Ambassador Avi Gil Served as the Director General of Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs from April 2001-November 2002. He also served as Director-General of Israel’s Ministry of Regional Cooperation, Deputy Director-General of the Peres Center for Peace; the Prime Minister’s Chief of Staff, Media Advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Minister of Finance, and Executive Policy Advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. He has been closely involved in Israel’s policy-making and peace efforts, including the negotiations that led to the Oslo Accords and the peace treaty with Jordan. He is a Senior Fellow at the JPPPI and a was a close advisor to President Shimon Peres.

Michael Herzog is a Brigadier General in reserve. He was discharged in August 2010 from long service in the IDF, which included, among other things, combat as an infantryman in the Yom Kippur War, a long career in the Intelligence Division, the head of the Strategic Planning Division in the Planning Division (AGT), the military secretary to the defense minister and chief of staff Minister of Defense (a total of six years in the last two positions, with four defense ministers).

Herzog has been involved in all of Israel’s peace talks with the Palestinians, Syrians and Jordanians since 1993. Between May 2009 and March 2010, he served as a special envoy of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Defense in efforts to drive the political process.

He has also served and is serving as a research fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

In 2021 Herzog was named Israel’s Ambassador to the US.