ORMER U.S. Ambassador to Israel William A. Brown once heard a story from Sen. Daniel Inouye of Hawaii that drove home the importance of keeping Israel  strong through Israel Bonds.

Inouye was badly wounded in Italy during World War II. He had his arm amputated. As he was recuperating, another wounded soldier told him how he participated in the liberation of Dachau.

The man said the bodies were lined up like cordwood. “I came from Hawaii,” Inouye said. “I didn’t know what cordwood was. I had to look it up in the dictionary.”

Israel Bond chief Gideon Patt (center) honored Arie Sheer (left), head of Israel Discount Bank, at dinner where former Ambassador to Israel William Brown spoke.

From that powerful account and many others like it, Inouye became “a dedicated friend of the newly formed State of Israel,” Brown said. “He went out and purchased one of the original Israel Bonds.”

“As a matter of fact,” the senator told Brown, “I still have that bond framed in my office.”

Brown, who served as ambassador to Israel from 1988-92, is a member of the board of directors of Israel Discount Bank of New York. He spoke at an Israel Bond dinner at the Grand Hyatt in New York honoring Arie Sheer, president/ceo of Israel Discount Bank.

The dinner raised $54,314,000. During the calling of the cards, one guest announced: “In honor of my two grandchildren who don’t write and don’t call, I’m buying two zero coupon bonds. And in honor of my future widow, an additional $5,000 bond.”

“I became a banker because of my mother’s fairy tales,” Sheer said. “She used to tell me that there was a poor fisherman, a poor tailor, but never a poor banker.”

Also, Israel Bonds president/ceo Gideon Patt presented the Imre J. Rosenthal Achievement Award to Jerry Sandak, senior executive vice president at Rosenthal & Rosenthal for his leadership in the Israel Bonds banking and finance campaign.