This former advisor to the Israeli Prime Minister is 65 years old, he is of American origin and lives in a colony in the occupied West Bank. He is close to the American Republican Party and critical of Joe Biden.
The Israeli government approved this Sunday, November 24, the appointment of Yechiel Leiter, close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as ambassador to the United States, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “The government unanimously approved the appointment of Dr. Yechiel Leiter as ambassador to the United States”announces the ministry press release.
Yechiel Leiter, 65, former advisor to Benjamin Netanyahu, is of American origin and lives in a colony in the occupied West Bank. Close to the American Republican Party, he was one of the leaders of the council of Yesha, one of the main settler organizations in the 1990s. A member of Likud, the party of the Israeli Prime Minister, Yechiel Leiter is currently a strategy advisor, notably for Israeli think tanks. Previously he held various positions, including in the Israeli administration, notably as head of the port authority.
His son, Moshe Leiter, an Israeli army officer, was killed in November 2023 in the Gaza Strip where the Israeli army has been at war against Hamas since the unprecedented attack by the Islamist movement in Israel, ago more than a year. He succeeds Mike Herzog, the brother of Israeli President Isaac Herzog, who was appointed in 2021.
Criticism of Joe Biden’s policies
Yechiel Leiter is set to take office in Washington after President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated. Very critical of the policies of the administration of outgoing President Joe Biden, he denounced in January on the private internet channel Tov the “American pressure” regarding Israel’s conduct of the war in Gaza. For his part, Donald Trump recently announced the appointment as ambassador to Israel of evangelical Christian pastor Mike Huckabee, a former governor who sees biblical reasons to defend Israel.
Defender of colonization, Mike Huckabee declared in 2017, in the Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim to CNN: “the occupied West Bank does not exist. There is Judea and Samaria.the biblical name for this region that Israelis use to designate this Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967, and where settlements are developing, all illegal according to international law.
Swiss
