Amb. Reda Mansour: Innovation key to start-up nation’s success

Israeli Druze diplomat ambassador Reda Mansour, director of resource development at the Technion, recently visited Australia to champion the institution’s world-leading innovation and generate increased support for its research and technology.

“Science is very expensive because you want to compete for the best scientists, and our scientists are really good,” Mansour said. “To keep them, you have to build them the best laboratories you can and to give them a team of researchers that can work with whatever ideas they’re working on.”

When asked how the Technion became a leader in innovation, Mansour said, “In a way the Technion was built to build Israel, they knew they needed engineers to build a new country.

“It’s a country that didn’t have any natural resources, very few. So, they had to be very innovative to find solutions to the challenges they had … This problem-solving attitude, I think, is what’s behind the fact that we became the start-up nation,” Mansour remarked.

Before joining the Technion, Mansour served as a diplomat for over 35 years across Brazil, Panama, Ecuador, Portugal, Atlanta and San Francisco. Appointed at 35, he was the youngest ambassador in Israel’s history and the first Druze career diplomat. He noted that Israel’s foreign ministry has opened up to more minorities over the last decade, which is helpful in overcoming misinformation about Israel.

“When you come as an Israeli diplomat who’s not Jewish, a lot of times people are very surprised … they discover that you’re Arab, it’s even more confusing, because most people … don’t understand the Israeli way of life.”

He added, “In the last few years, there was this whole movement trying to implicate Israel as if it’s an apartheid state. For me, this is a joke.”

“I think diplomats from Israel, who are not from the Jewish community, can tell the story in a different way,” Mansour said. “It’s not easy, because we are working against a lot of international media, international campaigns, countries who are investing a lot of money to create a different narrative.”

Turning to the specific challenges faced by Israeli Druze, Mansour reflected on the sensitivities when the Nation-State law was passed in 2018, as many Druze “felt left outside of the national collective, because the law spoke only about the Jewish identity and the Jewish nature of the state”, particularly as Druze serve in the Israeli army.

“Many of us serve more than we need to serve, and most of us serve in combat units as well,” he said. “We make a lot of sacrifices for the country.”

However, he also noted that Israeli Druze have welcomed Israel’s recent actions to protect Syrian Druze.

“Israel actually is the only country of the world who came to the rescue when this new Syrian government sent its supporters to massacre the Druze.”

Mansour said that more than 4000 were killed and many were raped and kidnapped.

“We bombarded the Syrian Ministry of Defence in the centre of Damascus and then it stopped,” he said.

Mansour said that Druze communities valued the opportunities for education Israel has created. “We’re very proud that education in Israel gives you a real possibility to change your life, to dream about any career you like. We admire the freedom that you get in Israel, we don’t have it in any other Arab country,” Mansour shared.

Marking his first visit to Australia, Mansour expressed pride in representing Israel’s Technion and highlighted the significant potential for mutual cooperation between the two countries.