Politicsולטר איתן

Walter Eytan

Walter Eytan was an Israeli diplomat who served as the first Director General of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, from 1948 to 1959, and as ambassador to France from 1959 to 1970.

1910 to 2001First Foreign Ministry Director GeneralCodebreaking at Bletchley ParkThe 1949 Rhodes armistice talksAmbassador to France

Born: 24 July 1910, Munich
Died: 23 May 2001, Jerusalem
Occupation: diplomat, writer, politician, literary scholar
Education: St Paul's School, University of Oxford

Walter Eytan was born in 1910 in Munich

Walter Eytan was born Walter Ettinghausen in Munich, Germany, in 1910. During World War I his family moved to Switzerland and then settled in England. He attended St Paul's School in London.

He studied at Oxford University and taught German there from 1936 to 1946. In World War II he trained as a tank gunner and joined the Naval Section at Bletchley Park. There he supervised the translation of German messages, working on codebreaking alongside his brother Ernest.

Moshe Sharett recruited him to political work and gave him the name Eytan in 1944. In 1946 he moved to Jerusalem, where he became spokesman of the Jewish Agency and set up its school for diplomats. In January 1948 he submitted a plan for the structure of the future Foreign Ministry.

In June 1948 he joined the new Foreign Ministry in Tel Aviv and was appointed Director General. In 1949 he led Israel's delegations to the armistice talks at Rhodes and to the Lausanne conference. He served as ambassador to France from 1959 to 1970 and died in 2001.