Rani Rahav celebrates 30 years of his PR office and talks about the behavior of Israelis during the epidemic ("giving them a score of 9, there was mutual guarantee"), the relationship with politicians ("calling to consult with me at night"), and the rift with Dalia Rabin and her children ( "It's because of my connection with the Netanyahu family")
"Rabin once said Sharni is like a safe in Switzerland."
Rani Rahav with the work "Houses" by Philip Rancher
Photo:
Kfir Ziv
I tied my bike to the fence next to the museum tower and entered the lobby.
From the large front wall on the entrance floor, which tells who the occupants of the floors are, you understand where you have come from.
Toto, the luxury restaurant that closed because of the corona, is still closed, but as you ascend in a high, highest elevator, up to the 24th, last floor, where Rani Rahav's kingdom resides, you realize that there are those whose lives have not stopped even for a moment.
After three and a half hours in two sessions, he takes me on a tour of his vast office, which tells the story of his life for the past 30 years, since becoming one PR hotel manager to one of the biggest, probably the biggest, and probably most mediated, weaknesses in this business.
It is rather strange that a public relations man, whose specialty is public relations - which is supposed to be merely an occupation that makes a move in the back - attracts so much fire towards him.
One of his best-known clients is the singer Eyal Golan, and Rahav, who lay on the fence for him in the difficult sexual affairs in which the singer was involved, was perceived in those days as someone who would remain loyal to both rebellious clients and the price of personal injury to his name.
"Once upon a time," he tells me, "the most important thing in the world, for me, was to be loved by everyone. Until one day a close friend, the late journalist Mira Averech, took me to lunch.
Mira was a real world woman, and she said to me: 'Rani, you have reached the summit, for everything you wanted, but if you want to make an impact, you can not please everyone and be nice to everyone'.
"I live today without fear and apprehension, except for the one sitting upstairs. I tell the truth and do not keep my stomach, and I am the most discreet in the world. Yitzhak Rabin once told Giora Eini, who was one of the most important and influential people in politics 40 years ago, that Sharni is like a safe in Switzerland. And I'm talking about a safe in the Switzerland of yesteryear, not of today, where everything is visible and exposed. "
Indeed, Rabin and his legacy, and of course his wife Leah, Rahav's best friend, are well felt throughout the office, which is laden with a collection of Israeli art ("the sixth largest in the country").
There are several portraits of them on the tables here, and photographs from the night of the murder and the weeks that follow hang on the walls.
But the presence of the current prime minister is also felt.
A large portrait of Netanyahu hangs in the main reception room, above that of Margaret Thatcher.
Rahav says that between 1992 and 1995, when Rabin served as prime minister, the two used to meet every Friday at Rabin's apartment in Neve Aviv.
"He would arrive at five to six from the prime minister's office in the Kirya, and we would sit for two hours, just him and me. Leah would come in with coffee and cake, put it on the table and close the door behind her. She would come back at eight, at the beginning of the TV news, I would stay to watch the broadcast." "Until eight-thirty, then we drive home."
What connection was there between you two?
"There were many things that if they had gone out, people to this day would have had to go down to the shelters. I made Rabin end with a long rage he had with Yoel Marcus from Haaretz, who in those days was the most important and influential journalist in Israel. Eitan Haber, who was Rabin's bureau chief. Caused a huge conflict between them.
"Marcus published in his newspaper a photo of the bar's pay slip, after he was loaned to the prime minister's office from Yedioth Ahronoth, and the bar confiscated him and did not let him meet or talk to Rabin.
I explained to Isaac that there was no way not to meet Marcus and not to share him.
Marcus would swim every day at 7 a.m. at the Hilton, and I got there and told him it was time to talk.
I told him: 'The bar is not interesting, you will arrive at the Kirya next Friday at four, and Yitzhak will receive you.'
"An hour before the meeting Marcus calls me and asks me if I'm sure it's okay, and what's up with the bar. I told him, 'You're Joel Marcus the Great, you should not be afraid of the bar.' He came to the bar, and the bar stood there in shock and asked him 'what are you doing? Here?'
