Lior Haiat named new FM spokesman
The Foreign Ministry named Lior Haiat, currently Israel’s consulate-general in Miami, as its next spokesman.
Haiat, who has been in Miami since 2016, previously served as deputy spokesman from 2007 to 2009, and also spokesman at Israel’s embassies in Argentina and Spain. In addition to Hebrew, he also speaks English, Spanish and Portuguese.
He is replacing Emmanuel Nahshon, who left the position last month to become Israel’s ambassador to Belgium and Luxembourg.
Haiat is expected to take up the position in October.
The ministry’s appointments committee also named Anna Azari – Israel’s current envoy to Poland and a former ambassador to Russia – as deputy director-general for Europe, and Gary Koren – Israel’s envoy in Moscow – as deputy director-general for Euro-Asia.
Over the last two years, Azari has been running interference between Jerusalem and Warsaw over sharp disagreements concerning Holocaust-related issues.
In addition, Yaakov Hadas-Handelman, a former ambassador to Germany, was named ambassador to Hungary; Isi Yanouka, who served in the past as ambassador to the Ivory Coast, will become Israel’s envoy to Cameroon; and Beth-Eden Kite, formerly Jerusalem’s permanent representative to the UN, the Organization for Security Co-operation in Europe and International Organizations in Austria, will become ambassador to Turkmenistan.
The ambassadorial appointments now need to be approved by the cabinet, something that is generally just a formality.