Israel’s Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer at Miami Event: “Israel Will Become the Most Important Ally of the US in the 21st Century”

Edited by: TJVNews.com

Discussing his new role in the newly sworn-in government,  Israel’s Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer said that Israel will be the most important ally of the United States in the 21st century as he addressed an event in Miami Tuesday night, as was reported by the Jerusalem Post.

Dermer arrived in Washington on Monday for talks with senior White House and State Department officials, two Israeli officials told Axios.

Axios also reported this marks the first visit by an Israeli minister to Washington since the new Israeli government was sworn in. Dermer is one of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s closest confidants and is expected to be his point person for talks with the Biden administration, according to the Axios report.

In Miami, Dermer spoke of the three priorities he has set for his ministry, which are the Abraham Accords, Iran and relations with the US, according to the JPost report. The Ministry of Strategic Affairs will not deal with the will not deal with the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, the report indicated.

At the event in Miami on Tuesday night, the International March of the Living (MOTL) honored Dermer and his wife Rhoda. In the previous Netanyahu government Dermer served as Israel’s ambassador to the US from 2013 to 2021. The JPost reported that he was a previous participant and speaker on the March of the Living “and has always been a staunch supporter of the program and its educational goals,” MOTL said.

The couple was “recognized for their outstanding service to Israel and the Jewish people,” according to the official website promoting the event. The event was planned months ago, before Dermer knew he would become a Minister, the JPost reported.

In a recording from the event, obtained exclusively by the Jerusalem Post, Dermer said that his ministry’s first priority will be “that the evil regime in Tehran, which openly calls and actively works to destroy the one and only Jewish state, does not achieve that goal,” he said and added that “that is the number one priority.”

“The second priority is to see if we can expand the circle of peace,” he said, as was reported by the JPost.  “We were able to achieve peace in 2020, thanks to the partnership we had with the previous administration and the great ambassador, David Friedman, who really deserves a great round of applause,” Dermer said, according to the JPost report. “In 2020, after only having two peace agreements in 72 years, we were able to achieve this in the span of four or five months,” Dermer said of the peace agreements that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu led with former President Donald Trump.

The new minister shared that “unfortunately, for the last two years, that circle of peace has not expanded,” and added that “Prime Minister Netanyahu is determined to expand it,” the JPost reported.

The report also indicated that he shared that he hopes “to work very closely with the Biden administration,” and that he thinks “the policy towards Iran is a critical part of expanding the peace agreements because I think it opens the space for Arab leaders to move into a public alliance with Israel when we face this common enemy together.”

As mentioned, Dermer’s third goal is to be Netanyahu’s right hand regarding the US, the JPost reported. He told the assemblage in Miami that “the third priority is to significantly upgrade the bilateral ties that we have with the United States of America. Some of you have heard me say this before, over many years, I believe Israel will be the most important ally of the United States in the 21st century. And what I’m tasked to do is to see how we can accelerate this process.”

Dermer explained that “just as Britain was the most important ally of the US in the 20th century, Israel will become the most important ally in the 21st century.”

Dermer revealed that the Strategic Affairs Ministry does not yet have employees, all of whom were moved to the Foreign Ministry after the Naftali Bennett-Yair Lapid government decided to dismantle the ministry in 2021, the JPost reported. These employees are expected to move to the Diaspora Affairs Ministry under Minister Amichai Chikli and deal with combating the incessant propaganda of the BDS movement and the dramatic rise in global anti-Semitism.

“I’m hoping to hire my first employee soon, in a ministry that doesn’t currently exist, and will have to be put together again,” Dermer said, according to the JPost.  “It’s a lot on the plate, but I’ve been privileged to work with the Prime Minister for 22 years. I’m confident that under his leadership Israel will be able to achieve these goals.”