NCSEJ WEEKLY TOP 10 Washington, D.C. May 25, 2018 Secretary of State promises appointment of special envoy to monitor anti-Semitism Jewish News Syndicate, May 24, 2018 https://www.jns.org/secretary-of-state-promises-appointment-of-special-envoy-to-monitor-anti-semitism/ At a hearing of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo promised that he would work towards an appointment of a Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism. During testimony in front of the House committee, Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.H.), a senior member of the committee, had asked the Pompeo to act on the appointment of the vacant Special Envoy position. “And in 2004, I authored the Anti-Semitism Special Envoy. That, too, has not been filled,” Smith said to Pompeo of the vacancy. “And I know that you care deeply about combating the scourge of anti-Semitism, which is rising all over the globe. Please move on that as well.” “You have my word,” Pompeo told Smith in response. The Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism heads the State Department office responsible for leading U.S. efforts to counter anti-Semitism around the globe. The exchange in Congress came after a letter, spearheaded by the leaders of the Bipartisan Taskforce for Combating Anti-Semitism—Reps. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.), Chris Smith (R-N.J.), Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.), Ileana Ros- Lehtinen (R-Fl.), Ted Deutch (D-Fl.), Marc Veasey (D-Texas) and Kay Granger (R-Texas)—was sent to Pompeo and signed by 120 members of Congress. “Without a Special Envoy, the United States lacks the focus of a person solely dedicated to spearheading our important diplomatic efforts in the fight against anti-Semitism,” the letter stated. “Appointing this important position will make clear to foreign governments that combating anti-Semitism remains an American priority and that the U.S. maintains its traditional leadership in the fight.” The American Jewish Committee applauded the efforts by Congress to fill an anti-Semitism envoy position. “Congress plays a vital role in U.S. efforts to combat global anti-Semitism, and one of its most effective instruments has been the creation, maintenance and ongoing interaction with the Office of the Special Envoy,” said Jason Isaacson, AJC associate executive director for policy. “Its very existence sends a powerful signal to world leaders and to vulnerable Jewish communities of America’s commitment to confronting this menace.” Pompeo Calls For Russian Troop Pullout From Georgia Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, May 21, 2018 https://www.rferl.org/a/pompeo-calls-for-russian-troop-pullout-from-georgia/29240854.html U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has called for Russia to withdraw its troops from breakaway regions in Georgia while also pledging deeper security and economic support for Tbilisi. "The United States unequivocally condemns Russia’s occupation on Georgian soil," Pompeo said in opening remarks to the annual U.S.-Georgian Strategic Partnership in Washington on May 21. "Russia's forcible invasion of Georgia is a clear violation of international peace and security." Russia has troops stationed in Georgia's Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions that remained after a 2008 war in South Ossetia between Russian and Georgian troops. Moscow and a few other nations have recognized the two separatist regions as independent countries. Pompeo also repeated U.S. policy that Washington supports Georgia's eventual membership in NATO. Georgian Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili said after a meeting with Pompeo that U.S. support for a peaceful resolution to Russian troops in Georgia "is of highest importance to our country and regional stability." Kvirikashvili added that Georgia's membership in the military alliance would be a "clear added value for Euro- Atlantic security." NATO promised Georgia eventual membership in 2008. Kvirikashvili said U.S. involvement in infrastructure projects in Georgia, like the Anaklia deep-sea port on the Black Sea coast, would help attract economic interest to the area. Despite sanctions, some Americans still want to do business in Russia By Amie-Ferris Rotman Washington Post, May 25, 2018 https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/despite-sanctions-some-americans-still-want-to-do-business-in- russia/2018/05/25/7be0e2f0-5f86-11e8-b656-236c6214ef01_story.html?utm_term=.8c9efb6c326a Russian poetry was quoted. Jokes were made about flying to Mars. One American chief executive even lauded his company’s relationship with Russia for outlasting his own marriage. Ties between Russia and the West may be at their worst since the days of the Cold War, but that did little to stop a slew of American business leaders from speaking at a panel at the country’s annual lavish investment summit on Friday. They were part of the largest international attendance in four years, when Russia