The Israel Foreign Ministry announced last night that Michael S. Comay will leave his post as Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, and that Gideon Raphael had been named to replace him.
The Ministry said that Mr. Comay had asked last summer to be relieved of the U.N. assignment, in which he has served since 1959, succeeding Abba Eban, Israel’s first Ambassador to the U.N., who is now Israel’s Foreign Minister. The change-over in Ambassadors is expected to take place in April.
Mr. Comay will serve in the Foreign Ministry on his return to Israel. A Foreign Ministry spokesman said it had not yet been decided whether Mr. Comay would attend a special U.N. session on South Africa, scheduled for April.
Mr. Raphael is now deputy director-general of the Foreign Ministry. A frequent member of the Israeli delegation to the United Nations, he served as vice-chairman of the dele- gation at the recent 21st U.N. General Assembly. He is also special assistant to the Prime Minister and Israel’s only roving Ambassador.
Born in Berlin, Mr. Raphael settled in Palestine in 1934. Entering the foreign service of the pre-state Jewish Government, he served as a member of the Jewish Agency delegation to the U.N. Special Commission on Palestine, and to the U.N. General Assembly in 1947.
He was an alternate representative on the Israel delegation to the U.N. from 1951 to 1953, and an Israeli representative to the Palestine Conciliation Commission in 1952. From 1947 to 1960, he served as Israel’s Ambassador to Belgium, Luxembourg and the European Economic Community.
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