President Isaac Herzog on Wednesday hosted Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, at the President’s Residence in Jerusalem.
Joining their meeting were Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, Michael Herzog; US Ambassador to Israel, Tom Nides, and a delegation of seven Members of Congress: Rep. Adam Schiff, Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee; Rep. Ted Deutch, Chairman of the Subcommittee on the Middle East, North Africa, and Global Counterterrorism; Rep. Barbara Lee; Rep. Bill Keating; Rep. Eric Swalwell; Rep. Ro Khanna; and Rep. Andy Kim.
Herzog welcomed Pelosi and said, “Welcome, Madam Speaker, Nancy Pelosi. We are really overjoyed that you are here in Israel and we are grateful to you for your friendship, which represents so much in the unique relationship between Israel and the United States, an unbreakable bond, and we are very glad that you are here with your husband in Israel, in Jerusalem, in the Holy Land. Welcome and have a wonderful visit.”
Pelosi said, “Thank you so much, Mr. President. It’s wonderful to see you and Michal again. I've heard you, when we first met, in the United States. I've quoted you many times. It is an honor to be with you.”
President Isaac Herzog and First Lady Michal Herzog invited for lunch with the Congressional delegation Ofra Fuchs, widow of the late Israeli poet Ehud Manor, whose words Speaker Pelosi quoted in her speech on the floor of the Congress after the Capitol Hill attack of 2021.
The President said, “We were sitting at a table at the Saban Forum in 2016, and Speaker Pelosi was complaining about the political situation in her country following the elections of 2016. And she was a bit depressed. A year before I had lost the election for the premiership, so I was also a bit depressed. I told Speaker Pelosi about the beautiful poem in Hebrew that says: ‘I can’t keep silent in light of how my country has changed her face / I won’t stop trying to remind her / In her ears I’ll sing my cries, / Until she opens her eyes.’ She took a napkin and she wrote it down and said, ‘Who’s the poet?’ I said, ‘His name is Ehud Manor.’ And she wrote it. And then Speaker Pelosi came to Israel a year and a half later and she said to me, as leader of the Opposition, ‘Thanks for the poem!’ I hardly recalled it.”
“Then, following the very painful event on January 6, 2021, at Capitol Hill, Speaker Pelosi made a historic speech and she opened her remarks, which were very short but extremely strong, with a quote from the famous Israeli poet Ehud Manor: ‘I can’t keep silent in light of how my country has changed her face.’ And there was an incredible tremor in our country. How did Speaker Pelosi know about Ehud Manor’s poem? I’m happy to have with us here the widow of Ehud Manor, Ofra Fuchs. I think this is a privilege, and a tribute to the beautiful power of words and poetry.”
The President concluded his remarks by quoting another, more optimistic poem by Ehud Manor, “To Follow Captive in Your Footsteps”: “You can interpret it as your spouse, partner, country, or land, or everybody. It says the following: ‘To follow captive in your footsteps / to inhale your searing sun / to dream beneath the heavens / to be in your pain, then fall in love again.’ So I think the relationship with the United States is endless love. So thank you for being with us. To the State of Israel and the United States of America, l’chaim!”
Pelosi said, “Thank you very much, Mr. President, for welcoming our distinguished delegation to the President’s Residence. Thank you for the set of guests you have invited. Thank you so much for honoring us with your presence. It really is true, and we’ve discussed this, that the arts bring us together. Somehow there is a way, where the inspiration and shared values enable us to forget some of our differences. To the beautiful friendship between our countries. God bless Israel, God bless America.”
