A diplomatic exodus

SEVERAL FOREIGN ambassadors are winding up their terms, and will be leaving Israel in the coming weeks, but it may be a while before their successors present their credentials to President Isaac Herzog. So far, there is only one ambassador waiting to do so, and presentation ceremonies usually involve four or five ambassadors who make their presentations one after the other, with each spending 10-20 minutes in conversation with the president. Those who are leaving continue to perform their duties, almost until the time they board the plane to return home.

A case in point is head of the delegation of the European Union Emanuele Giaufret, who met this week with various ministers and Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee head Yesh Atid MK Ram Ben Barak. The two discussed Israel-EU relations and mutual interests, as well as various political issues on which Israel and the EU do not always see eye to eye.

Giaufret is scheduled to complete his posting in August.

ALSO LEAVING soon is Swiss Ambassador Jean Daniel-Ruch, who has been heavily involved in organizing activities designed to protect the coral reefs of Eilat and Aqaba. Coral reefs are disappearing around the globe as climate change causes rising ocean temperatures and acidification.

For some reason, the Red Sea coral reefs are apparently immune to these destructive forces, and marine scientists and explorers are naturally eager to discover the secret of the Red Sea that enables coral to survive, and whether this would continue if the water is polluted. The Transnational Red Sea Center has organized a series of expeditions onboard the Swiss sailboat Fleur de Passion, which will carry a team of scientists over the next four years to explore the coastlines of Egypt, Eritrea, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Yemen. The boat sailed from Eilat this week. On hand to wish its explorers and crew well were Ruch, Environmental Protection Minister Tamar Zandberg, Regional Cooperation Minister Esawi Frej, Eilat’s acting mayor Eli Lankri and German Ambassador Susanne Wasum-Rainer.

IT’S BEEN quite an exciting week for the German ambassador. Following her return to Tel Aviv from Eilat, she attended the opening at the ANU Museum’s new permanent exhibition dedicated to 1,700 years of

Jewish life in Germany.

The exhibition includes touch-screen audio-visuals, reproductions and originals of ancient holy books and Torah scrolls, and an exquisite model of the Berlin New Synagogue that was built in 1866, and set on fire on Kristallnacht in 1938 but not destroyed. However, it suffered severe damage from allied bombings, and was not restored until 1995. Although services are held there, today it functions more as a museum than a synagogue, and houses the permanent exhibition.

Biographical notes about Jewish spiritual leaders, intellectuals, musicians, politicians, et al who over the centuries contributed so much to Jewish and German culture, and so many other aspects of Jewish life in Germany abound, side by side with exhibits and notes about Sephardi Jews. The German Jews were largely Ashkenazi. What Sephardi and Ashkenazi Jews had in common was the community structure.

The exhibition in its totality aims to show the plurality of Jewish life, and portrays Jews not just as victims, because its message is that the soul of the Jewish people transcends persecution and survival. The very dark chapters in the history of the Jews in Germany are not ignored, but despite the periods of darkness, the community thrived and flourished and participated in Germany’s cultural dialogue.

Although when Jews think of Germany they think primarily of destruction, one of the main messages of the exhibition is that to understand what was destroyed, it is important to understand what existed beforehand.

Planning for the exhibition began some three years ago. Plans were changed again and again as situations changed.

Wasum-Rainer paid tribute to many people who had in any way been associated with the exhibition’s planning and execution, singling out in particular Richard Hayato Yamato, the cultural attaché at the German Embassy.

She said Jews contributed to Germany’s intellectual life and that they had contributed to multicultural life in Germany in every form of its expression. “Without them,” Wasum-Rainer said, “Germany’s intellectual life would be poor.”

The exhibition (of which there is a similar one in Germany) is meant to arouse consciousness in Germany of Jewish roots, beyond issues of genocide, persecution and hatred of Jews, she said. It also emphasizes Germany’s unchanged commitment to break with prejudice and to fight antisemitism, she added, as she voiced her pleasure that Jewish life is again flourishing in Germany, where the Jewish population of 225,000 is the third largest in Europe after France and the UK.

MOST INDEPENDENCE or other national day celebrations hosted by ambassadors of foreign countries are formal affairs, sometimes enhanced by a musical offering or an arts and crafts exhibition, but basically, it’s mingling, eating, drinking, speeches and more eating and mingling.

