title: Niels Hansen (diplomat)
text: # Niels Hansen (diplomat)
  
  Niels Hansen (born 7 November, 1924 in Heidelberg; died 4 January, 2015 in Bad Godesberg) was a German diplomat.
  
  ## Early life
  
  Hansen attended high school in Lübeck. During World War II, he was a soldier in Italy. After the war, Hansen initially studied medicine but switched to law. He studied in Göttingen, Hamburg, Heidelberg, Zurich and Geneva. There he attended the Graduate Institute of International Studies. He graduated with a license in law (1951) and a doctorate in law in 1955.
  
  ## Career
  
  He was ambassador to Israel (1981-1985) and permanent representative to NATO in Brussels (1985-1989). He was also the author of Out of the Shadows of the Catastrophe: German-Israeli Relations in the Era of Konrad Adenauer and David Ben-Gurion (in German: Aus Dem Schatten Der Katastrophe: Die Deutsch-Israelischen Beziehungen in Der Ara Konrad Adenauer Und David Ben Gurion).
  
  ## Recognition
  
  In 1990, Tel Aviv University awarded him an honorary doctorate.
  
  