Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana made a brief stop in Queens to meet with the Bukharian Jewish community on Sunday before continuing to Washington, D.C., where he promoted a joint initiative to nominate President Trump for a Nobel Peace Prize.
QUEENS, NY—The Speaker of the Knesset—number three in the Israeli government—was in New York for just one day before continuing onto Washington, D.C. on December 10, 2025. During his overnight, he made a landmark visit to the Bukharian community in Queens.
“It was a huge honor to welcome him despite his extremely packed schedule. We were especially proud to host him at the Bukharian Community Center and show him around,” said Chagit Leviev Sofiev, President of the Bukharian Congress of the US and Canada. Although it was Ohana’s first visit to the Queens community, he told members he had heard much about it.
Amir Ohana has previously visited Uzbekistan, where he met Lev Leviev. He was joined on this visit by Knesset Member Eitan Ginzburg, and together they met with the community’s chief rabbis at the synagogue. During the visit, they viewed the Torah and offered prayers for Am Yisrael and the IDF soldiers, followed by a traditional Bukharian Jewish dinner with members of the community.
“We shared an evening of connection and conversation that truly felt meaningful,” Chagit wrote on Instagram.
The Queens visit was part of a larger U.S. trip that included stops at the Ohel, the resting place of the Lubavitcher Rebbe in New York, and high-level meetings on Capitol Hill with House Speaker Mike Johnson, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, and Senators Lindsey Graham and John Fetterman.
Ohana’s Washington agenda focused on rallying international support to nominate President Donald Trump for a Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his role in brokering the recent ceasefire and hostage release agreement with Hamas in Gaza. This initiative, spearheaded jointly by Ohana and Speaker Johnson, seeks to mobilize legislative leaders worldwide.
This marked Ohana’s second visit to the United States in recent months. In October, he met with President Trump and delivered a speech lasting over 20 minutes in which he compared the American leader to Cyrus the Great, the ancient Persian king who allowed Jews to return from Babylonian exile and rebuild their Temple in Jerusalem. Ohana praised Trump’s accomplishments, including recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, moving the U.S. embassy there, brokering the Abraham Accords, and targeting Iran’s nuclear program during this summer’s conflict.
“Mr. President, you stand before the people of Israel not as another American president, but as a giant of Jewish history,” Ohana said during that October visit, according to the Times of Israel.
The Knesset speaker’s emphasis on U.S.-Israel relations continued throughout his Washington meetings this week. After meeting with Senate Majority Leader Thune, Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, who was also visiting Capitol Hill, tweeted his confidence that “the alliance between Israel and America will flourish for many more years.”
JNS contributed to this reporting.