First Arab-Israeli chairman of Bank Leumi breaks ‘glass ceiling’
Dr. Samer Haj-Yehia has made history as the first Arab-Israeli to be appointed chairman of Bank Leumi, Israel’s oldest banking corporation. The appointment is contingent on approval from the Bank of Israel’s Banking Supervision Department, according to a statement by the bank.
The announcement came on Monday after a board of directors meeting and will come into effect on July 21, when current director David Brodet is slated to retire. On Sunday, Bank Leumi announced that its president and CEO will be retiring after seven years holding the position.
Now 48, Haj-Yehia has worked as a director at Bank Leumi for five years and has held similar roles at other firms such as Hadassah Medical Center, Strauss Group, the Council for Higher Education and the FinTech initiative BondIT. He has also worked for businesses in the US, including Fidelity Investments and GMO Investments. Haj-Yehia earned a PhD in economics at MIT as part of the Fulbright Israel-Arab Scholarship Program in 1996, and has lectured at Harvard, MIT, Hebrew University and the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya.
Many have taken to social media to congratulate Haj-Yehia on his promotion. “Another glass ceiling broken,” tweeted Jewish Agency Chairman Isaac Herzog. “He’s incredibly talented, globally renown. I had the privilege of mentoring him when he began his legal career and, watching his career bloom, I have every confidence in his success.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took to Twitter as well, saying: “I bless Dr. Samer Haj-Yehia’s appointment to chairman of Bank Leumi and wish him great success in his position!”
Some leaders have used Haj-Yehia’s appointment as a means of disputing claims that Israel is an apartheid state. “In another blow to the BDS movement and its claim that Israel is an apartheid state, Israeli Arab Dr. Samer Haj-Yehia was just elected as Chairman of the Board of Bank Leumi. How many black South Africans held similar positions in Apartheid South Africa?” tweeted Maurice Hirsch, head of legal strategies for Palestinian Media Watch.
Bank Leumi has roots in the early Zionist movement, tracing its origins to Theodor Herzl’s article “Jüdische Colonialbank,” which maintained that the Zionist movement needed institutional financial support. After collecting £250,000, Herzl helped jump start the “Jewish Colonial Trust,” and then the “Anglo-Palestinian Company” in 1902 London. By 1903, the APC managed to open a branch in Jaffa, which was then under Ottoman Turkish sovereignty. The company encouraged industry and construction in pre-mandate Palestine and eventually marked its separation from Britain in 1950 when it transferred its assets to a company called “Leumi Le’Israel.”
Bank Leumi has a market cap above $10.5 billion and its net income in the first quarter of 2019 was $301 million, a 50% increase from the year before. The bank has 250 branches throughout Israel and additional operations overseas.