Podcasts about jewish agency

Imagine standing in Jerusalem when the sirens wail—warning of incoming missiles. You have seconds to find shelter. The tension is real. The fear is constant. And the question echoes across the region: Will the war between Israel and Iran ever end? Today, we speak with Dvora Ganani of the Jewish Agency—joining us live from inside the chaos. This is The Endtime Show. 📚: Check out Jerusalem Prophecy College Online for less than $60 per course: https://jerusalemprophecycollege.com 📱: It's never been easier to understand. Stream Only Source and access exclusive content: https://watch.osn.tv/browse   ☕️: First Cup Coffee: use code ENDTIME to get 10% off: https://www.firstcup.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Five days in, Israel's battle to destroy the Islamic Republic of Iran's nuclear weapons infrastructure continues. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) launched the campaign in the wake of a decision by the IAEA Board to censure Iran a resolution declaring that Iran is in breach of its non-proliferation obligations, one day past a Donald Trump imposed deadline of 60 days for Iran to agree to relinquish its uranium enrichment capabilities. Iran has responded with indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets in Israel. Can Israel destroy Iran's nuclear program? Is that possible without the United States? What role will the United States play? And can the Tehran regime survive? Haviv Gur is a veteran Israeli journalist who serves as Senior Analyst for The Times of Israel. He has covered Israel's politics, foreign policy and relationship with the Jewish diaspora since 2005. He has reported from over 20 countries and is fluent in Hebrew and English. He served as director of communications for the Jewish Agency for Israel, the country's largest NGO. He travels around the world educating people on Israel and reporting on timely events and developments in and about Israel as a premiere analyst.Read the transcript here.Subscribe to our Substack here.

While Israel's government is still engaged externally in a nearly 19-month long war with Hamas in Gaza, crucial elections are underway for Jews around the world–including beginning June 5, for Canada–for control of Israel's four main national Zionist bodies: the Keren Kayemeth/Jewish National Fund, the Jewish Agency for Israel, the Keren HaYesod/United Israel Appeal, and the World Zionist Organization. These historic non-governmental institutions take direction from the World Zionist Congress, based in Jerusalem, and described by founder Theodore Herzl over a century ago as the unofficial “Parliament of the Jewish People”. This election will choose the 500+ official Congress members for a five-year term, which begins this fall. Organizers say there is much at stake. This election is being described as a battle for the soul of Israel, as it pits centrist and progressive Jewish slates against an increasingly powerful coalition of Orthodox and Haredi groups, who are campaigning for Torah values including supporting more settlement building on the West Bank. The Zionist Congress controls not only the policies but who gets appointed to run these major Israeli agencies, and, as a result, where and how their multi-billion dollar budgets are spent. (A tiny fraction of the money comes back to Canada to fund Zionist programming here.) While Israel and the United States are allocated most of the seats, the rest of the Jewish Diaspora including Canada makes up the rest. Canadian Jews are being asked to vote until June 15 through an online ballot. So who is running in Canada's WJC elections this month? And how can you cast your vote? On today's episode of The CJN Daily, host Ellin Bessner speaks with vote organizer Stan Greenspan, the president of the Canadian Zionist Federation, and himself a candidate. Plus you'll meet candidates Jacob Kates Rose with the progressive Hatikvah Canada slate, and also Dr. Yizhar Hess, a high-ranking Jerusalem-based diplomat who came to Canada recently to drum up support for his slate known as Mercaz-Canada, which represents Conservative-Masorti Jewish values. Related links How Canadian Jews can vote in the WZO's elections from June 5-15, 2025.  What is the World Zionist Congress anyway? Read Ron Csillag's 2020 feature in The CJN. Why the American Jewish community was split over voting in the WZO elections, in The CJN. Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Andrea Varsany (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer) Music: Dov Beck-Levine Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to The CJN Daily (Not sure how? Click here)