He replied that he was invited to Yitzhak, and the bar pressed the button and asked Rabin. Rabin asked him to let him in. The bar did not understand where it came from. It took him a while to realize that I was not just a friend of Leah.
"There was also the peace agreement I made between Yitzhak Rabin and Dan Shilon, contrary to Leah's opinion, which really raged about me. I never told about it.
" Shilon had the 'Circle' program on Channel 2, which was the most powerful on television.
He was then the sole ruler of the entertainment programs, and one day I hear him say that "Prime Minister Rabin is cut off from the people."
There were severe Hamas attacks at the time.
Leah called Shilon and screamed at him, how he dares to say that Rabin is disconnected, and slammed the phone down on him.
This man Shilon immediately went on the radio and said that Mrs. Rabin called him from the Prime Minister's house and screamed at him.
He made her a public lynching.
"But I knew he had the show with the highest rating, and I wanted Rabin to perform there for Independence Day. A year earlier he was supposed to perform there on Independence Day with Aviv Geffen, but Eitan Haber called it Brex because Geffen did not serve in the army. I came to Yitzhak and told him that Geffen Did not enlist because of a significant medical problem, scoliosis in the back.
"After the story with Leah, I closed all the edges between Shilon and Rabin's spokeswoman, Aliza Goren.
On the day of the broadcast at three in the afternoon, she calls me and says that Rabin is not ready to go to the show.
I said, 'It cannot be, with Isaac a word is sacred.'
I called the bureau, and Rabin tells me, 'Rani, I can not do this to Leah, after what Shilon did to her on the radio.'
I said to him: 'Isaac, leave me Leah.
You must appear in the program.
He accepted my advice.
"Then Leah calls me, and it's Leah who talks to me six times a day, and she asks, 'How do you do such a thing to me?' I tell her, 'You asked me to help Isaac. Let me do what's right, not what's right.' She hung up. "I got the phone. In short, Rabin was at his peak in that program with Shilon. At night, Leah called me and said, 'Rani, I was wrong. You were right. That was the most exciting thing that could have happened. Excuse me.'"
You are connected to all the prime ministers who have been here, including the Netanyahu family.
Do you find similarities between Leah Rabin and Sarah Netanyahu?
"No. Each one in her own way. Sarah Netanyahu chose to continue working as a psychologist, so naturally her public contribution is different. Leah was more involved in Israeli society than any other prime minister's wife, the place of the state to this day. She took all the autistic children out of mental hospitals and established them. They have completely changed the whole approach to autism in Israel.
As chair of the Friends of Sheba Hospital Association, she brought donations from all over the world and together with Prof. Mordechai Shani, Prof. Bolslav Goldman and Prof. Zeev Rothstein took the departments out of the barracks. They and the current CEO, Prof. Yitzhak Kreis, made Sheba one From the ten best hospitals in the world.
"Leah was also the greatest patron of Israeli art, supporting theaters, and after the murder she traveled all over the world and raised funds to establish the Rabin Center. She deserved the Israel Prize, but unfortunately she was murdered five years after Yitzhak's assassination."
Murdered?
"She died of cancer, caused by the grief and loss caused by the killer's erasure, whose name we still fund his fitness glat meals in prison. At three-thirty the night after the murder, I was at Rabin's house and said to Shimon Peres: To sit on an electric chair, otherwise a child killer will be born, there will be a circumcision, and if there is a circumcision, there will be a wedding, Shema Yisrael. "Shimon replied: 'Rani, unfortunately this can not happen, he will stand trial.'
" I am very sad that Amir is alive. .
No murderer has the right to live.
I'm in favor of the death penalty for murderers. "
* * *
Rahav, who will celebrate 57 at the end of the month, does not need the fact that exactly 30 years have passed since he opened his public relations office, which he runs together with his wife Hila, to explain his role here.
