National President Morton A. Klein

Morton A. Klein is National President of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), the oldest pro-Israel group in the U.S., founded in 1897.  Mr. Klein is widely regarded as one of the leading Jewish activists in the United States.  Morton Klein is a child of Holocaust survivors, born in a displaced persons camp in Gunzberg, Germany.

The national Jewish weekly, “The Forward” named Morton Klein one of the top five Jewish leaders in the U.S. today, stating “It’s impossible to deny that Klein has been extraordinarily effective.” The U.S. Department of State has awarded Klein a “Certificate of Appreciation” “in recognition of outstanding contributions to national and international affairs,” after he delivered a major address there. He is a member of the International Board of Governors of Ariel University in Israel.

Morton Klein worked in three administrations as an economist in Washington, D.C. He has served as a biostatistician at UCLA School of Public Health and the Linus Pauling Institute of Science and Medicine in Palo Alto, Calif., having worked closely with two-time Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling. Mr. Klein was also a lecturer in mathematics and statistics at Temple University.

The Philadelphia Jewish Exponent named Morton Klein one of the top dozen “Jewish activists of the century.” The NY Jewish Week (largest Federation paper) has named him one of the top ten Jewish leaders who have made a difference. The Jerusalem Post has called the ZOA, “one of the most important and influential groups in the U.S. today.” The Wall Street Journal called the ZOA “heroic and the most credible advocate for Israel on the American Jewish scene today” and we should “snap a salute to those who were right about Oslo and Arafat all along, including Morton Klein who was wise, brave, and unflinchingly honest. When the history of the American Jewish struggle in these years is written, Mr. Klein will emerge as an outsized figure.”

The New York Times, in a profile called “Public Lives,” called Morton Klein, “a man who ferrets out anti-Semitism wherever it is, a rare voice from the outset in the American Jewish community against the Oslo Accords, and an iconoclast who is a prolific speechmaker, writer, and Congressional lobbyist.”

Mort Klein’s successful campaigns against anti-Israel bias in leading textbooks, travel guides, universities, churches, and the media, as well as his work on Capitol Hill, were the subject of 40 feature stories both here and in Israel. His scientific research on nutrition and heart disease was cited by Discover Magazine as one of the Top 50 Scientific Studies of 1992.  Mort Klein has been invited to testify before the U.S. Congress, Including the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee and House Judiciary Committee, and the Israeli Knesset.

He traveled to Germany and persuaded the publishers of Baedeker’s, the world’s leading travel guide, to correct the many anti-Israel errors in Its guides to Israel and Jerusalem. He launched a campaign to correct dozens of anti-Israel errors in D.C. Heath’s “The Enduring Vision,” the most widely used American high school and college history textbook.

Mr. Klein is quoted internationally and has appeared in the media in countries including the U.S.A., Israel, France, Germany, Japan, Greece, Holland, etc. More than 400 of his articles and letters have been published in newspapers, magazines, and scientific journals around the world, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, LA Times, Washington Times, USA Today, Congressional Quarterly, New Republic, New Yorker, Commentary, Near East Report, Reform Judaism, Breitbart, Algemeiner, Jerusalem Post & other leading Jewish papers, Philadelphia Inquirer, Miami Herald, Chicago Tribune, Ha’aretz & Maariv (Israel), Canadian Jewish News, Journal of Preventive Medicine, Journal of Epidemiology.

Morton Klein has appeared on TV and radio including ABC’s World News Tonight (4 minute segment on ZOA “Lobbying for Israel”), NBC National News, CNN, Fox-TV, CNBC, MSNBC, NPR, BBC, C-Span, VOA, Israel TV/Radio. Lines from his speeches appear in the respected volume entitled “Great Jewish Quotations,” He is on the speaker’s bureau of UJC, and Israel Bonds.

Mr. Klein is married to Rita, has a married daughter Rachael, and four grandchildren.