Not so the Independence Day celebration hosted by Colombian Ambassador Margarita Eliana Manjarrez Herrera in her impressive residence in Kfar Shmaryahu. Yes, there were speeches and food and mingling. But there was also a party atmosphere, initially created by a background of Colombian music. That was followed by a display of Colombian dancing that included calisthenics by an amazingly agile and flexible group of dancers, after which the ambassador began dancing herself and was joined by many of her guests, who were having so much fun that the exhibition dancers enthusiastically joined in without bothering to change their dance costumes. By the coffee bar at the edge of the dance floor, there were two giant sacks of Colombian coffee. There was also, of course, the serious side to celebrating the 211th anniversary of Colombia’s independence from Spain.

The ambassador – a career diplomat, with a strong legal background – presented a long detailed report of her country’s aims and achievements as well as its excellent relations with Israel that include a free trade agreement which contains unique elements that are not usually found in FTAs with other countries.

She also spoke of Colombia’s peace agreement on the home front, and the efforts being made by the government to honor it in every way, despite the many social crises and their accompanying challenges. Speaking from a black stage decorated with exquisite, large white roses over the shimmering swimming pool, Manjarrez Herrera also referred to Colombia’s active Jewish community, which dates back to Spanish colonization. Many Colombian Jews have migrated to Israel, and distinguished themselves here, she said.

She was particularly pleased to welcome Agriculture and Rural Development Minister Oded Forer who, prior to giving up his Knesset seat this year in accordance with the Norwegian Law, was the longtime chairman of the Israel-Colombia Parliamentary Friendship Group.

Forer also referred to the free trade agreement, and said it had recently been discussed in a telephone call between Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Colombia’s President Ivan Duque. Bennett is familiar with Colombia, having visited there in one of his previous capacities. Forer and the ambassador each mentioned that Colombia will soon be opening an innovation office in Jerusalem. The ambassador emphasized the importance of developed countries extending help to developing countries.

DURING THE month prior to the end of his seven-year tenure as president, photographs and articles about Reuven Rivlin appeared almost daily in newspapers and magazines in Israel and abroad. This week, he received an honorary doctorate from IDC Herzliya, as did Dr. Miriam Adelson and several other people. To the IDC’s credit, it placed several large advertisements in the Israeli media in advance of the event, featuring photographs and short biographies of all the recipients. Contrary to its usual practice, however, the IDC did not put out a press release afterward, and the only newspaper in Israel to carry an extensive report was Israel Hayom, of which Adelson is the publisher and principal shareholder. An English translation of the article appeared mainly in Jewish publications abroad.

In the article, Rivlin was mentioned by name and former title, but no more than that. The article dealt mainly with Adelson and her late husband, mega-philanthropist Sheldon G. Adelson.

On its 25th anniversary in 2019, IDC Herzliya awarded an honorary doctorate to Sheldon Adelson, one of its major donors and a generous benefactor to many Israeli causes who passed away in January of this year, and followed through in July by honoring his widow.

Miriam Adelson has continued with the generosity in which she and her husband were partners. But that is not the only reason she is worthy of honors. In her professional capacity, Adelson has opened clinics to treat drug addicts and wean them off their debilitating habits. She certainly deserves kudos for that. But to give the person who just two weeks earlier was still president of Israel only a fleeting mention is a sad example of “the man who pays the piper calls the tune.”

IN A recent story-telling session at the Haifa Theater, MC Yossi Alfi, who hosts specially themed story-tellers’ evenings around the country, brought in a panel of former Mossad agents, one of whom was former chief Efraim Halevy, who mentioned that during the COVID lock-up period he occupied himself with translating the diary of Lawrence of Arabia into Hebrew.

He had done so at the request of a friend who was editing material related to the 100th anniversary this year of the Cairo conference, to which then-colonial secretary Winston Churchill had invited British military commanders and civil administrators throughout the Middle East to discuss and clarify issues such as the Sykes-Picot Agreement, the Balfour Declaration, and the apportionment of territories to Arab leaders, primarily Transjordan to Abdullah Bin Hussein, and Iraq to his brother Faisal.

Churchill was very impressed by Lawrence as a soldier, scholar, archaeologist and diplomat, and appointed him to a prominent position on his team. Inasmuch as Lawrence was a dedicated Arabist, he was also a virulent antisemite – until he learned about NILI, the Jewish spy ring composed mostly of members of the Aronsohn family who had a special gift for collecting material against the Turks and passing it on to the British. Without their input, Britain might not have won the war against the Ottoman rulers of the region.

This caused Lawrence to change his attitude toward the Jews. Halevy credited NILI with being the nucleus that led to the creation of Mossad.

This was not the first time that Halevy had given praise to NILI. He did so previously in a book that was published in 2017 to mark the centenary of the Balfour Declaration. NILI is an acronym for the biblical Hebrew phrase Netzakh Yisrael lo yeshaker, taken from the First Book of Samuel, and meaning, “The Eternal One of Israel will not lie.”