In a year when the Nobel Committee again made appalling choices for both the Literature and Peace Prize, we are all the more saddened by the death of a member of the Nobel Prize Committee whose finest hour came in resigning from it.

Kristiansen was one of the few world statesmen who was a consistent, genuine friend of Israel. A leader of Norway’s Christian Democratic Party, Kristiansen was minister of oil and energy from 1983-1986 and speaker of the Odelsting, Norway’s Parliament. He was that best of all friends, an outspoken truth teller in Israel’s defense when this was deeply unpopular and, even more unusual, in criticism of the state when required—and even more contrary to the “Zeitgeist.”

Kristiansen’s most famous action was to resign from the Nobel Prize Committee in 1994 in protest against awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to Yasser Arafat, whom he termed “one of the most renowned terrorists in the world.” Less noted was Kristiansen’s charge that another Nobel Committee member, Norwegian politician Terje Roed-Larsen, had accepted money from Shimon Peres before voting that Peres share the prize with Arafat and Rabin. (That 1994 award was a high water mark of sorts – if Arafat represented the depth of human infamy, Peres exemplified the height of human folly.) Kristiansen continued to issue statements urging the Committee to revisit the award to Arafat. A sign of the corruption of the Committee was that even in 2004 four of its five members told the Jerusalem Post that Arafat deserved the prize while at least three would publicly condemn Shimon Peres for participating in a Sharon-led government.

Kristiansen never let up. In 1997 he led a delegation of Norwegians demanding his country’s embassy be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. In 1998 – with Arafat in the next room – Kristiansen had the courage to meet with the Norwegian media and translate into Norwegian the videos in which Arafat, while ostensibly celebrating the fifth anniversary of Oslo’s “peace agreement,” called for Israel’s destruction. In 2004 Kristiansen warned that the optimistic views in Israel’s Knesset concerning Mahmoud Abbas “is a déjà vu repetition of the most complete failure of the Middle East conflict, the so-called ‘Oslo Agreement.’”

Even as he neared the end of his long life, Kristiansen’s love for Israel would not let him remain silent in the face of the destruction of the Gush Katif and northern Samarian communities. Invited to a dinner party sponsored by the Israeli government during the week Israel destroyed these communities, Kristiansen refused, declaring what few said and none put so well: “The Israel government expulsion of Gush Katif Jews is not an internal Israeli affair. It is everyone’s affair. This expulsion is an immoral and illegal act violating international ethical, human, legal and social rights.” In his letter to the Israeli ambassador in Oslo, Kristiansen wrote: “Being neither an Israeli citizen nor a Jew, I have been reluctant to express my opinions publicly in a situation where the expression of such opinions might be interpreted as foreign meddling in internal Israeli affairs. My excuse is love for Israel.”

Would that Israeli politicians had even a portion of Kristiansen’s sense, integrity and love for Israel.