Welcome to Season 2, Episode 1 of the Z3 Podcast! In this conversation, Z3 Founding Director Amitai Fraiman speaks with Rabbi Dr. Laura Novak-Winer and Robbie Gringras about the evolving landscape of Israel education, particularly in the wake of the events of October 7, 2023. Each of them discusses the goals of Israel education, emphasizing the importance of knowing Israel in a nuanced way rather than simply fostering love for the country. Their conversation delves into the historical context of Israel education, the challenges faced by American Jews in connecting with Israel, and the need for a deeper understanding of values and relationships within the Jewish community. In the latter half of the podcast, the speakers reflect on their personal theological journeys and the implications for future education. Together, they explore the complexities of Jewish identity, the impact of recent events on perceptions of Israel, and the role of education versus advocacy in shaping these discussions. Ultimately, they call on the importance of community and nuanced, continuing conversations as our communities continue to educate and define what it means to be Jewish in relation to Israel. About our Guests: Robbie Gringras was born and bred in the Jewish community of Britain, but has been living and creating in Israel since 1996, primarily with Jewish Americans. As such his work – educational and theatrical – bridges the Israel-Diaspora connection with empathy and insight. He lives in the secular world, while his knowledge base and research specialties – especially after his many years studying in Jerusalem – are deeply religious. While Creative Director of Makom, the Israel Education Lab of the Jewish Agency, he coined the phrase: “Hugging and Wrestling with Israel”, drove the 4HQ System of Israel Education, and wrote for and ran the Makom website.As a world-renowned solo theatre performer, he is also an inspirational speaker, and a charismatic teacher. As a prolific playwright, he is also a challenging and original educator. As an experienced and committed Jewish Zionist educator, his theater creations are educational treasure chests.Rabbi Dr. Laura Novak Winer, RJE, is the Director of the Master of Educational Leadership program at the HUC-JIR Rhea Hirsch School of Education in Los Angeles, CA. Laura teaches courses on pedagogy, classroom and organizational culture and leading change. She is a Senior Fellow at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education and Brandeis University. She was previously Director of Clinical Education at the HUC-JIR Rhea Hirsch School where she mentored students, coordinated fieldwork internships and taught graduate level courses in pedagogy and organizational change to students studying to become Jewish educational leaders and rabbis. Laura has worked in and with a variety of afternoon school settings and her current research focus is Israel education, particularly within the context of the supplementary school.Laura has been published in a variety of academic and online journals, is a regular contributor to Moment Magazine's “Ask the Rabbis” column, and was the editor of several curricula, including Sacred Choices: Adolescent Relationships and Sexual Ethics (2005 and 2007).Chapters00:00 Introduction to Israel Education01:56 The Goals of Israel Education12:55 Evolution of Israel Education24:13 Values and Relationships in Israel Education30:38 Theological Perspectives on Israel Education34:41 The Importance of Community in Jewish Identity41:19 Navigating the Impact of October 7th50:23 The Role of Education vs. Advocacy01:00:02 Defining Jewish Identity and Zionism