"What I'm most proud of is the change we've made in the world of public relations concepts. Public relations was also before me, but was not one of the three most important professions in the world of economics, in addition to law and accounting. A communications consultant is the man who represents you. Your fate in the media on good days, and certainly on bad days. "
Before becoming "Ran Rahav PR", he was the director of public relations and entertainment at the Dan Panorama Hotel in Tel Aviv. "In his previous names - 'Larom', 'Hyatt' and 'Astoria' - this was the most failed hotel in Israel," admits Rahav The Federman family bought it in May 1986, and it can be said that Rahav's professional life, in general, received a huge twist from a phone call in Polish between the hotel's VP of marketing, Yolanda Rosenthal, and her good friend from Poland, Naomi Ivcher.
Rahav testified that he heard that his name came up in conversations between the two, and was given the opportunity for polite words, which became a long-standing friendship with Naomi and her husband, 81-year-old Israeli-Peruvian businessman Baruch Ivcher.
Ivcher helped Rahav raise his PR company, joining as a partner. He later gave him his share of the partnership as a gift.
"There is not a day in those 30 years that I have not learned something from someone.
But our strength is loyalty to customers (they say there are about 170 of them; AP). I once went to the sea with Hila and friends. They spent time, and I was mostly connected to an iPad and kept working. Next to me sat a colleague from the advertising world, and his cell phone rang endlessly. Did not answer. I went crazy about it. At the end I said to him, 'Maybe your customer is looking for you urgently-urgently?'
He told me, "I'm not like you. There are moments when I hang up."
Rahav runs a team of 40 employees, along with his wife Hila, whose official role is CEO of the company. Their son Roi (26) is a business administration student at the University of Inside in Fontainebleau, France.
"Hila is in charge of fashion, design, cosmetics and put me in my little pocket.
She is a pharmacist by education, but has been working with me for 27 years.
When she told me she wanted to get into a company, I told her she was crazy, because married couples working together is a recipe for divorce.
So she said we would get along, and started from the bottom, as a budget assistant.
"After a few years, in the middle of the employees' dinner, without her knowing, I informed everyone that she was becoming CEO. She almost fainted, but believe me she honestly earned the job."
If you work from morning to night, how do you separate work and family life?
"There is a clear separation. Family, friends, friends, acquaintances - but work first. I once said this to my mother, and she did not know her soul. Then I explained to her that I learned it from her, and that it does not hurt my commitment to the family. My sister, Sharon Ben "Porat also works for me as CEO. At the end of the day, if you are happy at work, you can embrace your family."
* * *
The corona year was not easy for him.
"It is very difficult and frightening," he defines her, "from day one I understood that there was going to be a huge tsunami on the world and on Israel, and that it had to be prepared. For a year and four months, since the onset of the plague in the world, we managed the crisis rationally and focused. We worked 24/7.
" The first was chaos.
There were customers who could not pay, we informed them that we would continue to treat them with the same dedication and care even without payment.
These are customers who have been with me for years, so now that it's hard I'll tell them bye bye?
No way.
"There was a lot of compassion in our treatment. I do not need to be taught what compassion is, she has been with me for 50 years. At the age of 13 I applied to a school for at-risk youth, and for 35 years I have been active in the war, in hospitals like Tel Hashomer and Ichilov, in theaters ".
Were you scared on a personal level?
"
I was very scared to get infected, to get sick, and I'm not at all sure it's all over.
Israelis are used to wars with Arab countries or to dealing with suicide terrorism, but we were not prepared for such a thing.
We grew up in a generation that knew how to deal with epidemics, and there are vaccines for polio or measles, and even a cure for AIDS.
But in the middle of the modern age, when we are surrounded by Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia and Zoom, iPad and mobile, you realize that you are all dust and ashes, and completely temporary in this world. "
What do you think about the country's treatment of Corona?
" Overall good, and much better than countries considered model To emulate, like the US, UK, Italy or Spain. In contrast we deserve a Nobel Prize. Then some of my friends will stand up and wave in New Zealand, but it is very little wisdom to close a hermetic state as soon as two or four patients are found.
"On the other hand, I'm sorry That in the education system there are quite a few rude teachers, who allowed themselves not to get vaccinated and increased the chaos here.
