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Danny Danon is back in Israel after completing a five-year term as Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, one of the world’s most complicated diplomatic positions. His mandate corresponded to the global increase in anti-Semitism and the BDS, and he scored this month through the historic peace agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates.
Danon, a serious, specific and eminently undeniable strategist, made his debut in the early 1990s as an emissary of the Jewish Agency in Miami, then became global director of Betar, then global director of Likud. Israeli Knesset, who served successively as Vice President, Deputy Minister of Defense, Minister of Science and Technology, and in 2015, Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations.
Aish. com talked to Danon to take a behind-the-scenes look at the last five years of his diplomatic roller coaster career.
Aish. com: Israel’s new peace deal with the United Arab Emirates is a seismic change: it opens up the Israeli generation and exports to the largest economy of the moment in the Middle East. The agreement with the UAE also weakens the BDS movement as Arab countries move away from the boycott. Above all, the agreement puts an end to the myth that peace in the Middle East revolves around solving the Palestinian problem.
How do you see the development of Middle East dynamics in the coming years and how does the agreement with the United Arab Emirates reach the Palestinian deadlock?
Danon: Unfortunately, I don’t see any Palestinian leadership willing to negotiate directly with Israel, so today we want to communicate on a new paradigm. In the past, to move Israel forward at the regional level, the paradigm was the Palestinian confrontation first, but today is the exact opposite. We are running with the Arab world and they will help us negotiate with the Palestinians. Today we have full diplomatic relations with Jordan, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, and other countries can support us soon. So maybe we can sit down together and watch the Palestinian crash.
Aish. com: The wall of UN headquarters is engraved with Isaiah’s visionary words – “They will beat their swords in plows” – listening to the original noble mandate of the United Nations to proclaim peace and justice. However, the entire apparatus has been hijacked through corrupt Third World forces – a bloc of voters that causes Israel to be condemned through more United Nations solutions than any other country in the world. Former Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Abba Eban once said that if the UN brought a Solution, noting that “the flat land and Israel flattened it,” it would go through an overwhelming majority.
For more than five years, how have you controlled sentiment towards Israel in such a hostile environment?
Danon: When the United Nations was created after World War II, they had a transparent timetable to save their war and announce dialogue. Unfortunately, today’s United Nations is not the United Nations that was created 75 years ago. resolutions in a proportion that doesn’t make sense. Twenty-two resolutions a year condemn Israel, and only one condemnation of Iran. This is absurd.
By focusing on 3 pillars: Judaism, Israel and innovation, we have replaced the truth at the UN. The most productive example was when I ran for the chairmanship of the UN legal committee. It was a secret survey and I won the 109-member survey. States. Only 44 voted against me. I have become the first Israeli to chair a United Nations status committee. This is evidence that replacement is possible.
Aish. com: At the United Nations, the United States and Israel vote in combination 88% of the time; On the other hand, other Middle Eastern “allies” like Egypt and Saudi Arabia vote with the United States less than 10% of the time. In fact, figures from the US State Department show that for decades Israel has been voting with the United States. The United States more than Great Britain, France, Canada or any other country in the world.
However, Israel has followed a very fine line in affirming its own national priorities. Ben Gurion defied American tension by pointing himself out as a state; Levi Eshkol bravely challenged the United States with the 1967 e-emptive strike; and Menahem Begin was convicted across the United States for annexing the Golan Heights and destroying the Iraqi nuclear reactor.
In the past, he has spoken out against America’s appeasement, saying that “America’s pressure on Israel harms Israel and does nothing to promote peace. It’s a theme from his 2012 book, Israel: Has the Will of After Spending Five Years in such a Delicate Diplomatic Post, with 3 U. S. ambassadors to the United Nations, changed his view of this factor?
Danon: Every time Israel takes resolutions on its own without asking its friends and allies for permission, in the long run we earn the respect of the world, as they are the right resolutions. Apart from the examples you cite, Prime Minister Olmert, whose political positions I president George W. Bush writes in his memoirs about the day he told Olmert not to attack, however, after Israel demolished the reactor, Bush’s respect for Israel increased.
Then you don’t have to appease your allies. We will have to do what is smart for Israel and the other Jews in the long run.
