Mort Klein Re-Elected as ZOA President

At the Hilton on City Line Avenue at the far northwestern edge of Philadelphia county, just across the highway from the tony suburbs of Lower Merion Township, the annual convention of the Zionist Organization of America is taking place today, Sunday, March 9, and tomorrow.

At around mid-day Sunday, the two contenders for the seat of president of ZOA, the incumbent, Mort Klein, and the challenger, Steve Goldberg, spoke to the crowd, setting out the reasons each believes himself best qualified to lead the ZOA.

Klein has been the president of the organization since 1993.

Goldberg has been on the national board of the ZOA for five years, and was the president of the Western Region of the ZOA for a time.

The tallying of the votes cast by the delegates began at about 3:00 p.m. ET and at 3:30 the results were announced. Mort Klein won re-election. The vote was 115 votes for Klein, 9 votes for Goldberg.

Goldberg remarked to Liz Berney, Klein's campaign manager, "I did better than I thought."

The campaign was extremely ugly, filled primarily with nasty charges leveled against Klein by Goldberg, and, eventually, a response to those charges and counter charges against Goldberg.

Everyone suffered, including the mission of this important organization.

Now that the votes have been tallied, all the complaints and the boasts should be left behind and the organization should - it must - move forward in a positive direction.