Playboy Launches First Hebrew Edition

Israelis can now read Playboy 'for the articles' with the launch of the magazine's first Hebrew-language edition. Playboy has been widely available in Israel for years but this marks the first local edition of the magazine. It features Israeli models and articles by Israeli writers. Owner and publisher Daniel Pomerantz says he got the idea while working as a lawyer in Chicago, where he made friends with some of the magazine's lawyers.

It's not clear how well the magazine will be received in the Holy Land, where religious sensitivities are always simmering under the surface and observant Jews and Muslims live by strict modesty rules. Religious zealots have frequently burned down bus stops with ads of fully dressed women and have prompted major advertisers not to use female models regardless of how modestly they are covered up. Pomerantz, however, is confident of success. "It is a complicated and beautiful magazine for a complicated and beautiful country," he says. (More Israel stories.)