Prime Minister Naftali Bennett announced on Friday the appointment of retired Brig. Gen. Michael Herzog as Israel’s next ambassador to the US.

Herzog’s appointment will be brought to the cabinet for approval this week.

Herzog, 69, the brother of President Yitzchak Herzog, served in a number of senior positions in the IDF and as senior adviser to four defense ministers over the course of 40 years. In recent years, he has served as a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and the Jewish People Policy Institute.

Herzog also served as a negotiator in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, serving as then Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s special envoy on the peace process in 2009-2010 and as a negotiator in the 2013-2014 peace talks.

His role as a negotiator with the Palestinians has spurred some right-wing MKs to express their opposition to his appointment. The heads of the Land of Israel Lobby in the Knesset, Likud MK Yoav Kisch and Religious Zionist party MK Orit Struck, sent a letter to Bennett on Sunday requesting that he prevent the appointment of Herzog, saying that they “heard in astonishment” about Herzog’s nomination as he “actively seeks to advance the dangerous idea of the two-state solution.”

“Handing over the keys to relations with the US administration to a person who actively seeks to promote the dangerous idea of ​​a two-state solution and a continuation of withdrawals from parts of the land of Israel is a decision that conforms to the principles of the left-wing element in your government and will undoubtedly advance its disastrous policies,” they wrote in the letter.

“We call on you to stop this dangerous appointment and not allow the left to take control of the critical Israeli-US relations. The people of Israel overwhelmingly voted for right-wing policies which deny the establishment of a Palestinian state and any further withdrawals from parts of the land of Israel.”

“Prime Minister Bennett, this is the test of which government policy will lead. The election of Mike Herzog means left-wing policies. You have to make a decision now on whether the right-wing positions in your government will lead or not.”

Herzog’s nomination was also approved by Foreign Minister Yair Lapid so he can continue serving in the position of ambassador when Lapid begins his term as prime minister in two years.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)