Last week, during preparations for Prime Minister Binyomin Netanyahu’s visit to the United States, members of his bureau asked Accountant Zvi Halamish, the Finance Ministry’s representative in New York, to arrange Netanyahu’s visit to the New York Stock Exchange on Wall Street, Calcalist reported Monday.
Treasury representatives arranged a visit to the NYSE that included a meeting with bankers and directors of leading financial institutes. Calcalist has learned that the visit’s highlight was supposed to have been Netanyahu ringing the opening bell of the NYSE, to mark Israel’s acceptance into the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
After the Israeli side provided all of the authorizations and permits, the NYSE director cut short his visit to Europe so that he could be back in time to meet with the Israeli prime minister.
Hours before the scheduled event, members of Netanyahu’s bureau announced that the visit to the NYSE had been cancelled, and Finance Ministry representatives had to explain the Israeli “chutzpah” to the Americans.
“We felt bad because the head of the New York Stock Exchange and directors of financial institutions had cleared time in their schedules,” a source close to the Finance Ministry’s delegation in New York said over the weekend.
The Prime Minister’s Office said in response, “The prime minister’s schedule was particularly packed and included numerous meetings. Due to the multitude of meetings, the bureau announced a day before the event that the prime minister would not be able to ring the opening bell and would try to reschedule during his future visits to the city. The prime minister called the head of the New York Stock Exchange to apologize. The NYSE was understanding of the cancelation.”
{Ynet/Yair Alpert-Matzav.com Israel}
What is the great “chutzpah” here? They called in advance to cancel. No one ever canceled a meeting in their life before?