Aish. com: In 2010, the cultural branch of the United Nations, UNESCO, voted to claim Rachel’s tomb as a mosque and decreed that her preservation as a Jewish site a violation of foreign law. Then, in 2016, the White House helped orchestrate Rachel’s grave. the adoption of Resolution 2334, stating that the Jewish presence in Jerusalem’s Old City, adding the Western Wall, brazenly violated foreign law.
In reaction to those heinous denials of the truth, he donned a yarmulke and gave a speech at the United Nations, which later went viral, about the Land of Israel as the cradle of Jewish identity. You the Bible in Hebrew, then lifted it up and said, “This is our act to earth. “
In addition, during his tenure as Israel’s ambassador, he brought more than a hundred UN ambassadors to Poland and Israel, first appearing fuel chambers at Auschwitz, then Hamas terrorist tunnels in southern Israel and Hezbollah terrorist tunnels in the north (excavated under the noses of UN peace forces).
What is the effect of Israel’s old and devoted identity on its technique for global international relations and how does all this Israeli security affect?
Danon: From the Jewish point of view, I led a new wave at the United Nations. First of all, I am a very proud Jew. So I brought Judaism to the corridors of the United Nations, brought kosher food to coffee shops, made Yom Kippur recognized and knowledgeable ambassadors for Jewish holidays, traditions and culture.
Not only did I bring Israel to the United Nations, but I also brought the United Nations to Israel. With those hundred United Nations ambassadors, I traveled the country and crossed Jerusalem’s Old City. When I saw these ancient Jewish places, he asked them, “How can you now say that we have no connection to the earth, as UN and Security Council resolutions claim?”
I have earned the respect of many United Nations ambassadors, as well as Muslim ambassadors, because I have surpassed our rights on earth. I spoke to my center and read the biblical account of God’s promise to Abraham. Whether it’s Christian, Muslim or Jewish, it’s the same scripture, so you can’t argue with that. This is our act towards the earth. If you have anything else, destroy it.
Aish. com: For more than five years, Israel’s relations with the United States have had its ups and downs. Take the scenes with us.
Danon: During the vote on Resolution 2334 that condemned our presence in Jerusalem, I felt alone with so many of our friends voting against us, on the other hand, I had the help of millions of Jews, Christians and even Muslims who in our land rights and knew that we would triumph over this shameful resolution.
Look what has happened since then: the U. S. embassy has moved to Jerusalem, the United States has identified Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, and we are now consolidating our presence in the region with the UAE peace treaty. So I think we’re positive, and keep talking about our land rights.
Some others in Israel think we can appease others by apologizing all day long. We won’t have to apologize for our birthright, our connection to the earth. We want to speak more proudly.
Aish. com: How is Israel, as an “fledgling nation,” the cause of foreign diplomacy?
Danon: When I brought ambassadors to Israel, I showed them not only security challenges, but also opportunities: innovation, generation, and implementation. We Israelis make the mistake of focusing too much on security. Most other people in the world. We’re lucky and we don’t have to deal with terrorism all the time. People care more about sustainable progression: water, food, health. That’s why we want to replace the narrative and showcase our global functions on those sensitive themes. tikkun olam by sending our generation and innovation around the world, to build bridges and help them with our knowledge.
Aish. com: You, these delegations of ambassadors on the roof of Aish HaTorah, overlooking the Temple Mount, the Mount of Olives, and the Western Wall, how would you describe the experience?
Danon: One of the highlights of coming to Jerusalem and feeling holiness in the Old City. When you stop on the roof of Aish, one of israel’s most beautiful squares, you feel God’s presence. You can’t forget, about that.
Aish. com: Since the founding of the State of Israel, many UN solutions have dealt in particular with Palestinian refugees. His father left Egypt in 1950, among the 850,000 Jewish refugees from Arab countries after the creation of the state, but without the UN. The solution once referred to the fate of these displaced Jews. What progress is being made at the United Nations in detecting these forgotten Jewish refugees?
Danon: There are more Jewish refugees from Arab countries than Muslim refugees who have left Palestine. My father left the assets in Alexandria, Egypt, and many other people left everything they had. We’re not asking for compensation. Rather, we asked for popularity that this be written in the history books, so I drafted a solution about it. Unfortunately, with Covid-19, everything has been closed to the United Nations, but I am sure Israel will continue to make progress on the solution I drafted.
