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Dr. Jeffrey Weinstein is as pro-Israel as they come, but even the Edison resident tires of the often inept approach to public relations the Jewish state takes in times of conflict. Accordingly, he's been frustrated in the past by the Israel Defense Forces strategy of simply doing what they do, with little pause to explain their motives, actions, or results.

Until now.

The IDF recently launched its own YouTube video channel to take its case directly to the public, bypassing major news outlets and breaking with a past habit of avoiding advocacy of its own cause. The YouTube channel shows IDF videos of Hamas activity in the Gaza Strip, IDF strikes, and other footage from the current conflict in Gaza. An IDF major was quoted by an Israeli newspaper saying "the blogosphere and the new media are basically a war zone in a battle for world opinion."

Weinstein, national treasurer of the National Organization for Political Action Committee (NORPAC), a non-partisan political action committee that backs pro-Israel candidates, thinks it's about time the IDF pushed its point-of-view.

"The Palestinians have been doing a fantastic job of staging everything from funerals to shootings to make Israel look bad," said Weinstein, former president of NORPAC's Edison chapter. "The Palestinians have about a 10-year start on PR over Israel. Israel needs to catch up."

Policy experts, war historians, and pro-Israel advocates agree the Internet approach to preaching the IDF's case is a step in the right direction, but it's not enough. For the tactic to be successful in the long-term, it must be followed by more aggressive marketing measures that can be used to build supporters in Europe and the Middle East. In America, the hearts and minds of the Jewish community need little more convincing that their case is just, although many see the Web site as an entree to stir younger Jews to action.

The YouTube approach -- aside from increased exposure for IDF's philosophical and militaristic ideologies -- has another benefit. It is an unfiltered prism directed at Jewish communities without the spin of mainstream media, be that Arab, European, or Western.

"The young people in the Middle East, as well as in the U.S., are very tuned-in to self-created media," said Joshua Muravchik, professor of international relations at the Institute of World Politics in Washington, D.C. "And I think it can only help to bring them closer to the actual scenes on the ground. It' something new, but it's in the nature of the Internet... the audience for it is young."

Dr. Ben Chouake, a Bergen County resident and national president of NORPAC, said the IDF's reports from within the strip are a conduit for Jews to see a raw portrayal of the current conflict. He is unbothered by Israel's refusal to allow journalists into the war zone, a fact that has upset some media outlets. One recent Wall Street Journal report resorted to describing the Israeli offensive from lawn chairs perched on the hillsides overlooking Gaza.

"I am inclined to believe the reports out of the IDF and related agencies are fair and accurate," Chouake wrote in an email. "Israel has a tendency to be self-critical and that provides for a balance in action and information."

Weinstein suggested Jews here and abroad could support the IDF effort by accessing the videos to raise their popularity. Several of the 36 videos posted as of Jan. 9 had already been viewed more than 300,000 times. Videos that "go viral" routinely generate more than one million views. When asked if NORPAC would push New Jersey lawmakers to formally support the IDF platform, Chouake deferred to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

"Any resolution coordination would likely come from AIPAC," Chouake's email continued. "If needed, NORPAC would likely support the effort."

American declarations of backing, however, don't mean the IDF tack is working. While videos continue to be uploaded, YouTube pulled some videos in the site's first week of operation. Scott Rubin, a YouTube spokesman, said site users can flag content they believe violates the site's "community guidelines." Flagged content can then be reviewed and removed. The IDF videos that were deleted were quickly restored, after complaints from the IDF. Rubin said he is unaware of militaristic video channels similar to the IDF's, but noted YouTube sees all sorts of postings and has to be sensitive to the nature of all.

"Our community uploads 13 hours of video every night," Rubin wrote in an email. "We believe the Internet... provides a tremendous opportunity for free expression by letting people share and access information. The IDF channel is just one of many examples."

The channel also serves as a counterpoint to Hamas' network of communications throughout the Middle East, analysts said. And with the banning of independent journalists from the war zone, the IDF needed to add its voice to the Internet debate, according to Victor Davis Hanson, a military historian and academic.

Still, Hanson said, it might be best to embed journalists with Israeli forces, similar to how American media outlets covered the first few years of the Iraq war.

"I am not sure," Hanson, senior fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution, wrote in an email. "At this point, in the age of the wild west Internet, the IDF might as well provide honest videos in the arena of ideas and let them be adjudicated."

Steven Miller of Rutgers University thinks preaching the IDF message globally gives Israel a chance to sway undecided diplomats and heads of state in Europe. It may even soften the views of leaders in the Middle East, who may only have heard anti-Israel messages because of the IDF's past reluctance to take a bully pulpit.

And using inexpensive technology -- a $300 digital video camera and a $50 cable to upload videos -- allows Israel to connect to that audience without massive government outlays.

"It's a very big leap, indicative of the changing landscape of the media," said Miller, coordinator of undergraduate studies for the Rutgers journalism and media studies program. "It has nothing to do with Hamas; the revolution of the world is in the media."

That media and technology shift has already swept over much of the Middle East, Muravchik said. Saudi Arabian women use Web pages to campaign for the right to drive and to deplore their treatment in society. Egyptian youths use Facebook, the popular social networking site, to denounce regimes, discuss Egyptian-Israeli relations and even organize and stage public demonstrations.

IDF's entry into that editorial cyberspace amounts to "intellectual ammunition for the Jewish Diaspora," said Ilan Berman, vice president for policy at the American Foreign Policy Council in Washington, D.C.

"There are skeptics that say these sorts of policies aren't going to be decisive in shaping hearts and minds," Berman said. "But from the Israeli perspective, they're behind on public relations... I think they're thinking: What the hell?"