The team.
Andrew Tucker (1963) studied law in Australia (BA/LLB), UK (BCL) and The Netherlands, and has worked since 1988 as an adviser and consultant to private companies, governments and (semi-)public entities in various fields of international law.
Andrew was a Fellow of the Law Faculty of the University of Melbourne from 1994 to 2001, and Research Associate at the TMC Asser Institute in The Hague from 1996-1998. Based in The Netherlands, he is Principal of Tucker & Associates.
Andrew is co-author of ‘Israel on Trial’, Soest (NLD), thinc. (2018) and “Two states for two peoples?” (2022/23)
Olimpia Galiberti (1999) is a trainee lawyer with a double degree in French and Italian law from the University of Florence and Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne (Master in International Jurist). During her academic journey, Olimpia dedicated 7 months to an exchange program at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where she conducted research and wrote her thesis on Israeli Constitutional Law. Actively engaged on social media, Olimpia serves as a leader within the student association Student Revival. In addition to her leadership role, she actively collaborates with Christians For Israel Italy and makes valuable contributions to news pages like Aware Italia and Nazione Futura.
Frank Fink-Jensen (1959) studied political and business economy (M. Sc. (Econ.) in Copenhagen, Denmark. Frank has held several positions in commerce and IT in Denmark and in the Netherlands.
Frank and family moved from Denmark to The Netherlands in 1991 and has worked within the powered cleaning equipment sector ever since.
Frank joined thinc. in November 2022 as secretary of the board and is active as the Manager Operations starting August 1, 2023.
Bertine studied accounting at Hoornbeeck College in Amersfoort. She has worked as accounting officer for different organisations, currently in Banking.Bertine is politically active for the local SGP (Dutch Reformed Political Party). Her interest in Israel developed over the years. During a conference on Israel and Europe in Brussels, she came into contact with thinc. and decided to sign up as volunteer in the operations dept.
Leon Meijer (1964) is married to Janine and father of four children. In 1989 he received his engineering degree (master’s) from Wageningen University and Research Center. During his studies he did an internship in Israel. He returned to Israel with his wife in 1991 and arrived in Haifa just two weeks before the first Gulf War. From 1991 to 1992, he worked as a scientist at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa. In 1993, the Technion admitted him to the PhD program at the Agricultural Engineering faculty. He conducted research on the environmental effects of intensive aquaculture (fish ponds). In 2000, he received his PhD and became one of the few foreigners with an Israeli doctoral degree. After almost 8 years in Israel, Leon returned to the Netherlands with his family. In the Netherlands Leon worked successively for the European Parliament, trade union CNV and from 2014 to 2023 he was alderman in the municipality of Ede. He now works for the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport where he is responsible for improving the youth care system.
Since his return from Israel, he has remained closely involved in the country. Since 2016 he has been president of Christians for Israel International and from that position he maintains many contacts not only in Israel but also with Christians in other parts of the world who have a warm heart for the Jewish state.
Gregory Rose is a member of the Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCORS) at the University of Wollongong, Australia, where he is Professor of Law and Chair of the University’s Academic Senate. He has served as Discipline Leader for the School of Law and as Chair of the University’s Thesis Examination Committee. Prof. Rose expertise is in international law, within which he has published widely concerning marine, environmental and counter-terrorism matters. He has conducted Australian government funded projects on detention operations and counter-terrorism legal training.
Greg has edited books on following the international proceeds of environmental crime, and on detention of insurgents and terrorists in international military operations. He is currently writing a book on transnational fisheries crimes.
Robert Nicholson is Editor at Large of Providence magazine, co-founder and board member of Save Armenia, founder of The Philos Project, and co-founder of Passages Israel. Robert also serves on the advisory board of In Defense of Christians and The Hague Initiative for International Cooperation (thinc). A formerly enlisted Marine and Tikvah Fellow, he holds a BA in Hebrew Studies from Binghamton University, and a JD and MA in Middle Eastern History from Syracuse University. His written work has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Telegraph, New York Post, Jerusalem Post, Times of Israel, Newsweek, First Things, The Hill, and National Interest.
Luc Schraverus (1966) works as a senior investment manager in an international financial organization in the capital of The Netherlands since 1991.
Luc was raised in a Christian family with a warm heart and a deep affection for the Jewish people and the Promised Land. After travelling through Israël several times together with his wife and children he developed a vision for serving and supporting the Jewish state by using his talents. Thinc is an excellent next step in this process.