Many of you know that a B'nai B'rith organization gave birth to the ADL while defending its Atlanta chapter president Leo Frank. Frank raped and murdered a 13 year old girl who he was also employing along with many other teens, against child labor laws. Leo Frank ran a pencil factory sweatshop and often flirted with his illegal underage employees. The ADL was formed to defend him when he murdered and raped Mary Phagan. The details were disgusting. Her underwear was ripped and bloody and she was strangled to death with a wire. Her head had also been pummeled with a pipe. She went to get her paycheck of a meager $1.20 and never returned home. She was raped and murdered and then her body was dragged to the basement. Police found strands of her hair and blood on the floor above right across from Frank's office. Frank nervously revealed the victims name in front of police before they had given him any such details. The ADL was going to get him released based purely on the fact that He was Jewish and a high profile crime made Jews look bad. Arguably a Jewish organization trying to get a child murderer off the hook, makes Jews look worse. They would like one to believe that he was innocent with fake news history and will tell you so on Wikipedia which has Israelis paid to edit it. Leo admitted on the witness stand to the jury that he was “unconsciously” at the scene of the crime when the murder occurred. What we don't know, is if he raped her before or after killing her. The grand jury voted 21 – 0 for indicting him. Four of those jurors were Jewish. That shouldn't matter, but it does because later the ADL would try to argue that the jury wrongly convicted him because of antisemitism rather than because all the evidence showed that he did it in everyone's eyes. He was convicted. After the Judge, Leonard Roan, rejected all the appeals, he ordered Leo to be hanged on his birthday April 17, 1913. However Frank who was unanimously elected president of the B'nai Brith Chapter again even after being convicted of rape and murder had one last method to weasel out. He with Jewish pressure groups, appealed to the Governor. The lame-duck governor, John M. Slaton, in a very Clinton-esk move, commuted Leo's sentence his last week in office. He changed it from the death penalty to life in prison.Frank was knifed in prison by an inmate who took justice into their own hands. William Creen used a butcher knife and cut Leo's throat severely injuring him. On August 16th a mob broke into the prison captured Leo Frank and took him 2 miles away and hanged him. Although they took photographs no one in town would identify them. Of course the ADL twisted the story to say that these men were motivated by antisemitism and not that they hated him for raping and murdering a child. To see Southern Justice click hereThe ADL would fight to have him given a posthumous pardon which he got in 1986. Fred Grimm of the Miami Herald said in response to the pardon, “A salve for one of the South's most hateful, festering memories, was finally applied” showing his own prejudice towards the South rather than admitting a well known exploiter of child labor, who raped and killed a young girl and was unanimously convicted for the crime and sentenced to death was killed even after weaseling a pardon by an outgoing governor. Fred Grimm is constantly chasing down and doing stories about “Neo-Confederates” and “Neo-Nazis” as if either one are some huge bane and influence in modern society. Ironically it is groups like Antifa who act like ISIS tearing down American Statues and assaulting people. Despite having entire cities burned civilian homes and all by Lincoln's terrorists, not once in 150 years has a Southerner attacked a Union monument. Yelling racism at everything is fun though because it exercises safe moral indignation. That the US recently invaded Libya and have caused a country to be run by Al Qaeda terrorists who have revived the institution of slavery, selling humans for $400 in the market, doesn't seem to bother these same people so much as statues of Confederate generals. Apparently the Union military generals like Custer who rode west and committed genocide on Native Americans immediately following the Civil War, or enslaving the Chinese to build railroads, doesn't count as racism either.The ADL itself was created with Jewish mafia money. With connections to Meyer Lansky, Moe Dalitz, Bugsy Siegal, and illegal arms trafficker Hank Greenspun. The ADL gave Jewish gangster Moe Dalitz the Torch of Liberty Award. Dalitz was partnered with Galvastan's Sam Marceo and his brother Rosario of international narcotic trafficking fame. Dalitz and Sam began with a bootlegging gig. And it was the Maceo brothers who with Dalitz financed the Desert Inn Casio (where Frank Sinatra got his first Vegas gig). Interesting note, Sam's sister Olivia married Joseph Fertitta. You probably know the famous former owners of the UFC Frank III and Lorenzo Fertitta. They're all “family”. Maceo