Aish. com: Throughout his career, he has invested a lot of political capital in Israeli politics in Gaza, opposing Ariel Sharon’s withdrawal in 2005 from Gaza, and in 2014, he was fired as Deputy Minister of Defense for criticizing control of the Operation. Protective edge. However, the challenge remains: last year, his hometown of Moshav Mishmeret was hit by a rocket from Gaza, and incendiary balloons are used daily in cross-border attacks. and humanitarian point of view?
Danon: I make a distinction between the other people of Gaza and the Hamas regime that governs Gaza. I feel bad for the other people in Gaza and pray for the day when there will be genuine Palestinian leadership with which we can negotiate.
Ironically, at the United Nations, I discovered myself fighting for the rights of Gazans, as opposed to representatives of the Palestinian Authority. For example, there was an electricity crisis in Gaza and some countries sought to move the budget to help, so it helped coordinate that with UN professionals. But President Abbas’s Palestinian representatives in Ramallah tried to block the initiative, hoping to deny the rest of Gaza’s inhabitants more electricity. That’s what we’re dealing with.
Aish. com: Iranian leaders have threatened to “wipe Israeli cancer from the map. “The agreement with the United Arab Emirates provides Israel with a broader geographical starting point for any long-term attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. On the other hand, Europeans have now allowed iran to lift an arms embargo. In today’s complex geopolitical environment, what will Israel’s strategy be to prevent Iran from moving at full speed to expand nuclear weapons?
Danon: We will do everything that is obligatory to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, and it is not just Israel. Leaders communicate this strongly, and when I visited the United Arab Emirates three years ago, most of the discussions focused on the Iranian threat. So it’s a regional problem, and we’re very determined to prevent Iran.
Aish. com: We are talking about Iranian “sleeping cells” operating all over the world. To what extent is the United States involved in the Iranian nuclear threat?
Danon: Today, with globalization, if you have a nuclear bomb, you can put it in a suitcase, fly to South America, and in two days it’ll be in California, so yes, I think everyone deserves to be worried. it needs Iranian leadership to have nuclear weapons, because we have noticed what they have done in the past. Look at the attempts to attack several Israeli embassies and the fatal attacks that destroyed the Jewish center in Buenos Aires, Argentina: explosives and terrorists all got here from Iran Then God forbid, if they get nuclear weapons, believe what they can do.
Aish. com: In 2007 and 2014, you challenged Bibi Netanyahu for Likud leadership. Now that you are back in Israel, how do you position yourself in politics?
Danon: I returned to Israel with a lot of passion, knowledge, pleasure and relationships. I look forward to serving my other people as a public servant. Me and the Prime Minister, but we all know he won’t stay indefinitely, and when the day comes, I do see the option of running for an even higher position that I had as minister of government, just as I could win in the halls. of the United Nations, God willing, I can also win in the political corridors here in Israel.
Aish. com: When he was appointed UN ambassador in 2015, Haaretz indexed “six reasons to worry,” saying that “Danon’s appointment throws Israel off the diplomatic precipice. “What is your greatest achievement in silencing critics?
Danon: Because I come from the right side of the political spectrum and my ideology is clear, they doubted that I would succeed, I don’t expect them to apologize and I deserve to thank them for real. it was very simple to do them wrong. I have shown that you can remain true to your values, help our rights to Israel and be a proud Jew, and gain the help and respect of nations. This is the lesson we have taught ourselves. the many skeptics.
Aish. com: What do you see as a specific challenge you encountered at the United Nations, where in retrospect you may have dealt with the scenario differently?
Danon: One challenge I regret is that we didn’t run for a seat on the Security Council. When you could get a seat in 2018, I pushed for it and tried to convince my colleagues in Jerusalem to give me the one I needed. In the end, they made the decision that we didn’t have the budget or the labor force. In retrospect, we deserve to have placed more emphasis on that. It is the best time for Israel, a full member state of the United Nations, to deserve a seat on the Security Council.
Rabbi Shraga Simmons is co-founder of Aish. com and co-founder of “48 Ways to Wisdom” (ArtScroll). He is the founder and director of the Advanced Learning site of Aish. com. He is co-founder HonestReporting. com and “David