Bennett said at the launch of the new joint team that "we will safeguard the lands of our country and will not hand over a single centimetre to the enemy".Bennett's lengthy response this week to the Ben-Gvir controversy this week was telling."This is how we will fix Israel's hasbara," he began in a post on social media.Hasbara — the Hebrew word for "explaining" — is the complex communications operation run by Israel which extends well beyond public diplomacy to push Israel's message in the international community.As an organisation, it now runs under the control of the prime minister's office and, since the war on Gaza, its budget is estimated to have jumped from around $15 million in 2023 to $700 million in 2026.Much of the commentary in Israel about Ben-Gvir's actions goes to the damage he has done to the hasbara message."Everyone was talking today about the hasbara disaster caused by a failed minister who sold out Israel's security for likes on TikTok Instead of just talking about what not to do, it's time to talk about what to do."Bennett went on to list what his new political force would do if it won office, including establishing "a powerful national hasbara authority", which would "set Israel's messaging strategy, coordinate between bodies, and ensure that the Israeli response is swift, unified, and professional".That is, not change the underlying actions, just the public relations machine.His comments seem to suggest that Israeli politics really doesn't get the point, which is that Israel probably needs to spend less time worrying about controlling the optics and more time considering the implications of its actions for its long-term international support.Laura Tingle is the ABC's Global Affairs Editor.