JERUSALEM (JTA) — David Keyes, a human rights activist, will become Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s English-language spokesman.

The plan to appoint Keyes was first reported this week in the Jerusalem Post, which cited unnamed senior government sources. He will replace Mark Regev, who will become Israeli ambassador to London in March. The Prime Minister’s Office has not confirmed the appointment.

Keyes, who was born in California and now lives in New York, is executive director of Advancing Human Rights and a co-founder of CyberDissidents.org. Advancing Human Rights is an umbrella human rights organization that operates Movements.org, a crowdsourcing platform connecting dissidents with volunteers to help them around the world. He founded CyberDissidents while working for former Russian refusenik and current head of the Jewish Agency for Israel, Natan Sharansky.

Keyes, who is an Israeli citizen, is fluent in Hebrew and Arabic.

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