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Friday January 5, 2007

Israel’s new U.S. ambassador popular with American Jews

by ron kampeas
jta

washington | One of Sallai Meridor’s first acts as chairman-elect of the Jewish Agency for Israel was to deliver relief to a Muslim country, Albania.

The shipment of food and medicine to refugees from the Kosovo crisis in April 1999 was a first for the organization best known for rescuing Jews and was a sign that the scion of one of Israel’s founding families had a perpetual yearning for a wider diplomatic role.

Little more than a year after Meridor shocked the Jewish world by quitting the agency before his term ended, telling friends he hankered for a diplomatic role, his wish has come true: Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni appointed him Israel’s next ambassador to Washington.

He replaces Danny Ayalon, now completing a four-year term.

Meridor’s appointment comes at a critical time. The U.S.-Israel relationship has probably never been stronger, but the path to Israeli-Palestinian peace that both countries had embraced has been crumbling amid chaos among the Palestinians and growing regional threats from Iran and Iraq.

It also comes after Olmert’s political fortunes were severely hampered by the damage Israel suffered this summer during its war with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Traditionally, Israel’s ambassador to Washington goes beyond the role of intermediary between Jerusalem and Washington, with the ambassador often involved in helping to set Israeli policy.

Meridor, 51, enjoys a decades-old friendship with Olmert, which is probably the critical element explaining Meridor’s selection, according to Jewish leaders who have known both men for decades.

“The most important thing for an ambassador to the United States is to have the confidence of the prime minister, and they go back many years,” said Abraham Foxman, the national director of the Anti-Defamation League.

Meridor has a reputation for integrity, rolling back the Jewish Agency’s reputation for patronage during his 1999-2005 term, and cutting its expenses.

He is well known and praised by American Jewish officials of both political and philanthropic organizations.

Stephen Hoffman, president of the Jewish Community Federation of Cleveland and former president of the United Jewish Communities, worked closely with Merifor during his term at the agency.

“He is a good listener and he is articulate in English as well as Hebrew,” Hoffman said. “He thinks strategically and looks at a lot of different angles, is cautious and gathers a lot of opinions before he makes a move.”

Meridor has often straddled two worlds as a West Bank settler who lives in Kfar Adumim, a settlement near Jericho likely to be dismantled in the withdrawals that Olmert has advocated. He speaks Arabic.

“Sallai has the ability to take people, to appeal to people from the right and the left and make people feel comfortable whether he agrees with their opinions or not,” said Morton Klein, president of the Zionist Organization of America, who admires Meridor despite their disagreements on last year’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. “In this kind of job, that’s an important trait.”

As the World Zionist Organization settlement chief from 1992-1997, and then as Jewish Agency boss, Meridor presided over an end to the long-standing agency policy of not directing funds to West Bank settlements, a practice that earned him reproaches from the Israeli left.

The settlement legacy will not harm him now, said Malcolm Hoenlein, the executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. “His politics are seen as moderate, he’s someone who gets along with all sides of the spectrum,” he said.

Meridor’s familiarity with Jewish leaders will also serve him well in his new job, Jewish leaders said.

Steven Nasatir, president of the Jewish United Fund/Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago and an associate member of JAFI’s board of governors, said Meridor “has all the right stuff; he understands America. He is a great advocate for Israel. He has connections to the Jewish community — he is not a neophyte.”

JTA correspondent Dina Kraft in Tel Aviv and staff writer Jacob Berkman in New York contributed to this report.

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