The Times of Israel

• 1. Founding And Leadership

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  The Times of Israel launched in February 2012. Journalist David Horovitz and American billionaire Seth Klarman co-founded the publication. Horovitz serves as the founding editor while Klarman chairs the website. The pair established operations from Jerusalem to document developments across Israel, the Middle East, and the Jewish world. Several editors who joined later had previously worked for the Haaretz English edition. Joshua Davidovich and Raphael Ahren came from that background. Former Haaretz Arab affairs correspondent Avi Issacharoff joined as a Middle East analyst.

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• 2. Multilingual Expansion Strategy

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  The newspaper began publishing additional language editions shortly after its initial launch. Editors rolled out an Arabic version on the 4th of February 2014 under Suha Halifa. A French edition followed on the 25th of February 2014 edited by Stephanie Bitan. The Persian edition arrived on the 7th of October 2015 with Avi Davidi at the helm. A Hebrew site named Zman Yisrael launched on the 1st of May 2019 edited by Biranit Goren. Both the Arabic and French editions combine translations of English content with original material in their respective languages. Horovitz stated they invited readers with value to share opinions through blog pages. They restricted comments to users identified via Facebook profiles or equivalent systems to avoid toxic anonymous discussions.

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• 3. Audience Growth Metrics

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  Readership figures climbed steadily during the first decade of operation. Two years after launching, the outlet claimed two million readers in February 2014. Unique monthly users rose to 3.5 million by 2017. By 2021, average unique users exceeded nine million each month with over 35 million monthly pageviews. The press kit listed an audience of eight million unique monthly users for 2025 alongside 25 million visits and 75 million pageviews. Website ranking company Similarweb recorded 45 million visits in June 2025. More than half that traffic originated from the United States. Liaison journalists stationed in New York City supported these international numbers. Web visits increased 604% year-on-year in November 2023 reaching 64.2 million total.

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• 4. Security Breaches And Controversies

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  On the 2nd of November 2017 hackers in Turkey took down the website for three hours. They replaced the homepage with anti-Israel propaganda. Horovitz responded that they constantly work to improve security against relentless attacks. In 2020 Reuters reported the site published op-eds sent by someone using a falsified identity. Opinion editor Miriam Herschlag regretted the scam because it distorted public discourse. Third-party blogging platforms occasionally brought controversy through inflammatory content later removed. A blog post by Jeffrey Camras in May 2023 claimed Palestine must be obliterated. Genocide scholar Raz Segal cited this as genocidal rhetoric before the piece was deleted. The newspaper has at times removed content violating policies despite not editing outside user posts.

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• 5. Local Partner Network

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  Since 2016 The Times of Israel hosts websites of Jewish newspapers in several countries. These entities function as local partners under the main umbrella. March 2016 saw the start of hosting New York's The Jewish Week. Britain's Jewish News joined the network alongside the New Jersey Jewish Standard. The Atlanta Jewish Times and Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle also became partners. October 2019 marked when The Australian Jewish News became the seventh local partner. This expansion allowed regional publications to leverage the larger platform while maintaining distinct identities. The arrangement supports diverse voices across different geographic regions within the Jewish community.

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• 6. Podcast And Multimedia Production

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  The organization produces three podcasts alongside written journalism and video content. The Daily Briefing serves as a daily news podcast for listeners. Times Will Tell operates as a long-form weekly revue covering deeper topics. Paralyzed Nation provides a deep look into the Israeli political system. Amanda Borschel-Dan hosts one of these weekly programs while serving as Deputy Editor. She previously worked as Magazine Editor of The Jerusalem Post. Her role covers the Jewish world and archaeology. The site maintains a blog platform where some 9,000 bloggers post articles independently.

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