Col. Uri Dromi, Israeli Air Force Reserve, is director general of the Mishkenot Sha'ananim conference center in Jerusalem. From 1996 to 2007, he was director of International Outreach at the Israel Democracy Institute. He was born in 1946 in Pardes Hanna, Israel. He is married to Dalia, and they have three children: Yael, Danny and Shai. Dromi served in the Israeli Air Force in 1964-89 as a navigator. Participated in the Six Day War, War of Attrition, the Yom Kippur War, the Lebanon War and flew many operational missions.
He was the chief education officer of the Israeli Air Force and the editor-in-chief of the IAF Magazine and the IDF Publishing House. Retired from active duty in 1989, he keeps flying regularly in the reserves, in the same squadron he joined in 1966. From 1989 to 1992, he was the North American director of information for the World Zionist Organization. In 1992-96, Dromi was the director of the Government Press Office, being the chief spokesman for the Rabin and Peres governments.
Dromi graduated from Ben Gurion University (history) and started doctoral studies at the Hebrew University. He teaches communications at the College of Management in Tel Aviv and military history at the Command and Staff College. He has published three books and numerous articles in Israeli and international newspapers.
JERUSALEM -- Last week, we headed to She'ar Yeshuv, a pastoral village in the Upper Galillee, at the far north of Israel. We went there for the annual music festival at Kfar Bloom, a Kibbutz not far away.
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JERUSALEM -- Sen. Barack Obama is gearing up to his Middle East trip, meant to bolster the presidential candidate's foreign policy credentials. If I had the luck to corner one of his senior aides, and -- maybe with the help of a drink or two -- push him or her into a talkative mood, I guess I would hear something like this:
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JERUSALEM -- In the summer of 2006, two Israeli soldiers -- Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser -- were abducted by Hezbollah. Israel reacted by launching a war against this Lebanon-based terrorist organization. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declared then that one of the main war aims was to return the two soldiers back home.
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JERUSALEM -- The Romans, who knew something about the nature of human beings and the corrupting potential of power, devised a system by which an elected official didn't have to be corrupt. Any consul -- the highest job in the Roman Republic -- was to serve only one year in Rome. One year, that's it. No time for election campaigns, for building unhealthy relations with donors and benefactors, for sleazy deals. One year, and you're out.
