Israeli Ambassador to the United States Ron Dermer will be recognized for his public statements in defense of Israel by the American nonprofit organization Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) at a June 2 gala dinner in New York City.
Each year at the gala the organization recognizes an individual who has contributed to speaking truthfully about Israel in the public square with the Emet (“Truth”) Award. Former recipients have included Nobel Prize laureates such as Elie Wiesel, U.S. senators such as Joseph Lieberman, presidents such as Spain’s Jose Maria Aznar and prime ministers such as Canada’s Stephen Harper.
This year’s honoree, Ron Dermer, recently made headlines for his trenchant comments about The New York Times after the paper published an anti-Semitic cartoon.
“The same New York Times that a century ago mostly hid from their readers the Holocaust of the Jewish people has today made its pages a safe space for those who hate the Jewish state,” said Dermer. “Through biased coverage, slanderous columns and anti-Semitic cartoons, its editors shamefully choose week after week to cast the Jewish state as a force for evil.”
“We always try to honor people who represent what CAMERA is about—the spirit of boldly demanding truth from the mainstream media,” said CAMERA chair George Violin. “We have that person this year.”
Dermer was born in Miami Beach, Fla. He earned a degree in finance and management from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, and holds a degree in philosophy, politics and economics from Oxford University. He was a columnist for The Jerusalem Post for three years.
In 2004, Dermer co-authored with Natan Sharansky the best-selling book The Case for Democracy, which was translated into numerous languages. From 2005-08, he worked as Israel’s Minister of Economic Affairs in the United States, helping to transform Israel into a global commercial and technological innovator.
His contributions to Israel’s economic thought and direction earned Dermer a place as a senior adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from 2009-13.
In October 2013, he began serving as Israel’s ambassador to the United States. This position has placed him on the frontlines of defending Israel in the media when global crises have erupted.