died only a year after purchasing the casino and it quickly went into the Fertitta side of the family. Dalitz not only did business with Maceo, he ran with the Mayfield Road gang in Ohio who had a branch dubbed the Collinwood Crew nicknamed the Young Turks. This is a very fitting name considering that the ADL denies the Armenian genocide. They even fired a New England Director Andrew H. Tarsy because he broke rank and called it a genocide. See killing 1,500,000 people isn't genocide because nothing is allowed to compete with the Holocaust victimhood.Moe Dalitz at Desert InnDalitz was an early business partner with Abe Berstien of the murderous Purple Gang. They used to murder motorists for sport. That didn't bother the ADL. In 1985 they gave Moe an award. Moe would become the Mob Boss of Cleveland, even tough most of his operations would move and center on Vegas. His businesses however were all over the United States. Dalitz was not only a close confidant of Meyer Lansky, the two co-owned the Frolic Club in Miami. (p.6)The Desert Inn casino also took investments from convicted illegal arms smuggler Hank Greenspun, who was not only invested but became the publicist as well. He owned the Las Vegas Sun and pulled a money laundering scheme with advertising that was similar to what Boris Berezovsky repeated in Russia. Prior to that, he had been the publicist for another Mafia Casino, the Flamingo, which was run by Lanksy's childhood friend and murderer Bugsy Siegal. Greenspun's wife was given top honors by the ADL. Her husband attempted to smuggle 42 Pratt and Whitney R2800 LOW airplane engines to Palestine when the Haganah terrorist group was creating the state of Israel through ethnic cleansing.After jury tampering, with the sole Jewish Juror meeting with the defense, Greenspun and two of his cohorts William Sosnow, and Samuel Lewis were acquitted, but his other partners Adolph Schwimmer, Leon Gardner, Renoyld Selk, and Abraham Levin, were convicted.But Greenspun would be found guilty of smuggling the machine guns that would go with the planes as well as artillery and ammo. He stole 30 and 50 cal machine guns from Hawaii and shipped them to the Haganah in Palestine through Mexico. When he was indicted Greenspun tried to bribe his way out. He offered $25,000 to Seth Solomon Pope “or anyone else designated by Pope” to “quash” a second Neutrality Act indictment against him. Solomon worked in Hawaii at the War Assets Administration, in charge of decommissioning and selling off WWII surplus. He was most likely the original contact for the smuggling. The man was investigated three time for fraudulent sales. They also stole over 500 machine gun barrels. Reportedly Hank took an addition 10% Kickback from arms sales he made. A Grand Jury in Los Angeles indicted Hank and six other of violating the Neutrality Act and Export Control Law, Title 50 United States Code section 701 and Title 22 United Stated Code, section 452. However he got only a 10k fine and no jail time. Greenspun was paid through the SSE. The SSE was a front for the AJDC's Lishka which financed communist and Bricha illegal immigration. The Jewish Agency which was the government in waiting that organized the terrorist groups that formed Israel, facilitated the cash flow to gun runners like Hank. In “Concealed in the Open: Recipients of International Clandestine Jewish Aid in Early 1950s Hungary” Zachary Paul Levine, of Yeshiva University Museum writes.“The JDC-Israeli collaboration that formed around clandestine emigration to Israel and welfare to migrants filled the vacuum with the creation of two institutions. The first was created in 1952 by the Israeli government's Liaison Bureau of the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, or Lishka by its Hebrew acronym, which collected information and administered individual aid. The second was created in Switzerland in 1953. Known as the Society for Mutual Aid (SSE by its French acronym), this organization directed AJDC funds to the Lishka and represented Jewish aid providers' interests to communist governments” …”However, as an American organization at the height of the McCarthy “Red Scare,” AJDC administrators could hardly justify the appearance of sending cash or material into a state with which the U.S. was technically engaged in “economic warfare.” In March 1953, the AJDC and Lishka together established the SSE, a “paper organization” that “covered” the