Israel’s new US ambassador, Gilad Erdan, began his term in Washington, DC, on Thursday, with his appointment coinciding with the inauguration of President Biden.
He replaced Ambassador Ron Dermer, who held the position for seven and a half years and helped shape the Trump administration’s dramatic change in US policy toward Israel and the Middle East.
Erdan, who will play the dual role of Israeli ambassador to the United States and the United Nations, said he is committed to working with the Biden administration to combat the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change.
“I take up my position as Israel’s ambassador to the most important country in the world and Israel’s most important ally,” Erdan said in a statement.
“Under my leadership, Israel will continue to work closely with the United States and cooperate with the new administration on its agenda to defeat the coronavirus and combat climate change, an issue that is extremely close to my heart,” he added.
Erdan is the second member of the Israeli prime minister’s rankings Benjamin Netanyahu
Benjamin (Bibi) NetanyahuMOREThe Likud political party, and its position in Washington, is seen as a direct extension of Netanyahu.
Erdan is expected to present his credentials to Biden, a traditional ceremony for a new diplomat, but which will undoubtedly be different in the COVID-19 era. The date of the meeting has not yet been set, according to the Israeli embassy.
He will be a key voice as the Biden administration works to engage Iran to frame its nuclear ambitions in an effort to bring the US back to the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, aimed at preventing Tehran from building weapons. nuclear.
Netanyahu opposes the US reintroducing the agreement, arguing that the agreement does not go far enough to curb Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, which pose an existential threat to Israel, and celebrated the former President Trump
Donald Trump, Clinton, Bush and Obama reflect on the peaceful transition of power on Biden’s Inauguration Day. Arizona Republican brothers say he is “at least partially to blame” for the violence in the Capitol.withdrawal from the agreement in 2018.
For Biden, Israel’s opposition to US engagement with Iran will be backed by key ties in Washington with Yousef Al Otaiba, the United Arab Emirates envoy to the United States and Bahrain’s ambassador to the United States Abdullah Bin Mohammad Bin Rashed Al Khalifa – formal relations mediated by the Trump administration under the agreement known as the Abraham Accords.
Al Otaiba developed a close relationship with Dermer while he was the Israeli envoy to Washington.
Both the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have spoken out about their expectations of being included by the Biden administration in discussions on Iran’s involvement in limiting its nuclear program.
While Biden has long expressed strong support for Israel and said the US commitment to its security is “ironic”, his administration is expected to review many of the drastic policy changes that have taken place under the administration. Trump, a move that is likely to attract opposition from Israel.
This includes the Biden administration’s commitment to return to the Palestinians, who hope the president will resume funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, the main assistance program for Palestinian refugees for which Trump cut US aid in 2018.
Israel welcomed the move at the time and criticized the agency for a long time for helping to perpetuate the status of Palestinian refugees in the 1948 Israeli-Arab war and including their deaths as beneficiaries of refugee status.
Another key move made by the Trump administration that Israel welcomed was the former secretary of state Mike Pompeo
Mike PompeoBiden puts career civil servants to action in state action, USAID, UN China sanctions Pompeo and more than two dozen American figuresThe decision to recognize Israeli settlements in the West Bank as part of Israel is a major reversal of US policy.
The majority of the global community considers settlements to be illegal under international law. In addition, Pompey made US investments in settlements – which had previously been blocked – and allowed exports from Israeli settlements in the West Bank to the United States to be labeled “Made in Israel.”
Other key issues include how the Biden administration approaches the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, an organized effort to put pressure on Israel through a political, cultural and economic boycott of its policies towards the Palestinians.
Pompeo issued a directive to the State Department labeling the movement as anti-Semitic and directed the agency to compile a list of non-governmental organizations to support the movement that would be barred from receiving funding from the State Department.
There is bipartisan opposition to boycott, divestment and sanctions in Congress, but Democratic lawmakers are divided over the implications of anti-movement legislation on concerns about violating the rights of the First Amendment.
Anthony Blink
Antony Blinken: The Senate confirms Biden’s chief intelligence officer, offering him the first official of the Biden cabinet, who stops to stop the US exodus from the World Health Organization. Biden is recruiting career civil servants to state action positions, USAID, UN, Nominated by Biden for secretary of state, said on Tuesday during the Senate confirmation hearing that he and the president are “strongly opposed” to the movement and that he “unjustly and inappropriately designates Israel, promotes a double standard.” and a rule does not apply in other countries. ”
But Blinken also said he respected the rights of Americans to the first amendment “to say what they believe and what they think.”
Blinken also said during the confirmation hearing that the Biden administration will keep the US embassy in Jerusalem. Trump moved the embassy there from Tel Aviv in 2018, which was celebrated by Israeli officials as a legitimate recognition of Jerusalem as the country’s undivided capital.
The majority of the international community with relations with Israel maintains its diplomatic missions in Tel Aviv, recognizing that Jerusalem’s final status should only be determined by comprehensive negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians, who hope to establish a capital of a future Palestinian state in the city. .