FM Cohen offers Leo Dee, husband, dad of terror victims, envoy role

Foreign Minister Eli Cohen has offered Rabbi Leo Dee, whose wife and two daughters were murdered by Palestinian terrorists in April, the role of special envoy, the minister said on Wednesday.

Dee confirmed that he is in talks to be a Foreign Ministry envoy to Jewish communities around the world.

“I heard his eulogy for his wife, and you could not help but be moved by it,” Cohen said.

The minister said he was inspired by Dee’s call for unity even in the midst of an immense personal tragedy.

“Everyone who heard him had to feel the same way,” Cohen said.

Cohen also said that an EU member state plans to break ranks with the rest of the union to open an embassy in Jerusalem in the next two months.

Read the full interview with Foreign Minister Eli Cohen in Friday’s edition of The Jerusalem Post.

Leo Dee: Husband, father to Israeli victims of terror

Dee’s wife Lucy, 48, and daughters Maia, 20, and Rina, 15, were murdered on Passover by Palestinians affiliated with Hamas who opened fire at their car in the Jordan Valley, firing more than 20 bullets from a Kalashnikov sub-machine gun.

About 10,000 people attended the Dees’ funeral, in which the father and husband said: “Today the Jewish people have proven that we are one, we are united.

“When a simple, quiet family in Efrat is devastated, the whole country hurts,” Dee said. “And when a family in Tel Aviv is devastated, the whole country hurts. There’s no greater proof of our unity.”

Days later, Dee commented to the Post on the deep political divisions in Israel, saying that he believes that “if in a situation of tragedy everyone can come together, that means that we can come together anytime…I think that if there’s love that’s shown towards people, they want to come together. If people criticize each other, which unfortunately is the modern way… then we’ll just create a polarized society. So I think that we have to accept other people, we have to show that we love other people and we want to listen to them, even if we don’t agree.”