Prior to joining de Supervisory Board of Thinc in November 2023, Luc was treasurer for a charity foundation working in the southern part of Africa. He also was an elder in an Evangelical Church in his town for several years .
Luc and his wife Marjan have three adult children and live in the center of Holland.
International lawyer, diplomat, writer and activist, Hillel C. Neuer is the Executive Director of UN Watch, a human rights NGO in Geneva, Switzerland.
Hillel Neuer is an acclaimed speaker who has testified often before the United Nations and the United States Senate and House of Representatives. Mr. Neuer taught international human rights at the Geneva School of Diplomacy, and served as Vice-President of the NGO Special Committee on Human Rights in Geneva.
Prior to joining UN Watch, Neuer practiced commercial and civil rights litigation at the international law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP, where he represented Oprah Winfrey and other high profile individuals and corporations.
Neuer is a member of the New York Bar and the author of several legal publications.
Nic Lesmeister – Executive Director of Gateway Center for Israel and Executive Pastor of Church & Jewish relations.
Nic received a life calling to serve the Jewish people in 2011 while in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia with one of his spiritual fathers, Dr. Wayne Wilks. After a successful business exit as an entrepreneur in the finance sector, Nic moved his family to Israel where in 2015 he earned a Master’s Degree in Nonprofit Management and Leadership from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 2019, Nic Lesmeister led the vision to create the new Gateway Center for Israel as a part of Gateway Church, and serves as its executive director. Nic and his wife, Tabatha, have three children and live in Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas.
István László Mészáros obtained his law degree (cum laude) in 1985, and worked as attorney at law ever since. Next to his work in the private sector, he has served as a member of parliament in different public commissions and committees of the Hungarian National Assembly, mainly focusing on human rights, minority rights and religious freedom. Mészáros has also served in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, and contributed to different committees within. Furthermore, Mészáros is the vice rector of the Saint Paul Academy in Budapest.
David Nathanson: I graduated from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec with a B.A. degree and was awarded the gold medal in economics and political science. I attended Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut on a Woodrow Wilson fellowship, where I earned an M.A. degree in economics. Thereafter I attended and graduated with honours from the Faculty of Law of the University of Toronto in Toronto, Ontario. I was called to the bar of the province of Ontario in 1971. I specialized in the field of taxation. My practice extended to all areas of Canadian taxation, including, but not limited to, individual and corporate income tax planning, litigation at all court levels, and dispute resolution.
Allan Parker, President of The Justice Foundation, is a former Professor of Law at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas, where he taught Education Law and Civil Procedure. He was a Visiting Professor at the University of Texas, and studied International Human Rights at the International Human Rights Institute in Strasbourg, France. He taught International Human Rights at the St. Mary’s Institute on World Legal Problems in Innsbruck, Austria in 1992.
Mr. Parker has been a volunteer Senior Fellow with the Texas Public Policy Foundation as well. He and The Justice Foundation were selected in 1996 by the Texas State Board of Education to evaluate the Texas Open- Enrollment Charter Program.
Prior to teaching, Mr. Parker was in the general civil practice of law as a trial lawyer. He was Board Certified in Civil Trial (1987-1992) and Personal Injury Trial Law (1988-1993) by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization.
Mr. Parker received his J.D. degree with high honors from the University of Texas School of Law in 1979. He was an Associate Editor of the Texas Law Review, a Chancellor, Order of the Coif, and Order of Barristers for his outstanding advocacy skills. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Oklahoma with a B.A. in Economics in 1974.
Alan Shatter is a former Irish Minister for Justice, Equality, and Defence, a former member of the Irish Parliament, a former Chairperson of the Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, a former member of the Parliament’s Justice & Defence Committee and also its Children’s Rights Committee. As a member of the latter committee he was instrumental in the preparation of a Children’s Rights Amendment to the Irish Constitution adopted in 2012. He was also a founding member and Chairperson of the Parliament’s Ireland–Israel Friendship Group. In 2013, he was chairperson of the EU’s Council of Justice and Home Affairs Ministers and also of its Council of Defence Ministers. In 2022, he participated in a public hearing of the Irish Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee in which he comprehensively criticized Amnesty International’s report wrongly depicting Israel as an apartheid state. Mr. Shatter is Chairperson of Magen David Adom Ireland. As a practicing lawyer, he was involved in seminal cases before both the Irish Supreme Court and the European Court. While serving as Minister for Justice, the pioneering legislation he initiated in the Irish Parliament included bills reconstituting and extending the remit of Ireland’s Human Rights and Equality Commission and also reforming the Irish courts and legal profession. He is the author of four textbooks on Irish Family Law, a novel. ‘ Laura’ and of ‘ Life is a Funny Business ( 2017) and ‘ Frenzy and Betrayal’ ( 2019). A legal and political commentator, his most recent article on the Israeli governments proposed judicial reforms is published online by the Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs.