This is an unparalleled scandal, and if it's up to me, such people should not remain in the system.
In the war in Corona, as in the war in Lebanon, there are no wisdoms, and people can not do what they want. "
You say the state treated Corona well, but 6,300 Israelis died from Corona. That is a horrible number.
" I do not believe any government, no matter who the prime minister, was Can prevent 6,000 deaths, as no prime minister prevents thousands from dying from the flu every year. "
What grade do you give Israelis for their conduct during the epidemic?
" Score 9, thanks to the mutual guarantee that was here.
People kept discipline, brought food to the people to the house.
There was a lot of help. "
What mutual guarantee are you talking about? We saw here mainly quarrels and wars between tribes.
" There was also a mutual guarantee between secular and ultra-Orthodox.
People came to the aid of others in Bnei Brak and Jerusalem.
Conflicts have always been here, but the critical mass was conducted properly.
There are tribes and there is democracy, and everyone says what he wants.
Isn't that good too? "
* * *
He was barely 13 years old when he got on the bus on line 34 from his home in Ramat Gan and went to a conference of volunteers of the movement for a change of government.
"This world interested me. Yigal Yadin, who founded the DS party, even came to my bar mitzvah, because my mother was a Nahal chief in the Ministry of Defense and a member of the Histadrut's executive committee.
Peres also came.
Even then I saw how much intrigue and horror there is in politics.
I realized it was not for me. ”
Despite this, and although his office does not provide PR services to political figures or parties, he himself is connected to politicians from all corners of the spectrum.
"It's no secret that many of the captains call me at night to consult at the highest discreet level, and get a lot of respect. Out of 120 MKs, I am on friendly terms with about 100. I recruit them for all sorts of voluntary issues in my other hat, as Honorary Consul of the Marshall Islands."
The past year has taught that Israel is a state of tribes, who apparently can not really connect, as he said perhaps in a sketch in "A Wonderful Land."
"I did not see this sketch. But I think the people of Israel should take to the streets not only because of massacres and planting, but to change the electoral system to personal-regional. Personal election of the prime minister, and regional election of representatives to the Knesset. Otherwise there is no way this country can Function for years. Any prime minister seeking a majority of 61 is blackmailed and unable to run a country.
"I am also in favor of French law, not retroactive, but one that will allow governance in the future.
I've been shouting this for 15 years because there is no prime minister here who has not been questioned.
Here, Nicolas Sarkozy was tried after completing his tenure and convicted, and received a year in prison.
Of course I do not include in French law murder, rape, sexual harassment and treason. "
And what do you think about limiting a prime minister's term to two terms?
" It is less true, because experience dictates.
In Monaco the only job of Prince Albert is to get up in the morning, call the casino and check how much money the casino made at night.
Here it takes years just to understand the systems.
If there's someone successful, I do not mind him staying more than eight years.
The more experience you have, the more likely you are to succeed in this role.
"Being prime minister of Israel is more difficult than being president of the United States.
How many times do you wake the US president at night, and how many times do you wake the Israeli prime minister? We are still a state at war. This is a difficult and forced good job. Netanyahu reached very important agreements with six states and made the Palestinians understand that the process can continue without them. Before it is too late for them. "
I do not think there was a prime minister here who remembered him well after he finished.
"Prime ministers here have won the Nobel Peace Prize. I am sure Netanyahu is also an excellent candidate for the Nobel Prize, if he achieves peace with Saudi Arabia and the Palestinians. But the only one who said amazing things about him was murdered, and no longer heard what was said about him. Many remembered him for his amazing work." .
And many did not accept his way, the Oslo Accords.
"Every prime minister has something to say. We are 50 percent Jewish mind and 50 percent Israeli mind. In times of war we are the best in the world for each other, but in calm we start raging at each other."
Do not agree with you.
The Corona period was a war, and here there was a complete lack of inclusion among the tribes.
Where have you seen mutual guarantee?
"Clashes between tribes have always been and always will be, but in the moment of truth we are all one people. This is a democratic state, and there are debates and quarrels, but even if there are breakdowns, democracy wins."
