Israel and the Palestinians: Uri Zaki, Director of B’Tselem USA
- Venue: Hashomer House
- Contact: info@meretz.org.uk
- The meeting is booked to start at 7.30pm for 8pm
- Usual entrance fees: £5, or £4 members, and concessions
Since serving in the IDF, Uri Zaki – now director of B’Tselem USA – completed his law degree at the Hebrew University and became media and political advisor to Yossi Beilin, former Justice Minister and later party leader of Meretz in Israel. Uri took part in the talks that formulated the Geneva initiative and was one of its main spokespersons. He was later elected chair of Young Meretz and stood for the party in the 2009 national elections. An alumnus of the American Council of Young Political Leaders exchange programme, Uri is also a former Vice President of the International Union of Social-Democratic Youth (IUSY). In 2008 he was named among Israel's leading young professionals by Forbes Israel magazine. Uri often publishes opinion pieces in both the Israeli and American press.
B’Tselem stands for the Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. Renowned internationally for its principled work, it was founded in 1989 and has published more than a hundred reports on a range of pressing human rights issues, generating hundreds of newspaper articles in the last year alone. The name “B’Tselem” derives from a phrase in the Book of Genesis that says all human beings are created “in the image” of God. B’Tselem set up its American office in 2008 to advocate a stronger role for human rights in policies regarding the Israeli-Palestinian situation, and to disseminate information about B’Tselem to American policy makers, legislators and media and the American Jewish community.
