Israeli Diplomat Is [Historian] in Middle

WASHINGTON — With Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel engaged in an unusually public dispute with the Obama administration over Iran, Mr. Netanyahu’s man in Washington, Michael B. Oren, has been working rooms all over town.

He has run up to Capitol Hill for damage control. He has spent hours with reporters making Israel’s case against Tehran. He went to a Rosh Hashana party celebrating the Jewish New Year at Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s house. He had the White House chief of staff and hundreds of others over for Rosh Hashana at his own house. He went to a ribbon-cutting ceremony in Maryland to open the North American headquarters of an Israeli military contractor. He even made a quiet trip to press his arguments about Iran at J Street, the dovish Jewish lobbying group.

Much of it was the crisis management and daily business conducted by any Israeli ambassador to the United States, who always finds an open door in Washington. But with the New Jersey-born-and-bred Mr. Oren [who received his PhD in Near Eastern studies from Princeton University], there is a difference: He is representing a prime minister who has infuriated the White House....