Professor Alan Dershowitz & Ambassador Danny Ayalon - February 11, 2012
PROFESSOR ALAN DERSHOWITZ
Professor Alan M. Dershowitz is Brooklyn native who has been called “the nation’s most peripatetic civil liberties lawyer” and one of its “most distinguished defenders of individual rights,” “the best-known criminal lawyer in the world,” “the top lawyer of last resort,” “America’s most public Jewish defender” and “Israel’s single most visible defender – the Jewish state’s lead attorney in the court of public opinion.” He is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Dershowitz, a graduate of Brooklyn College and Yale Law School, joined the Harvard Law School faculty at age 25 after clerking for Judge David Bazelon and Justice Arthur Goldberg.
He has also published more than 100 articles in magazines and journals such as The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post. The Wall Street Journal, The New Republic, The Nation, Commentary, Saturday Review, The Harvard Law Review and the Yale Law Journal, and more than 300 of his articles have appeared in syndication in 50 national daily newspapers. Professor Dershowitz is the author of 27 fiction and non-fiction works with a worldwide audience. His most recent titles include Rights From Wrong, The Case For Israel, The Case For Peace, Blasphemy: How the Religious Right is Hijacking the Declaration of Independence, Preemption: A Knife that Cuts Both Ways, Finding Jefferson – A Lost Letter, A Remarkable Discovery, and The First Amendment In An Age of Terrorism, and The Case For Moral Clarity: Israel, Hamas and Gaza.
In addition to his numerous law review articles and books about criminal and constitutional law, he has written, taught and lectured about history, philosophy, psychology, literature, mathematics, theology, music, sports – and even delicatessens.
In 1983, the Anti-Defamation League of the B'nai B'rith presented him with the William O. Douglas First Amendment Award for his "compassionate eloquent leadership and persistent advocacy in the struggle for civil and human rights." In presenting the award, Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel said: "If there had been a few people like Alan Dershowitz during the 1930s and 1940s, the history of European Jewry might have been different." Professor Dershowitz has been awarded the honorary doctor of laws degree by Yeshiva University, the Hebrew Union College, Brooklyn College, Syracuse University and Haifa University. The New York Criminal Bar Association honored him for his "outstanding contribution as a scholar and dedicated defender of human rights."
AMBASSADOR DANIEL AYALON
Ambassador Daniel Ayalon has played an instrumental role in Israel’s foreign policy during the last three consecutive Israeli Administrations. Prior to his appointment as Ambassador to the United States, Daniel Ayalon was the Foreign Policy Adviser to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
From 1997-2001, Ambassador Ayalon was the Deputy Foreign Policy Adviser to former Prime Ministers Ehud Barak and Benjamin Netanyahu, during which time he was a member of the Israeli delegations to the Sharm El-Sheikh (1997), Wye Plantation (1998) and Camp David (2000) summits.
Ambassador Ayalon served in New York from 1993-1997 as the Director of the Bureau of Israel's Ambassador to the UN, at which time he was a member of the Israeli Delegation to the UN and Israel's representative on the General Assembly's Committee for Peace Keeping Operations and the UN Development Fund (UNDP).
As a professional Foreign Service diplomat, Ambassador Ayalon’s pervious diplomatic missions abroad have included Panama, where he was responsible for political, economic, media and cultural ties between Panama and Israel.
After finishing his stint as ambassador to the United States in November 2006, Ayalon returned to Israel and became co-chairman of Nefesh B'Nefesh, an organization that promotes aliyah and assists immigrants moving to Israel.
Ambassador Ayalon, 47, is a native of Tel Aviv. He is a graduate of Tel Aviv University's Economics Department and holds an MBA from the University of Bowling Green in Ohio. Ambassador Ayalon is married with two children.
Professor Fred Lazin - February 25, 2012
Fred Lazin was born in Boston and grew up in Sharon Massachusetts. An Eagle Scout, in high school he served as New England Regional President of Young Judaea and attended Camp Tel Yehuda. After high school he participated in the Young Judaea Year Course in Israel.
He was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and graduated Cum Laude in Government and History at the University of Massachusetts where he served as president of Hillel. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago. He joined the faculty at Ben Gurion University (BGU) in Israel in 1975. At BGU, he established an Interdisciplinary Urban Studies Program and the Department of General Studies and chaired the Department of Behavioral Science. He served as the Director of the Hubert H. Humphrey Center of Social Ecology and the Overseas Student Program (OSP). During his tenure at OSP, the student body increased five fold. In 1991 Fred became the Lynn and Lloyd Hurst Family Professor of Local Government. He recently completed two terms as Chair of the Department of Politics and Government at BGU.
Fred has taught at the Hebrew University, NYU, UCLA, GWU, Cornell University, Tufts and City University of New York (John Jay College and Hunter College). He has served as a Visiting Scholar at universities in Sweden, France, China, Czech Republic, Canada and the US.
Professor Lazin has authored over sixty scholarly articles and chapters in books. He has written and edited ten books dealing with public policy in the United States, Israel and developing countries, Israeli politics and society and Jews in American politics. He received the Israel Political Science Association's award for the outstanding English language book on politics in 2005 for The Struggle for Soviet Jewry in American Politics; Israel versus the American Jewish Establishment. His pioneering research on the response of American Jewish organizations to German Jewish refugees in the 1930s opened a new field in Holocaust Studies. His latest book Higher Education and Equality of Opportunity: Cross-National Perspectives was published in October 2010.
Fred’s current research project involves a study of the role of the American Jewish Committee in the struggle for Soviet Jewry, its lobbying efforts in Washington and its ties with Israel. He is also researching the role of Christian clergy in the struggle for Soviet Jewry.
Fred is married to Rachel Dabi Lazin. They have three children.
He was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and graduated Cum Laude in Government and History at the University of Massachusetts where he served as president of Hillel. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago. He joined the faculty at Ben Gurion University (BGU) in Israel in 1975. At BGU, he established an Interdisciplinary Urban Studies Program and the Department of General Studies and chaired the Department of Behavioral Science. He served as the Director of the Hubert H. Humphrey Center of Social Ecology and the Overseas Student Program (OSP). During his tenure at OSP, the student body increased five fold. In 1991 Fred became the Lynn and Lloyd Hurst Family Professor of Local Government. He recently completed two terms as Chair of the Department of Politics and Government at BGU.
Fred has taught at the Hebrew University, NYU, UCLA, GWU, Cornell University, Tufts and City University of New York (John Jay College and Hunter College). He has served as a Visiting Scholar at universities in Sweden, France, China, Czech Republic, Canada and the US.
Professor Lazin has authored over sixty scholarly articles and chapters in books. He has written and edited ten books dealing with public policy in the United States, Israel and developing countries, Israeli politics and society and Jews in American politics. He received the Israel Political Science Association's award for the outstanding English language book on politics in 2005 for The Struggle for Soviet Jewry in American Politics; Israel versus the American Jewish Establishment. His pioneering research on the response of American Jewish organizations to German Jewish refugees in the 1930s opened a new field in Holocaust Studies. His latest book Higher Education and Equality of Opportunity: Cross-National Perspectives was published in October 2010.
Fred’s current research project involves a study of the role of the American Jewish Committee in the struggle for Soviet Jewry, its lobbying efforts in Washington and its ties with Israel. He is also researching the role of Christian clergy in the struggle for Soviet Jewry.
Fred is married to Rachel Dabi Lazin. They have three children.
