Tuesday, July 13, 2021The United States of America was the first country to recognize Israel as a state in 1948, and the first to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel in 2017. The World Factbook published by the Central Intelligence Agency describes Israel as being located in the "Middle East, bordering the Mediterranean Sea, between Egypt and Lebanon". And yet, one of this country's leading proxy voting advisory firms conspicuously fails to recognize that Israel is incontrovertibly located in the Middle Eastern. Institutional Shareholder Services Inc. (ISS) attempts to identify board members' racial and ethnic identities for purposes of voting recommendations under its Socially Responsible Investing (SRI) and Catholic Faith-Based polices. One of these is "Middle Eastern/North African" which it defines as "A person with origins in any of the Persian or Arab countries in the Middle East or North Africa".

Source: The North Africa Journal July 13, 2021 14:37 UTC