AJDC-Israeli partnership, and provided a means for regularized AJDC funding for Lishka from the Joint's Relief-in-Transit budget that funded activities that might have contravened U.S. law (Beizer 2009: 117). The SSE's Swiss chairman, Erwin Haymann, had years of experience channeling money from the U.S. for Bricha and other clandestine activities. Funds traveled through the SSE and on to Lishka agents who received U.S. dollars or another western currency and exchanged them into Hungarian forints on the black market in Vienna. Subsequently, these forints traveled via diplomatic pouch or in the suitcase of an apparent traveler to the legation in Budapest, whose staff distributed the cash around the country.”We learned from declassified FBI documents that Erwin Haymann, the same man aiding communist on behalf of the JA is who made three transfers of 1.3 million dollars to Greenspun. Greenspun would later become the Western Director of bonds for Israel. Haymann sent the payments to Banco del Ahorro, Mexico by cable.Interesting, because 1.3 million is exactly how much Moe Dalitz sank into the Desert Inn Casino, which Greenspun was a publicist for and invested in, what a coincidence. If you are into Kennedy Research here is a cookie for you. Hungarian Jew Tibor Rosenbaum is the bridge between Meyer Lansky, Erwin Haymann, and heavy Florida-Cuba crime syndicate. …But I will leave that tangent alone. Greespun was known for having blackmail on political candidates, Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy even plotted to raid on the Vegas Sun vault in order to gain access to blackmail that Hank had on Howard Hughes. Hughes by the way bought Mafia properties like the Desert Inn Casino using millions in cash. They credit him with cleaning Vegas up from the mob, it was more like the mob took him to the cleaners. Dalitz ironically started out with a cash only dry cleaning business.Kennedy whose father was involved with the Outfit and the East Coast mob and who had a love affair with his friend Frank Sinatra's ex-girlfriend Judith Exner while she was also involved with Chicago mob boss Sam Giacanna. Sinatra introduced her to JFK. Kennedy gave Greenspun a pardon his first year in office. I wonder why. LBJ likewise was sleeping with Mathilde Krim who was also part of the Swiss connection who help Irgun terrorist. Johnson did all this while she was married to his campaign advisor Athur Krim, a willing cuck. It makes you rethink Monica Lewinsky doesn't it. Well Clinton did give Jewish Billionaire Marc Rich a pardon, after Rich donated $100,000 to the ADL. Rich was yet another crook in the Swiss connection.These are the founders and reward recipients of the ADL. The ADL was given defacto powers of an intelligence agency in the United State and it gathers intel on who it pleases. It is anything but an Anti-Defamation League. They defame people themselves. The ADL under the cover of fighting Anti-Semitism, simply uses this cry as a club to chase down and censor anyone critical of Zionism or the Israeli state. If you point out that Israeli snipers are shooting children in Palestine from across the border, then the ADL can get you removed. Vimeo stole $5,000 in profits from me and erased six years worth of my work because of my criticism of Israel. When the ADL partnered with YouTube December of 2008, my channel was gone the first day, and over a thousand videos were erased. No justification was needed, simply the accusation of antisemitism. When I made a complaint in my appeal I learned that the ADL would oversee the case. Of course I never had my channel restored nor was I even given an explanation from YouTube. Another wing of the ADL is the SPLC and they too have been granted censorship powers across social media. The ADL used the SPLC as both an attack dog and a buffer to separate itself from ramifications of its constant chicken little censorship. In the rare case of actual antisemitic groups online or otherwise the ADL has been busted reacting to its own creations as the “Nazis” they screech about turn out to be their own provocateurs.Birthed to defend a murdering child rapist, financed by mass murdering terrorists and organized crime, narcotic peddling, gun running, psychopaths formed the pro Zionist organizational bully called the ADL. They have been caught spying through American police departments, spying on American citizens, and even coaching American police on what they should be on the look out for and how Hate Crime means anything Israel doesn't like. And this is their great online weapon. The Zog Media already refuses to report on what Israel is doing to Palestine, the Israeli role in orchestrating the Iraq War, and the Proxy War on Syria. People have been giving the information online. Naturally the ADL has been censoring such journalist all while screaming antisemitism. AIPAC bribes congress and the ADL censors the media. It is a one two punch to protect criminal Zionists interest. And now you know its criminal origins. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.ryandawson.org/subscribe

