AJC Brings Prominent U.S. Jewish Middle East Expert to Japan

Elliott Abrams, senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), recently visited Japan on a speaking tour sponsored by The Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership in collaboration with AJC.

Abrams, who served in in the Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush administrations, delivered lectures on U.S. Foreign Policy and the U.S. presidential election to packed halls of faculty, students, and diplomats at Doshisha University in Kyoto and Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo.

Shira Loewenberg, director of AJCs Asia Pacific Institute, who also traveled to Japan with Abrams, introduced him at the lectures. Together, they held a series of meetings with senior Japanese government officials and academics in Kyoto and Tokyo.

The July visit was part of the AJC initiative with The Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership, launched last October, to bring prominent American Jewish intellectuals to Japan. AJC CEO David Harris, who has visited Japan many times, was the first speaker in the series. AJC was the first Jewish organization to begin, more than 25 years ago, regular visits to Japan.

“Our partnership with the Japan Foundation demonstrates our commitment to the strengthening of the essential ties between Washington and Tokyo, a key U.S. ally, and our interest in furthering the relationship between the U.S. Jewish community and the Japanese,” said Loewenberg.

Abrams and Loewenberg met with officials at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and National Security Secretariat, and with senior researchers at several influential Japanese think tanks, including the Rebuild Japan Initiative Foundation, Research Institute for Peace and Security, Japan Institute of International Affairs, the Japanese Institute of Middle Eastern Economies (JIME), and Canon Institute for Global Studies. They also held discussions with media representatives at Yomiuri Shimbun and Kyodo News.

Principal topics discussed at the various meetings included: (a) U.S.-Japan ties; (b) developments in East Asia; (c) challenges and opportunities in the Middle East; (d) the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP); and (e) the U.S. presidential election.

Through its Asia Pacific Institute, founded in 1989, AJC engages with Japanese diplomats, intellectuals, academics and analysts in Asia, Europe and across the U.S. Directed by Loewenberg, API is chaired by Jeffrey E. Stone, and represented in Tokyo by Jerome Rosenberg.