TV from Israel

Last Updated on April 20, 2024 by Watch TV

Television in Israel refers to television broadcasting services in the State of Israel, inaugurated on March 24, 1966. Initially, there was one state-owned channel, operated jointly by the Israel Broadcasting Authority and the Israeli Educational Television. In 1986, a second state-regulated channel was launched. This channel became a state-regulated commercial channel in 1993. An additional commercial channel was introduced in 2002, followed by the introduction of three commercial niche channels: an Israeli Russian-speaking channel (in 2002), a channel of Israeli popular music (in 2003) and an Arabic-speaking channel (in 2012).

Colour transmissions were introduced gradually around 1980. Multichannel cable television service became available to subscribers gradually since 1990, but small illegal cable TV stations operated in the big cities already during the 1980s. Satellite-based multichannel service has been available since 2000. Almost 75% of the population is subscribed to pay TV systems which are provided either by a cable service called "HOT", or by a satellite service called "yes". The Israel Broadcasting Authority was closed down in May 2017 and replaced by the Israeli Broadcasting Corporation as the operator of the state-owned TV channels. Channel 2 is expected to split into two different channels in November 2017, by giving each of the two current operating commercial companies a channel of its own.