Isaac Herzog – Life Story

Isaac Herzog has a long history of public service: He served as Member of the 16th–20th Knessets (2003–2018) and Minister in the 30th–32nd Israeli governments. Herzog held the following positions: Minister of Welfare and Social Services; Minister of Housing and Construction; Minister of Tourism; and Minister for Diaspora, Society and the Fight Against Antisemitism; Member of the Security Cabinet of Israel responsible for humanitarian coordination with Gaza; and Leader of the Opposition. Today, he is the Chairman of the Jewish Agency. Since he assumed the position of Jewish Agency Chairman, 80,000 new immigrants have made Aliyah to Israel, including during the year of the COVID-19 outbreak.

Herzog has been widely admired for his professional work in all of the operational positions he has held, especially during his tenure as the Minister of Welfare and Social Services. He oversaw a comprehensive revolution and is considered one of the best welfare ministers that Israel has ever had.

Statesmanship is Herzog’s second nature: He is a man of the world, knows his way around world leaders, publishes many articles across the globe, and often appears in the international media. He is very popular among Jewish communities in the Diaspora, in all the rabbinic circles and Jewish movements, as well as among the leaders of other religious communities and sects in Israel.

Herzog is a man of the people: He speaks to people as an equal; he is amicable and people-loving. Herzog is considered a pragmatic, matter-of-fact, reasonable, and responsible person. A diligent workaholic who has command of the material, has high analytical skills, and pays attention to detail.

Herzog is well-received within the international diplomatic arena. Herzog has achieved international standing among world leaders and in the diplomatic and international arena, which has viewed him as a key factor in advancing a decisive regional political process that would change Israel’s political climate. These contacts planted the seeds that blossomed into the Abraham Accords over the past year.

Herzog strongly believes in connections and in forming coalitions based on agreement. Naturally, he receives support from across the political spectrum. He is able to connect and bridge between all the groups in Israeli society, to identify what people have in common and that which unites them. As an accomplished builder of coalitions, he will be able to apply these skills in the challenging task of mending the schism between the segments of the Israeli public.

Herzog’s unique political skills have often served him well: He ran in his first primary elections in 2003 and took first place, when he was elected Labor Party leader in 2013, when made the decisive move of the 2015 elections and unite Labor with Tzipi Livni’s Hatnua to form the Zionist Union, and when he was elected Chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel.

Personal and Family Background

Isaac Herzog was born on 22 September 1960, 1 Tishrei 5721. He attended Zeitlin State-Religious High School in Tel Aviv and continued at the Jewish Ramaz School in New York, where he moved in the summer of 1975 for his family’s diplomatic tour. There Herzog also conducted his first political campaign, when he was elected Head of the Student Council in a landslide.

Herzog served in Intelligence Unit 8200, and he ascended the officer ranks to the rank of major, his service including lengthy tours of duty in both in Sinai and Judea and Samaria. In the unit, he met Michal Afek, a daughter of a Palmach fighter and a senior IDF officer. Her mother was from a family of farmers who were among the founders of the city of Afula. Their modest wedding was held in the family home. Michal Herzog is a lawyer and mediator who has been socially active for years. Isaac and Michal have three sons.

Herzog is a lawyer with an LL.B from Tel Aviv University and has completed additional academic studies at Cornell University and New York University.

He has published two books dealing with society and economics:

How to Get Out of This: Socioeconomic Solutions for an Economy in Crisis (Teper, 2004).

Work Plan: A Recipe for Economic Well-Being (Teper, 2010).

The Herzog Family: The Herzog family hails from Ireland and Egypt and can trace its roots back to the Spanish Expulsion and Poland. Not only was his childhood home a source of inspiration, but it was also a practical training ground for public office. Choosing a life in the public service was almost natural, when even as a four-year-old misbehaving in preschool, his teacher would reprimanded him that his conduct was not befitting for a grandson of a Chief Rabbi.

His late grandfather, Rabbi Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, was Israel’s first Chief Rabbi and the man who composed the Prayer for the Welfare of the State of Israel. In 1939, with the publication of the British White Paper, Rabbi Herzog tore it up in protest during a speech in Jerusalem. During the Holocaust, he embarked on journeys to save Jews, and was even able, as the Chief Rabbi of the British Mandate of Palestine, to meet with US President Franklin Roosevelt and implore him to save the Jews and bomb the Nazi death camps. He worked to bring Jewish children, who had been hidden in monasteries or among Christian families during the Second World War to save their lives, back to Judaism. He brought about 500 of the Surviving Remnant Children to Palestine on a train known as the Herzog Train.

His late grandmother, Sarah Herzog, was one of the founders of the Emuna movement and took care of orphans. She imprinted upon him the love of mankind and the importance of helping those less fortunate when she founded the Herzog Psychiatric-Geriatric Hospital in Jerusalem.

His late father, Chaim Herzog, was an officer in the British military. He participated in the invasion of Normandy and the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. A Yeshiva student who became a Hagana fighter, Chaim went on to become a General in the IDF, Israel's national commentator and relaxer during the Six-Day War, a lawyer who established a thriving practice. As Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, his speech against the UN resolution equating Zionism with racism shocked the UN General Assembly and was chosen as one of the 50 most important speeches in history. Finally, of course, he served as the sixth President of Israel. As President, Herzog led a change in the attitude to Israel’s Arab citizens when he proclaimed: “I am President of all the people.”

His mother, Aura Herzog, was born in Ismailia in Egypt and attended the first class of the Jewish Agency’s Diplomatic School. Years later she was badly injured in the first terrorist attack in Israel, on the National Institutions Building in Jerusalem. Chaim Herzog was the man who saved her life by rescuing her from the wreckage. Aura Herzog initiated the International Bible Contest and founded the Council for a Beautiful Israel, which became her life’s work.

His uncle was Abba Eban, who was called Israel's “Number One Diplomat.” He was legendary as minister of foreign affairs and as the ambassador of the young State of Israel to the United Nations. His other uncle, Dr. Yaakov Herzog, was a star diplomat and director general of the Prime Minister’s Office.