Lady Cosgrove was born and educated in Glasgow, Scotland.
She was admitted to the Faculty of Advocates in Scotland in 1968 and was appointed to the bench as a sheriff in 1979. In 1996 she was promoted to the High Court and was appointed a Senator of the College of Justice in Scotland, the first woman in the court’s four-hundred-year history to hold that office. In 2003 she was promoted to the Inner House of the Court of Session, the Appeal Court. During her judicial career she was a member of the Parole Board for Scotland and was chair of the Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland. She was also chair of the Boundary Commission for Scotland and of the Expert Panel on Sex Offending.
Lady Cosgrove is now retired, and she and her husband have recently made Aliyah to Israel. She is co-chair of United Kingdom Lawyers for Israel, an organisation that is dedicated to utilising the law to combat antisemitism and the denigration and delegitimization of Israel. She is also a trustee of StandWithUs UK whose aim is to educate young people about Israel and its relationship with its Arab neighbours to equip them to deal with the hostility they too often face at school and university.
Professor Robbie Sabel Ph.D. is Professor of International Law, Faculty of Law, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, and Visiting professor at Tel Aviv University and IDC Herzliya. Prof. Sabel is Member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, The Hague. Former positions include: Legal Adviser Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Foreign Ministry’s
Deputy Director General for Arms Control and Disarmament; MFA Coordinator for combatting Antisemitism; Head of Israel Delegation, Taba arbitration with Egypt. Prof. Sabel is Arbitrator on the Appeals Panel of the International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims. His publications include Procedure in International Conferences, Cambridge Univ. Press, 3rd ed., January 2018, and International Law (with Yaël Ronen, Faculty of Law, The Hebrew University Jerusalem, 3rd edition 2016).
Dr Li-ann Thio, Ph.D. (Cambridge), LL.M. (Harvard), B.A. Hons (Oxford), Barrister (G.I.) is Provost Chair Professor at the Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore. She teaches and researches on the fields of Constitutional and Administrative law, Comparative Constitutional Law in Asia, Human Rights in Asia and Public International Law.
She is currently Chief Editor, Singapore Journal of Legal Studies and Advisory Board Member, Max Planck Encyclopedia of Comparative Constitutional Law. She was formerly General Editor, Asian Yearbook of International Law, Chief Editor, Singapore Journal of International & Comparative Law and Editor, International Journal of Constitutional Law. A prolific scholar, she has published more than 100 law review articles/book chapters and several books. Her monographs include Managing Babel: The International Legal Protection of Minorities in the Twentieth Century (2005) and A Treatise on Singapore Constitutional Law (2012).
Pieter Hoogendoorn (1951) studied Electronics, Mathematics and Computer Science at the Technical University of Delft. He graduated in 1979. After his studies he has worked i.a. for IBM and ACI Worldwide as senior consultant and project manager around the globe. His expertise includes biometrics IDentification, electronic payment systems and System Integration in Finance, Telecom and the Public sector.
From 2000-2010 he has worked as project manager in the UAE, Hong Kong, Singapore and Saudi Arabia.
Pieter is the founder and principal of Marites Consulting (2008) — a professional consultancy and (project) management company.
In 2017 he became co-founder and director of thinc. In 2022 he resigned from the MT and joined the Supervisory Board.
Hans graduated as a mechanical engineer and subsequently studied business management at the Vienna University of Economics and Business. After a scholarship in South Africa, he worked in the IT sector, then in the packaging industry, and in the last 25 years of his career held senior management positions at a Swiss stock-listed, globally active group in the field of access control and locking systems. When Hans retired, he established a consulting company and has been engaged in European product standardization and EU legislation since. Currently, his main occupation is managing a European Industry Association.
Hans’ affection for Israel has developed over many years and is fostered not only by regular visits but especially by the work of Christians for Israel, where he has been secretary of the Austrian branch since its foundation.