What do you think about the demonstrations in Balfour?
"Any protest is legitimate in my eyes. This is our amazing democracy."
And about the lack of decision in the election?
"A lot of trouble. Politicians must understand that the will of the people here is that there will be no clear decision. Therefore, people must make a supreme effort and sit together."
There has already been such an experience.
Netanyahu did not count Ganz.
"We mentioned Giora Eini, the man who mediated all the difficult crises between Rabin and Peres and knew how to bring about a compromise. There was no such man between Bibi and Gantz. In the end, the human fabric of the public in Israel is not simple. Herzl determined that it would be the Jewish state. "Israelis, and they are part of the country, and we are also trying to respect their choice. The result of the election is not a clear cut, and I expect as broad a government as possible."
A government with Arab parties?
With the support of the Arab parties?
"I have no problem with them, as long as they declare that they are against terrorism and martyrs and for peace. It is impossible to talk about democracy all the time, it has to be done.
" Since I accompany prime ministers here, it does not matter to me what they say before.
I was interested in it, and what was the interest less.
The Arabs will finally be truly partners.
I strongly believe that the young Palestinians want to advance towards peace, in contrast to their middle generation.
They understand that it is better for them to have peace, and to turn all of Palestine into a flourishing Ramallah.
It can also happen in Nablus, Jericho and Jenin.
"From my acquaintance with senior Palestinians, they want peace like us. The Abu Mazen era must end, because he belongs to the same fixed generation that lives by slogans. Our elections have dropped the token for the Arabs: they want prosperity, health and personal security, but understand that their elected officials do not bring them "Nowhere. Mansour Abbas has understood this, and he is even willing to risk his personal security. I hope the security service knows how to protect him."
But Netanyahu has a problem, Itamar Ben Gvir does not allow him this connection.
"As for Ben Gvir, it is inconceivable that this terrible man entered the Knesset. I prayed to God that the Supreme Court would disqualify his candidacy for the Knesset, just as I prayed that No. 7 in the Labor Party, Ibtisam Maraana, would not enter. Unfortunately the Supreme Court decided otherwise, and I with the court did not. Argues".
On Holocaust Remembrance Day, Rahav sent me a picture of MK Maraana lighting a candle in memory of the victims of the Holocaust and standing still during the siren: "This conduct of hers makes me happy, and I recall the things I said against her.
I hope that you will continue like this and strengthen Merav Michaeli and the members of the faction he founded. "
* * *
What do you think Netanyahu needs to do now to form a government?
"I think he should enter into a conversation of a few hours with Yair Lapid and form a rotation government with him. I know it sounds imaginary."
come on.
"I am completely serious. There must be a heart-to-heart conversation to see how to bridge the gaps. We must all sit together - even Gantz, Bennett and Saar, because in the fifth election everyone will lose. The best sons in politics will disappear. So everyone should sober up. Leah Rabin always had. Currency: 'Winks or no winks from prime minister's material' ".
What about Naftali Bennett or Gideon Saar?
Were they winked at by Prime Minister's materials?
"I really like Lapid, my close friend, I love Ganz, Gideon, Naftali Bennett, and also Merav Michaeli and Horowitz."
You did not answer the question, nor did you mention Bennett.
"I think all the leaders I have appointed have been winked at by appropriate material, but that does not mean that everyone can be prime minister in the current situation."
The Rabin family does not exactly like your protection of the prime minister.
"Unfortunately, Dalia Rabin, Yonatan Ben-Artzi and Noa Ben-Artzi do not talk to me. It has to do with my relationship with the Netanyahu family. Leah and Yitzhak Rabin were family, soulmates. Sarah and Benjamin Netanyahu are my friends. I am in touch with Yuval Rabin's ex-wife and the children. their".
(Yonatan Ben-Artzi responded: "The Rabin family has nothing to do with Rani Rahav, and I have nothing to comment on him").
The change bloc claims that Netanyahu tried to form a government four times and failed.
