cover 2006

12 BGU NOW
the honorees – Morris Kahn and Yair Green – Nobel
laureate Prof. Sir Aaron Klug OM FRS of the University
of Cambridge, UK; Assistant Dean for Special
Projects, Washington University School of Medicine,
Prof. Philip Needleman of Prospect Venture Partners,
USA; Director of the NIBN Prof. Irun Cohen; Deputy-
Director of the NIBN Prof. Varda Shoshan-Barmatz
and researchers at the Institute.
Participants traveled to the University’s Sede Boqer
campus to take part in a symposium: “The Jacob
Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research Salute their
Founders in the United Nations International Year
of Deserts and Desertification.” In the presence of
founder of the Zuckerberg Institute for Water
Research, Roy J. Zuckerberg, and moderated by
the Director of the Institutes, Prof. Avigad Vonshak,
a panel of distinguished researchers discussed the
various efforts made at the BIDR over the years
and in the present to combat
desertification. They included Israel Prize
winners Prof. Yehudith Birk and Prof. Joshua
Jortner – who both played instrumental
roles in the Council for Higher
Education’s early assessment and
support of the creation of the
Institutes – and former Directors
of the Institutes, Prof. Amos Richmond,
Prof. Joseph Gale, Prof. Louis Berkofsky
and Prof. Uriel Safriel.
A group of young BGU scholars from various
disciplines presented personal accounts of
themselves and their research to the Board members
and guests at a special session presided over by
Vice-President and Dean for Research and
Development Prof. Moti Herskowitz. They included
Dr. Nirit Ben-Aryeh Debby of the Department of
Arts; Dr. Ron Folman of the Department of Physics;
Dr. Leslie Lobel of the Department of Virology;
Dr. Eitan Rubin of the Department of Microbiology
and Immunology; Prof. Golan Shahar of the
Department of Behavioral Sciences; Prof. Alon Tal
of the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research;
and Prof. Rachel Yerushalmi-Rozen of the Department
of Chemical Engineering.
Prior to the procedural activities of the Closing
Plenary Session, presided over by the Chairman of
the BGU Executive Committee David Brodet,
scholarships were awarded by the Chaim Herzog
Center for Middle East Studies and Diplomacy to
Doctoral and Masters students. Guest of honor
Minister of Tourism Isaac Herzog, son of Aura and
the late President of the State of Israel Chaim
Herzog, presented the prizes together with Chairman
of the Chaim Herzog Center, Dr. Yoram Meital. Iraqiborn
scholar and former dissident, who later penned
the new Iraq’s Constitution, Prof. Kanan Makiya
Laurence and Dan Ohayon at the cornerstone-laying ceremony
of the Abraham Ben-David Ohayon Behavioral Sciences
Building
from Brandeis University, lectured on “A
Reassessment of the 2003 Iraq War: Planning,
Execution and Aftermath.”
The Session concluded with reports by the
chairmen of the various committees and the motions
that were ratified by those present.
Guests who remained in Beer-Sheva were invited
in the evening to the homes of academic faculty
members and had an additional opportunity to make
their acquaintance and learn about the University.