was hit with U.S. and European Union sanctions for annexing Crimea from Ukraine. Since then, Moscow’s ties with Washington have only further deteriorated over allegations of election interference. French President Emmanuel Macron jetted in to headline the event alongside his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. On Friday, the two spoke at length to Russia’s business and political elite, just moments after the Netherlands and Australia said they were holding Russia legally responsible for the downing of flight MH17, which was shot down over Ukraine four years ago, killing all 298 people on board. But the forum hummed along with Macron saying France hoped to become Russia’s largest investor. Encouraged to attend by Washington’s ambassador to Russia, Jon Huntsman, himself a businessman, the Americans’ optimism in continuing business with Russia underscored the parallel reality in which those trying to straddle the fraught U.S.-Russian relationship often find themselves. “Mutual isolation will only drive us further apart,” Huntsman said in a video address on the embassy’s Twitter feed. “That is why I’m going.” The panel was joined by sanctioned Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg, whom special counsel Robert S. Mueller III has taken a recent interest in. Huntsman had originally been scheduled to attend the panel, and it was not immediately clear why he pulled out. “He is here in spirit,” Russian foods tycoon David Yakobashvili told the panel. President Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen received payments of a reported half a million dollars after the 2016 election from a company linked to Vekselberg, and the motives for this are under investigation. One of Russia’s richest men, Vekselberg is under intense media scrutiny and spent much of the first two days of the St. Petersburg forum dodging reporters’ questions. On the panel, Vekselberg, who has made his fortune from oil and metals, was wearing one of his many hats as president of Skolkovo, ostensibly Russia’s answer to Silicon Valley. Vekselberg appeared wistful as he described current relations between Moscow and Washington. “The number of optimists has declined, though some remain in this room,” said the tycoon, whose two children both attended universities in the United States. He quoted a famous song by Soviet writer Bulat Okudzhava, about the futility of military service, and soldiers’ feelings of disappointment at not being able to truly change the world. Vekselberg was not the only one to wax lyrical. Markwart von Pentz, who heads agriculture and turf equipment at the American John Deere Company, cited the 19th century Russian poet Fyodor Tyutchev, saying “Russia cannot be understood with the mind alone,” before saying the world’s largest country has the potential to feed a growing world. The president of Boeing, Bertrand-Marc Allen, said Russia “is a place for long-term partnership,” noting that his company’s 25 years in Russia exceeded the time he has been married to his wife. The American aerospace company was recently on the receiving end of the Kremlin’s ire when Russia said it would cancel titanium exports to Boeing as part of counter-sanctions. That proposed ban was later rolled back by Russia. Sitting near the front was Sergey Kislyak, until recently Russia’s long-serving ambassador to Washington and once at the center of alleged collusion by Russia in Trump’s campaign. The veteran Russian diplomat issued the most measured response to the surge of enthusiasm in the room. “I consider the people who gather here as sort of pioneers in a new environment in bettering American-Russian relations,” he told reporters on the panel’s sidelines. “There are still a few.” Know your oligarch: A guide to the Jewish machers in the Russia probe By Ron Kampeas Jewish Telegraphic Agency, May 22, 2018 https://www.jta.org/2018/05/22/news-opinion/know-oligarch-guide-jewish-machers-russia-probe The special prosecutor’s probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election offers an unsettling journey for anyone steeped in Russian Jewry, and the transition from the repression of the former Soviet Union to the relative freedoms of the Russian Federation. Of 10 billionaires with Kremlin ties who funneled political contributions to Donald Trump and a number of top Republican leaders, at least five are Jewish. (The Dallas Morning News has a handy set of interactive charts.) There’s Len Blavatnik, the dual British-American citizen who dumped huge amounts of cash on Republican candidates in the last election cycle, much of it funneled through his myriad investment firms. (The same Len Blavatnik funds scholarships for IDF veterans and who is friends with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.) Alexander Shustorovich is the president of IMG Artists, a titan among impresarios, who gave Trumps’ inauguration committee a cool $1 million. He arrived in 1977 with his penniless family in New York at age 11, fleeing Soviet persecution of Jews.