Dani Dayan‘s position as chairman of Yad Vashem is safe, according to a report by Israel’s Channel 12 News.
The report followed an international outcry over alleged government efforts to dismiss the former Israeli Consul to New York, who was appointed to head Yad Vashem in August 2021 under the government of then-Prime Minister Naftali Bennett.
Senior government officials were quoted by the news outlet as saying the issue had been taken “off the table” following reports in Israeli media that Education Minister Yoav Kisch had been seeking Dayan’s removal for several months.
Kisch recently sent Dayan a letter accusing him of mismanagement at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Center.
Dayan Dayan rejected the claims, saying some were unfounded and others were altogether false. He also threatened to take the matter to Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara.
Condemnations of the alleged move to replace Dayan came from US State Department’s antisemitism envoy Ellen Germain and from Katharina von Schnurbein,the European Union’s coordinator on combating antisemitism, as well as in a letter signed by 123 Holocaust educators and comments from deputy chairman of the World Zionist Organization Gil Segal.
Germain, who serves as Special Envoy for Holocaust Issues at the US State Department, praised Dayan in a lengthy post on Saturday night on X, formerly Twitter.
“The US values the crucial work of Yad Vashem and its director’s leadership as we work together on Holocaust education, remembrance, and research. Maintaining the independence of such institutions around the world is key as we face efforts to distort/deny the facts of the Holocaust,” she wrote.
