The suggestion that Einstein be invited to assume the presidency of the Jewish state was first publicly disseminated by the evening newspaper Maariv. The idea, which spread quickly, became broadly popular; for example, one government statistician commented: “He might even be able to work out the mathematics of our economy and make sense of it.”
According to Yitzhak Navon, then Ben-Gurion’s political secretary and later Israel’s fifth president, Ben-Gurion told him on the morning after Weizmann’s death, “There is only one man whom we should ask to become president of the state of Israel. He is the greatest Jew on earth. Maybe the greatest human being on earth. Einstein.”
As Navon recounts in “On Einstein and the Presidency of Israel,” a chapter he contributed to Albert Einstein: Historical and Cultural Perspectives, edited by Gerald Holton and Yehuda Elkana:
I know that what Ben-Gurion did was really a way of expressing the deep admiration and gratitude he felt for Einstein the humanist, and of proclaiming the pride of the Jewish people in a man who was a great universal figure and at the same time did not deny, but on the contrary was proud, that he belonged to this persecuted people, a people who indeed saw in science and culture the climax of achievement.
A Jew by action and birth, if not actual belief (a very complex subject for another day), Einstein was a vociferous supporter of the creation of a Jewish homeland in Eretz Yisrael; see in particular his About Zionism (1931). Yet even a cursory review of the Internet will yield a plethora of nonsensical and hateful gibberish to the effect that because Einstein was a humanist, a pacifist, an internationalist, and a “cultural Zionist” who advocated peaceful coexistence between Arabs and Jews – facts that are beyond dispute – it all somehow means Einstein opposed Israel as a Jewish state and that Zionists have misrepresented him as one of their own.
The bottom line is that no other Jew of Einstein’s stature consistently permitted the use of his name to promote Zionist objectives.
On November 16, 1952, Ben-Gurion sent a cable to Abba Eban, at the time Israel’s ambassador to the United States, directing him to “inquire immediately of Einstein if he is prepared to become President of Israel if elected [by the Knesset].”
After several unsuccessful attempts to contact the scientist by phone, Eban sent him a wire explaining that he had orders from the Israeli government to convey a message of historical consequence, too important to communicate telephonically.
Eban asked Einstein to accept a visit from David Edward Goitein, second in command at the Embassy, who would deliver an important letter.
According to Helen Dukas, Einstein’s secretary, Einstein knew very well what “the important message” was going to be, and he was troubled about how to turn down the offer. He paced the floor of his Princeton home muttering, “This is very awkward, very awkward…why should that man come all that way when I only will have to say no?”
Though he knew with certainty he was going to decline the offer, he was deeply concerned about the possibility that his refusal could cause embarrassment to Israel. Dukas suggested that Einstein simply call Eban. She tracked the ambassador down and put Einstein on the phone with him.
Einstein told Eban that he knew very well what the ambassador wanted to tell him. He confessed that he had no talent at all for human relations and wanted to continue his scientific work without distractions. He declared that he could not consider even discussing a position for which he was so eminently unqualified.