It may be surprising to note, that the biggest terrorist attack of the Mandate era was actually perpetrated by the Jewish Agency against Jewish refugees.    Notes: Palestine Hijacked: How Zionism Forged an Apartheid State from River to Sea, by Thomas Suárez: https://amzn.eu/d/7i397uA   The Patrai Affair, Moderates vs. activists in Mapai in the 1940s, by Meir Chazan: https://humanities1.tau.ac.il/segel/meirch/files/2012/08/The-Patria-Affair.pdf   Cover image of Moshe Sharett and Yitzhak Sadeh   Buy me a coffee: https://buymeacoffee.com/dsconsciousness   Become a subscriber: https://payhip.com/b/Sq0ZB   Rain and Tears by Neutrin05   / neutrin05   Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported  — CC BY-SA 3.0  Free Download / Stream: http://bit.ly/2PKvY28 Music promoted by Audio Library    • Rain and Tears – Neutrin05 (No Copyright) matt2131@hotmail.com

This week, we are re-releasing the top episode chosen by Wondering Jews' loyal listeners. Mijal and Noam are joined by special guest Rabbi Joe Schwartz, director of Makom, the Israel Education Laboratory of the Jewish Agency. They explore the complexities of Jewish identity, Zionism, and the evolving relationship between Israel and the global Jewish community, particularly in light of the events of October 7th. The discussion includes the challenges of bridging the gap between American Jewry and Israel, the implications of Israel's rightward political shift, and personal reflections on what it means to be a Zionist today. Get in touch at WonderingJews@jewishunpacked.com, and call us, 1-833-WON-Jews. Follow @jewishunpacked on Instagram and check out Unpacked on youtube. ------------ This podcast was brought to you by Unpacked, a division of OpenDor Media. For other podcasts from Unpacked, check out: Jewish History Nerds Unpacking Israeli History Soulful Jewish Living Stars of David with Elon Gold 

From warning Jews to leave Germany, prior to WWII, to the founding and building the State of Israel and beyond, since 1929, the Jewish Agency has worked to secure a vibrant Jewish future. Today, the Jewish Agency provides the global framework for Aliyah (Jewish immigration to Israel) and is working feverishly to get Jews out of persecuted regions. We are joined By Dvora Ganani of the Jewish Agency on this edition of End of the Age! --------------- 📱: It's never been easier to understand. Stream One Source Network and access exclusive content: https://watch.osn.tv/browse 📚: Check out Jerusalem Prophecy College Online for less than $60 per course: https://jerusalemprophecycollege.com 🏧: America's Christian Credit Union: Make the switch from the BIG banks: https://www.endtime.com/switch ☕️: First Cup Coffee: Use code ENDTIME to get 10% off: https://www.firstcup.com 🥤: Ready Pantry: https://www.readypantry.com/endtime ⭐️ Birtch Gold: https://www.birchgold.com/endtime Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dear Trolls,  We thought we explained this to you well enough but we clearly haven't. Over 95% of Jews understand this well: Your attempt to separate Jews from their origins in Judea-Samaria (aka Israel) is blatant Jew hatred disguised as anti-Zionism. Being said, I brought on an expert from the Jewish Agency for Israel. Daniel Elbaum has dedicated his life to understanding the complicated geopolitics and history of the middle easy. Elbaum understands that such matters require microscopic-level analyses and intricate and articulate explanations. Elbaum reveals deeper connections to Chaz Volk, host of Bad Jew, in hopes to arm listeners with the facts to help them explain the truth more effectively.  