Par D.R.
Rubrique: Actualité
Publié le 13 décembre 2009

Steff Wertheimer, l’un des hommes les plus riches d’Israël est en train de construire l’un de ses rêves: construire un parc israélo-arabe en plein coeur de Nazareth. Son premier parc a été construit dans le Nord du pays à Tefen en 1982. Le parc va accueillir des firmes de tous les secteurs. Au départ l’industriel voulait construire son parc à Gaza. Il a finalement opté pour Nazareth.

Steff Wertheimer est devenu le citoyen le plus riche d’Israël à la faveur d’une transaction spectaculaire avec l’investisseur américain Warren Buffet. Six mois de négociations serrées ont accouché de l’un des plus gros investissements étrangers jamais réalisés en Israël. Le businessman américain Warren Buffet, un des hommes les plus riches au monde après Bill Gates, a fait l’acquisition de 80 % des parts d’Iscar, leader de l’industrie des outils métalliques de découpe, pour 4 milliards de dollars.

Fondée il y a cinquante-cinq ans par Steff Wertheimer, 80 ans, l’entreprise est dirigée par son fils Eytan, 54 ans, depuis les années 1980. Le Premier ministre Ehoud Olmert a plébiscité la transaction, qui a rapporté à l’État un revenu de près de 1 milliard de dollars ! Pour la première fois les Wertheimer, apôtres du secret dans les affaires, ont été contraints de sortir de leur réserve habituelle et d’ouvrir les portes de leur entreprise aux médias. Iscar réalise un chiffre d’affaires de 1 milliard de dollars par an.

Steff Wertheimer est un ancien du Palmakh, qui a fui l’Allemagne nazie avec sa famille à l’âge de 11 ans pour s’installer à Naharya, dans le nord d’Israël et un sioniste de la première heure. Il reste convaincu que l’avenir de l’État se joue dans le développement de la Galilée et du Néguev. Après un passage éclair en politique au sein du parti laïque Shinouï, il continue de militer en faveur d’un rapprochement israélo-palestinien.—

Israel21C : "One of Israel’s richest men also happens to be one of the country’s most socially aware businessmen. Renowned for his modesty, industrialist Steff Wertheimer made billions in the metal industry and is now building his sixth technology park, this time in the Israeli Arab city of Nazareth.

Wertheimer has already built five tech parks, one in Turkey and four in Israel – including the original Tefen Park, built in 1982, that also provides opportunities for Israel’s Arab minority. But his vision for Nazareth is different; this time the park will be based inside an Israeli Arab population center.

Nazareth was a natural choice for Wertheimer, especially because the area around Nazareth caters to a large population of both Arabs and Jews, he explains.

“My purpose is to keep people busy and out of mischief – to create good and interesting jobs for them that help families stay together. I want to get [the population around Nazareth] away from religion, and olive oil, and land and water – which have been the main issues – so they can be part of the free world,” Wertheimer relates.

In a way, the latest park may be a replacement for the one Wertheimer was hoping to build for the Palestinians before the second intifada broke out, shattering the deal. “I want the Arab and Jewish sectors both to be successful each in their own way,” he says.

Wertheimer’s original vision called for the building of a technology park in Gaza, to grow trade and industry for the Palestinians. “I was just days away from getting all the ‘okays’ from everybody and then the intifada made the whole thing impractical. I had signed letters and agreements in place.”

But focusing inside Israel proper is important for peace in the region, too, Wertheimer believes. And it may even help to curb terrorism. He dares to hope that the new technology park may go some way toward bridging the divide.

“There is mistrust on both sides,” he says, referring to allegations of land expropriation and water theft. He suggests that this lack of trust may be overcome not by coercion, but by allowing the two sides to be successful together.

Wertheimer thinks globally: “We must change the attitudes. Land and water are not the issues. We need to make this area a successful industrial area. The real problem will be how to get the word out in the market.”

Don’t ask him if he’s a social revolutionary. Wertheimer balks at the description. What he’s doing, he says, is just following a global trend: “The Irish made peace. Singapore is a successful place. South Korea is very successful after its independence. The Balkan area is relatively quiet now. All these places used tools that helped them to update modern industry.”

These countries, he continues, became successful because of their willingness to be part of the global market. That’s his vision for tech park number six in Nazareth. “We copied everything from other countries,” he says, referring to Tefen in the Galilee where, “The fact is that we created thousands of jobs for Arabs and Jews and Druze, which has made the Galilee a very positive place.”

Eighty percent of Wertheimer’s family business Iscar was sold to American investor Warren Buffet in 2006 for $4 billion. But well before that his reputation and panache for social entrepreneurial projects was already in gear.

The success of his technology park Tefen, built in 1982, is “a result of not being successful in the Knesset (the Israeli parliament),” says Wertheimer. In the late 70s and early 80s he tried and failed to convince the government that it should differentiate between paid jobs and skills in the Arab labor force: “I wanted to educate the people,” he says, stressing that the Arab community has the same entitlement to entrepreneurship as its Jewish counterpart.

That failure pushed him to take matters into his own hands with Tefen, and he’s been going full steam ahead ever since. While the new technology park’s official status is that of a for-profit endeavour, Wertheimer says that despite its location on a site just over three acres in area it won’t be a real estate investment. “We’ll probably lose money,” he says ruefully.

However, in this case, that’s not the point. The park will include space for a combination of established and emerging industries and will also offer technical education in line with the European “Berufsschule” model (an economic model that encourages close relationships between the financial and industrial sectors to cultivate economic prosperity). If his track record in the Galilee is anything to go by, Stef Wertheimer will go some way toward transforming Nazareth into “a very positive place” as well".

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