Why are so many Israeli officials Americanized?

by on May 6, 2009 12

At AIPAC, I was struck by the fact that senior Netanyahu adviser Ron Dermer seemed so American. And he's from Miami, with a tough-guy swagger. I also saw Michael Oren, the next Israeli ambassador to the U.S., who I have to say is very appealing, and was born in New York and seems utterly American. Also saw Dore Gold, formerly of Connecticut, now of J'lem (though he has collected $96,000 a year as a scholar from the American Enterprise Institute)--a longtime part of the Netanyahu braintrust. And then there's Netanyahu himself, who went to high school outside Philly, and can sound very American too.
What's with all these Americanized Israelis? I asked Jeff Blankfort. He says:
There is an unwritten requirement that has grown stronger over the years that Israeli prime ministers, foreign ministers, ambassadors, spokespersons etc., have to be fluent in English in order to sell Israel at top dollar to the US, which is why David Levy never had a chance. The old guard, of course, Ben Gurion, Shamir, Begin, Rabin, Sharon, spoke with heavy accents, but we are not likely to see that anymore. What the Israelis want Americans to see and hear on the news programs and the radio is an image of themselves, the goal obviously being to reinforce the spin of "shared values," which is always referred to without getting into the details of life in Israel-- that a half million Israelis who came to the US didn't want to put up with.

About Philip Weiss

Philip Weiss is Founder and Co-Editor of Mondoweiss.net.
Posted in Israel Lobby, Israel/Palestine, Israeli Government

{ 12 comments... read them below or add one }

  1. Shirin says:
    May 7, 2009 at 4:35 pm

    Most of those guys are not "Americanized", they are Americans, born and raised.

  2. chuck suchar says:
    May 7, 2009 at 5:18 pm

    Hey, let's keep our eye on the ball, all those rednecks who want to kill Jews–after all, they have
    so much political influence in the power establishment quo. We need to keep them killing arabs and thinking they are doing it for USA. Let's keep our cannonfodder and targets priorities straight.

  3. Anthony says:
    May 7, 2009 at 3:36 am

    No truer words have been spoken!

  4. DICKERSON3870 says:
    May 7, 2009 at 4:16 am

    RE: "…the details of life in Israel– that a half million Israelis who came to the US didn't want to put up with…" THE WORDS OF A FORMER ISRAELI: "Israelis have never been particularly kind to each other. It’s one of the reasons I left actually. In my late twenties I started to grow weary of the unkind, harsh and unforgiving atmosphere around me. It was a tough place to live in not because of our ‘enemies’ but because of how people treated one another. You would believe that we were all enemies rather than people who have some kind of a shared heritage. The only thing that could unite people and temporarily brought out more kindness and a sense of cooperation was a feeling of being under collective threat, and in particular a ‘good wholesome war’." – Avigail Abarbanel SOURCE – http://www.avigailabarbanel.me.uk/index.html

  5. Sten says:
    May 7, 2009 at 5:00 am

    Great Post. This is the actual link to her post: —————————————————————————— http://www.avigailabarbanel.me.uk/gaza-2009-01-04... ——————————————————————————

  6. JES49 says:
    May 7, 2009 at 12:43 pm

    Bull pucky! First of all, how would Jeffrey Blankfort know anything? He's probably too young to remember Abba Even with his Oxford accented English. In the early years of the state, there were also a whole host of fluent English speakers representing Israel abroad including the Herzog brothers, Avraham Harman and David Kimche. At any rate, he leaves out Barak (have you ever heard Barak speak English? Butchers the language.) and Olmert. The reason that David Levy never had a chance as Foreign Minister is that he was a high school dropout who, wisely, stayed away from functions of state so as not to emberass himself. Tzipi Livni wasn't exactly "fluent" in English. And Avigdor Lieberman? Faggedaboudid.

  7. JES49 says:
    May 7, 2009 at 12:46 pm

    BTW, the same could be said for the Palestinian side. Edward Said was quite fluent in English. Saeb Erekat studied at San Francisco State University, and even refers to helicopters as "choppers" (although when he says it, it sounds more like "jobbers").

  8. Just Asking says:
    May 7, 2009 at 1:18 pm

    How many former non-Jewish citizens of the US now represent their new residential country's government in the USA? Is this pattern similar with any other country?

  9. Gert says:
    May 7, 2009 at 1:40 pm

    The Aryanisation of Israel is what it's called…

  10. B.BarNavi says:
    May 7, 2009 at 2:03 pm

    The extreme-right American oleh is a common trope in Israeli comedy. The religious settler is often depicted with a comical American accent, despite most settlers being Israeli by birth. These guys are the natural product of the mainstream American Jewish take on Zionism, which rests on lofty ideals and is detached from reality.

  11. B.BarNavi says:
    May 7, 2009 at 2:07 pm

    Monsieur Levy parle couramment le français! Don't underestimate the role that racism played in his downfall, either.

  12. Todd says:
    May 8, 2009 at 2:38 pm

    I view Netanyahi as very foreign. Who cares if he speaks English, grew up in Philly and wears a suit? I don't think Phil understands how foreign American Jews are to many Americans. There is a gulf between the groups that clothing and language can't bridge. If Americans have any influence in their own nation, men like Netanyahu are useless for the task of pushing Israel's interests at the expense of our own interests. In ither words: I don't think many Americans view these Israelis as one of us.

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