Israeli statesman Dr. Michael Oren (born in 1955) served as Israel’s Ambassador to the United States between 2009 and 2013. He holds a Ph.D. in History from Princeton University.
Oren has authored best-selling books, articles and papers on the history of the Middle East. He served as a Distinguished Fellow at the Shalem Center in Jerusalem, a contributing editor for The New Republic and an analyst of Middle East Affairs for CNN.
Born in New Jersey, USA, Oren first arrived in Israel when he was 15 years old, landing in Kibbutz Gan Shmuel. Ever since, during his high school years, he would return every summer to perform agricultural work on various kibbutzim. He completed his BA and MA at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs in 1978. In 1986 he earned an MA and a Ph.D. in Near Eastern Studies from Princeton University. He also taught at Harvard University and Yale University as a visiting professor.
Oren immigrated to Israel in 1979. He enlisted in the IDF as a lone soldier and served as a combat soldier in the Paratroopers Brigade, including during the first Lebanon War, during which his unit was ambushed by Syrian soldiers. Oren’s unit sustained numerous casualties in the incident.
At the beginning of the 1980s, Oren was sent by the government to the USSR to help with the Zionist underground activities. During the Rabin government, he worked in the Ministry of Religious Affairs, in the Department of Inter-religious Relationships. During the Gulf War, he served as liaison officer for Israel with the US Sixth Fleet. Oren also served as Maj. (Res) during the Second Lebanon War in 2006. During Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip, he enlisted again for reserve duty and explained the IDF’s actions to the foreign media.
Oren has been an Israeli citizen since 1979, and with his appointment as Israeli ambassador to the United States in 2009, he waived his American citizenship. In December 2013, he completed his term as ambassador.
In January 2014, Oren was appointed analyst of Middle Eastern Affairs at CNN, but during Operation Protective Edge he chose to waive the exclusive contract with the station so that he could work with all foreign channels to explain Israel’s and the IDF’s actions.
Oren and his wife live in Tel-Aviv. They have three children and a grandson. Their sons served as combat soldiers in elite units.
Oren authored the book Six Days of War: The War that Changed the Face of the Middle East”, a New York Times best seller. His book won the National Jewish Book Award and History Book of the Year from the Los Angeles Times.
Oren’s book “Power, Faith and Fantasy, America in the Middle East 1776-to the Present A History of American Involvement in the Middle East” was published by Norton and became a New York Times bestseller, earning critical acclaim from Newsweek and the Washington Post, in the New York Times Book Section and in the San Francisco Chronicle as well as The Willamette Week.
The prestigious Washington Institute for Near East Policy granted Oren the Top Politician for 2014 award (among the recipients of this award in previous years: Bill Clinton, Condoleezza Rice, Tony Blair, Henry Kissinger, Dennis Ross, etc.)
Oren serves as Israel’s representative on the Taglit Steering Committee, as an a honorary member of the Executive Committee of the International Joint and as international chair of the Lone Soldiers Association and of Heseg Foundation, which grants scholarships to lone soldiers.
Oren won two gold medals for rowing during the 10th Maccabiah Games (1977).
George Deek is an Arab-Israeli diplomat. In 2018, Deek was appointed Israeli ambassador to Azerbaijan. He is the first Israeli Arab Christian to become an ambassador. Deek grew up in an Eastern Orthodox Christian family in the Ajami neighborhood of Jaffa, in a building where the other tenants included Muslims, Catholics, Jews and a Catholic priest of Jewish ancestry.[2][3] His father, who worked as a tax advisor,[3] was one of the leaders of the Christian community in Jaffa who served as chairman of the Orthodox Association, and was considered a well-known and popular figure in the city until in 2015 a square was inaugurated in his memory in Jaffa in the presence of Mayor Ron Huldai.[4] According to Deek, his grandparents fled to Lebanon for safety when the 1947–1949 Palestine war, having been told that the Jews would slaughter them if they remained in their homes, but expecting to return home once Arab armies defeated the Jews.[3] According to Deek, when the war ended, his grandparents felt that they had been “deceived”, and decided to return illegally to their home in Jaffa rather than remaining in Lebanon as refugees. Since reentering the country was illegal, Deek’s grandfather, an electrician, was arrested and jailed.