00:00 Discussing Jewish connection to Israel amidst conflict 04:00 Introduction 08:00 Israel is essential to Jewish identity and history 10:10 History repeats 14:59 Israeli support of the Jewish state 17:28 Questioning motives 22:15 Antisemitic enablers 25:14 Prayer for anti-Zionists' enlightenment 29:00 Israel: refuge and homecoming  30:38 Israel's importance globally. 33:41 Conclusion About Daniel Elbaum: Dan Elbaum is the Head of North America for The Jewish Agency for Israel and President and CEO of Jewish Agency International Development(JAID). In this role, he leads and oversees all aspects of the historic organization's North American operations. Since taking on his current position, Elbaum has spearheaded innovative new ways to advance The Jewish Agency's work in connecting American Jews to Israel and Jews around the world. He has appeared in media outlets ranging from NBC Date line to Al Jazeera and has had opinion pieces published in both English and Hebrew in some of America and Israel's leading newspapers. In 2023, the Alpha Epsilon Pi Foundation awarded Elbaum the Gitelson Silver Medallion for his commitment to world Jewry. In the fraternity's110-year history, only 55 alumni out of 120,000 have received this award. Prior to joining The Jewish Agency, Elbaum was the Chief Advocacy Officer for the American Jewish Committee (AJC) where he oversaw the organization's advocacy efforts around the world. He had previously served as AJC's Director of Regional Offices, and before that as Regional Director of AJC Chicago. He came to AJC after six years as Civil Rights Counsel and Director of Development for the Anti-Defamation League's Midwest Region. Before entering the world of Jewish non-profits, Elbaum was a felony prosecutor in the Cook County State's Attorney's Office. He is a graduate of the University of Illinois College of Law and lives in the suburbs of Chicago with his wife and two daughters. SPECIAL THANKS TO THE SPONSOR OF THIS EPISODE: JEWISH BIG BROTHERS AND BIG SISTERS OF LOS ANGELES! Become a big today! JBBBSLA.org/mentorship Connect with Bad Jew:  BadJew.co https://linktr.ee/badjew BadJewPod@gmail.com Ig @BadJewPod TikTok @BadJewPod

We're taking a week off from our main podcast, but we want to share with you an episode of our new podcast, 18 Questions, 40 Israeli Thinkers, recorded on Sept. 9. Subscribe to on Spotify or Apple Podcasts to catch the latest episode every Monday. Until Hamas is gone, Haviv Rettig Gur says, Gaza will be unable to recover after the war.The Times of Israel journalist and political analyst has emerged as a leading voice for the Israeli public and the Jewish world for deeper understandings of the war's developments. Haviv has covered Israeli politics — domestic and foreign — for nearly two decades and speaks internationally about Zionism, the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict, and Israel's future.Haviv was previously the director of communications for the Jewish Agency for Israel, and currently teaches history and politics at Israeli premilitary academies.Now, he joins us to answer 18 questions on Israel, including the country's leadership, Western media, and the Palestinian future.Here are our 18 questions:As an Israeli, and as a Jew, how are you feeling at this moment in Israeli history?What has been Israel's greatest success and greatest mistake in its war against Hamas?Do you think Western media covers the Israel-Hamas War fairly?What do you look for in deciding which Knesset party to vote for?Which is more important for Israel: Judaism or democracy?What role should the Israeli government have in religious matters?Should Israel treat its Jewish and non-Jewish citizens the same?Now that Israel already exists, what is the purpose of Zionism?Is opposing Zionism inherently antisemitic?Is the IDF the world's most moral army?If you were making the case for Israel, where would you begin?Can questioning the actions of Israel's government and army — such as in the context of this war — be a valid form of love and patriotism?What do you think is the most legitimate criticism leveled against Israel today?Do you think peace between Israelis and Palestinians will happen within your lifetime?What should happen with Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict after the war?Where do you read news about Israel?Where do you identify on Israel's political and religious spectrum, and do you have friends on the “other side”?Do you have more hope or fear for Israel and the Jewish People?Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/18forty-podcast--4344730/support.

