Last May (2011)
According to Dan Gillerman, "the existence of Israel hangs in the balance" at this meeting today -- about to take place just minutes from now.
Gillerman says this is the "most important meeting" between American and Israeli leaders since Chaim Weizmann and Harry Truman.
Pray for Bibi.
JewishHistory.org tells the story:
.... The Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann, who was by then old and half-blind, traveled to the U.S. to try and see Truman to get him to reinforce American support of the partition plan. Truman refused. The Jewish leadership put on whatever pressure it could, but to no avail. Truman would not see Weizmann.Then the Jews sent in Eddie Jacobson. It’s been written in Truman’s memoirs and many, many other places. Jacobson said, “Mr. President, Harry, you’ve got to do me this one favor. See this tired, old man. He’s come halfway across the world to see you. Just give him a few minutes of your time.” And Truman reluctantly agreed.Weizmann was a great diplomat. He told Truman, and “You have the opportunity of the ages. If you’ll stay strong now, you’ll go down in history for all eternity.” And Truman was impressed by it, and he called Warren Austin at the UN to inform him of American policy. For added drama, when the call came, Austin was in the middle of a speech about how America was backing out of the partition plan. But when he returned from the phone call, he said, “President Truman has instructed me that the United States supports in full the partition plan as adopted by the United Nations and will work to see it implemented.”When that happened, the situation turned. The state was declared on May 15, 1948. And not two weeks later, Weizmann presented Truman with the traditional gift Jews give to heads of state: a Torah scroll. When Truman saw it, he said, “I always wanted one of those.”
