Arutz Sheva spoke to Efrat Mayor Oded Revivi in his capacity of Yesha Council Chief Foreign Envoy for the first time to the annual American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) conference in Washington D.C. as hundreds of supporters attended a Yesha Council event held at the Museum of the Bible in Washington. Guests included Ambassador Dani Dayan, Minister Tzachi Hangebi, Former Minister Gidon Saar, Member of Knesset Amir Ohana and retired British Colonel Richard Kemp.
Not only is it Revivi's debut representing Yesha before AIPAC, this also marks the first time any Yesha representative has been invited to address the body. "We're extremely delighted to be given the opportunity," Revivi said.
Revivi was asked to describe the significance of the precedent-setting invitation, and said, "I think there are two ways to understand it. First of all, in the last two-and-a-half years I personally have addressed over three hundred delegations; I would reckon about fifty of them are AIPAC delegations. You can't come and expose to AIPAC delegations to the Efrat Mayor in Judea and Samaria and say, 'Oh, he's too controversial' when we have the policy conference. And I think that after so many years, after speaking to so many of their donors, there came a demand from the donors themselves: 'We want Oded Revivi in the policy conference.'"
Revivi recounts how he was blocked from previous conferences: "Last year and the year before that we did a breakaway event in a hall that we rented outside because we understood that under this roof there are people who support Judea and Samaria, who want to come and see and hear us, but they won't be given a chance to have it in the policy conference, and we had our own private event. This year, it's changed," Revivi said.