy pressure, and therefore the pressure must be increased.".
Strauss, Bank Hapoalim, and Bezeq declined to comment. Unilever, Yafaura, and Chlalit did not respond.
Hafels: We are the ones who suffer
The Hapeles newspaper told 'Globes: "The Hapeles newspaper does not take any illegal or inappropriate action against advertisers and economic entities. On the contrary, it is Hapeles that has suffered since its establishment in July 2012 from a proactive and organized campaign of threats and harassment against advertisers who chose to address the newspaper's readers for business reasons. The matter is well known, and this is considered an 'open secret' in the world of ultra-Orthodox advertising. In several serious cases in which advertisers were threatened that if they did not stop advertising in Hapeles they would suffer physical harm and acts of violence - complaints were filed with the police. We are also aware of advertising contracts that include a commitment to a low price in exchange for boycotting the Hapeles.
""This is an unprecedented conduct that means issuing a liquidation contract on a newspaper for reasons of commercial competition and political differences of opinion. It should be emphasized that this was not done in an underground manner and on the personal initiative of anonymous parties. The newspaper Yated Ne'eman decided to publish an open and official directive to carry out a boycott of publications in Hapeles. Hapeles does not resort to any inappropriate means against potential advertisers. A brief investigation we conducted revealed that the appeals to advertisers are not related to the newspaper's marketing department, but are made on the private and independent initiative of readers who feel harmed by the boycott of the public and the withholding of information in an attempt to harm the freedom of the press and the public's right to know. To the best of our knowledge, these private initiatives are also done only in a legal, fair and proper manner, and if inappropriate things were done by anyone, we disavow this and condemn it unequivocally.".
Yated Ne'eman told 'Globes: "Yated Ne'eman is the leading newspaper and is accepted by the absolute majority of Haredi society, hence its power and influence. We apologize for the blasphemy that has been created and the unnecessary damage to the image of the religious and Haredi public in Israel following incidents of bullying that deserve to be investigated by the authorities authorized to enforce the law.".
