The Jeff Pulver Blog: Next week in Israel: VON Israel, IVA and Israel High-Tech CEO Forum

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June 12, 2006

Next week in Israel: VON Israel, IVA and Israel High-Tech CEO Forum

A year ago today I arrived in Israel for our VoIP Mission to Israel where I had the opportunity to honor a number of pioneers at City Hall in Jerusalem.

During that trip I had the chance to meet with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert who at the time was the Minister of Industry, Trade and Labor (and the former Minister of Communications). During our meeting I spoke about our desire to produce VON Israel in 2006. Looking back at my blog post from a year ago, I wrote the following accounting of our meeting: "We started at the Minister's Office but were rushed over to the Knesset, so that the Minister would be available to vote (presumably against) a Labor initiated vote of "no confidence." This was a remarkable experience for everyone who was traveling with me at that time. Suffice it to say that the Labor Party, although it registered more votes than Likkud, could not muster the 61 votes necessary to obtain a vote of "no confidence" in the current government. Floor debate was in Hebrew so much of the substance was lost on me, but, if tone is a fair indicator, it was at least as heated as the British Parliament debates many of us have become accustomed to witnessing on CSPAN in the States. It was pretty cool to see the Industry Minister, with whom we had just been meeting minutes before sitting on the floor sandwiched by Ariel Sharon and Benjamin Netanyahu. Clearly, tension runs high in Israeli politics, and has done so throughout its history."

A year later I will be returning to Israel to co-produce VON Israel and Ehud Olmert is now the Prime Minister of Israel.

While in Israel I plan to visit the IVA conference, speak and spend time at VON Israel and meet with a number of hi-tech startups. I will also be giving a talk at the June meeting of the Israel High-Tech CEO Forum.

Israel Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Jeff

Tags: VoIP, Israel, VON, Jeff Pulver

(c) 2006 Jeff Pulver. All Rights Reserved.
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