Prof. Yehiam Prior was educated in Jerusalem, Berkeley and Harvard before joining the department of Chemical Physics at the Weizmann Institute of Science, where he has served as a department head, chair of the Scientific Council, and most recently as Dean of the faculty of Chemistry.

On the public scene, he has founded (with others) and headed the movement for unilateral separation (Hipardut Chad Zdadit, HACHETZ) which was very active for the building of the fence defining Israel’s eastern borders, and has been a board member for the Council for Peace and Security.