"The right of the change bloc to demand Netanyahu's departure, but it is also his duty to listen to the almost two million Israelis who voted for him to be prime minister. There is no other way but to try to respect their choice. I do not accept the statement that there is a majority that chose Netanyahu, all He also consists of MKs who do not declare their loyalty to the state. "
Mansour Abbas is loyal to the State of Israel?
" I heard his speech in Hebrew and connected with him.
I did not connect to his speech in Arabic.
But I believe in his intentions and am convinced that most of his supporters want to live in peace within their country.
I expect the shared list to go its own way, too, and then a new page really opens.
But if they are not willing to make a process, then with all due respect to the beauties of the soul - this is not acceptable
to me
. "
Which brings me to your conduct on social media, and also to your confrontation with Afif Abu Moch, who attacked you when you said the Jewish public chose Netanyahu. Who attacked you.
"Twitter often has violent discourse.
I try to change the discourse for the positive, but if a negative discourse is conducted against me, I will be 100 times stronger in my negativity.
So there are some extreme leftists and all kinds of activists that I do not like, and it took me maybe six hours to respond to them, but in the end I defeated them.
As for Abu Mokh, I say again: if they want to be part of the State of Israel, let them be full partners in the burden.
It is impossible to want to be equal, and at the same time support terrorist operatives and martyrs. "
Where do you stand on the issue of nationality law?
"The Nationality Law must be amended immediately so that we can respectfully and lovingly respect the Druze public, which is a real part of the State of Israel. I differentiate them from other non-Jewish populations, because they are full partners in the burden. additional".
The ultra-Orthodox do not really bear the burden either.
"Many ultra-Orthodox serve in the army, thanks to Yair Lapid. I respect those who say that Torah study is the strengthening of the Jewish state, but I expect them to do national service."
Speaking of the Marshall Islands, what happened there during the Corona period?
"The place is completely closed to tourists. There are 70,000 residents there, and no one is infected."
How many times have you been there?
"Once. I am the only honorary consul who has no business in the country he represents. The Marshall Islands have a voice in the UN that is considered the voice of the United States or China. In 95 percent of the time, they vote with Israel. The Iranians try to bribe them, but it does not. Employee".
* * *
You rub a lot against the big rich.
Do you have a special insight on particularly rich people?
"The fact that you are a millionaire does not mean at all that you are happy or that you know how to live. More than that - never resilience. People need to know how to deal with people. A person like me, who is in constant contact with 250,000 people, I have had maybe eight conflicts all my life. It's nothing." .
Do you fire customers?
"I once fired a client who lied to me, and because he lied, he made me lie to a journalist. It happened a long time ago."
Who will you not represent?
"Murderers, rapists, drug dealers, traitors in the country."
What does a company CEO who is your customer get from you?
”The whole truth, discreetly.
Not every CEO wants a spokesperson to tell him the whole truth face to face. I know those internal spokespersons who tell their managers how amazing they are. From me you will not hear that the media is wrong. Many times, when there is no external consultant but an environment that worships the boss, there is a danger of losing control "As has happened many times to Donald Trump in his presidency."
What do you think of Trump?
"The best American president Israel has had, and a bad president for America. Since I only hold an Israeli passport, and I am only interested in Israel, I will remember Trump forever."
Did you think he would win the election?
"I thought he would lose. He conducted himself shockingly, on the verge of crime. The American people were in bloom, but his treatment of Corona eliminated him."
Were you able to manage Trump's crisis?
"Yes, unless he fired me first. I would advise him not to deny reality. He lost a critical time in the first stage of the corona, and had to deal with the crisis without fear and apprehension."
What scares you?
"Diseases of those close to me. It makes me sad."
Are you afraid of death?
"No. Everything from above. I can go a moment after I finish the interview with you, and I can go in 50 years."
What music do you like?
"Ilanit, Yehoram Gaon, Eyal Golan, Gevatron, this is the cute baldness - well, Rivka Zohar, Mike Brant."
You are strong in singers of yesteryear.
"Why? I also like contemporary, yo nim it. For example, Elton John."
Now you killed.
aviadp65@gmail.com