“I never thought there's antisemitism. It's something from the past, for my grandparents, for my mom a little, but it's not something in my generation, or my kids' generation. It's done . . . apparently, not.” Einat Admony is a chef, cookbook author, comedian, and social media star who grew up in Bnei Brak, Israel. With parents from Iran and Yemen, Einat spent her childhood in the kitchens of Mizrahi, Sephardi, and Ashkenazi neighbors. Learn about her family's deep-rooted Jewish heritage in Iran and the broader Middle East. Along with her mother Ziona's journey from Iran to Israel in 1948, Einat discusses the antisemitism she's dealt with online and on the streets in the past year. Hear her stories of Jewish-Muslim coexistence in Iran and memories of spices and perfumes that inspire Einat's dishes. Her cookbooks Balaboosta and Shuk, along with her Manhattan restaurant Balaboosta, reflect a blend of tradition and innovation. “You could not have Judaism today, if it were not for the Jews of Iran,” says Houman Sarshar, an independent scholar and director of publications at the Center for Iranian Jewish Oral History in Los Angeles. Sarshar highlights the historical relationship between Iran and Israel, noting that Iran was the second Muslim-majority country to recognize Israel post-1948.  The conversation also touches on the challenges faced by Jews in Iran, their cultural integration, and the impact of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.  —- Show notes: How much do you know about Jewish history in the Middle East? Take our quiz. Sign up to receive podcast updates. Learn more about the series. Song credits:  Pond5:  “Desert Caravans”: Publisher: Pond5 Publishing Beta (BMI), Composer: Tiemur Zarobov (BMI), IPI#1098108837 “Suspense Middle East” Publisher: Victor Romanov, Composer: Victor Romanov; Item ID: 196056047 ___ Episode Transcript: EINAT ADMONY: I've been in Israel a few months ago. It's like you always feel loved, you always feel supported. It's still home. It's always going to be my home. MANYA BRACHEAR PASHMAN: The world has overlooked an important episode in modern history: the 800,000 Jews who left or were driven from their homes in the Middle East and North Africa in the mid-20th century. Welcome to the second season of The Forgotten Exodus, brought to you by American Jewish Committee. This series explores that pivotal moment in history and the little-known Jewish heritage of Iran and Arab nations. As Jews around the world confront violent antisemitism and Israelis face daily attacks by terrorists on multiple fronts, our second season explores how Jews have lived throughout the region for generations despite hardship, hostility, and hatred, then sought safety and new possibilities in their ancestral homeland. I'm your host, Manya Brachear Pashman. Join us as we explore untold family histories and personal stories of courage, perseverance, and resilience from this transformative and tumultuous period of history for the Jewish people and the Middle East.  The world has ignored these voices. We will not.  This is The Forgotten Exodus. Today's episode: Leaving Iran. MANYA: Whether she's deviling eggs soaked in beet juice, simmering Oxtail in shawarma spices, or sprinkling za'atar on pastry dough, chef Einat Admony is honoring her family's Middle Eastern heritage. Both the places where they have lived for generations, as well as the place they have and will always call home: Israel.   EINAT/Clip: Start with brushing the puff pastry with olive oil and za'atar. Have some feta all around and shredded mozzarella. Take the other sheet and just cut it to one inch strips. Now we're going to twist. Need to be careful. Now we're just gonna brush the top with the mix of oil and za'atar. Get it some shiny and glazy. This is ready for the oven. Bake at 400 until it's golden. That's it super easy, just sprinkle some za'atar and eat. MANYA: For the chef, author, reality TV star, and comedian, food reflects the Zionist roots that have been a constant for Einat, the self-made balaboosta, who is largely credited with introducing Israeli cuisine to the U.S. That love for Israel goes back generations, long before the modern state existed, when her maternal ancestors lived in the land, that until 1935 was known as Persia, but is now known as Iran. Her own mother Ziona, the third of seven siblings, was even named for the destination where Einat's grandparents aspired to one day raise their family. Returning home to the land of Zion from which Jews had been exiled centuries earlier was always the goal. When you ask her why, Einat laughs in disbelief.  EINAT: Why? Why? That's homeland. I think a lot of Jewish people for hundreds of years was, that's in every prayer, it's in every Shabbat dinner evening. MANYA: The hatred directed toward Israel by Iran's regime in the form of the deadly attacks on Israel by Iran-backed terrorist groups and the Islamic Republic of Iran itself make it hard to believe that Iran was once a place where Jews and the Zionist movement thrived. But in fact, Iran's history includes periods when the wide-open roads between Iran and Israel ran two ways and the countries not only lived in harmony but worked in close partnership.  Iran was the second Muslim-majority country after Turkey to recognize the modern state of Israel after its formation in 1948, and the two established diplomatic ties. Regular flights ran between Tehran's Mehrabad International Airport and Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion airport.  SARSHAR: We cannot overlook the fact that since October 29, 539 BCE the Jewish community of Iran remains to this day the largest community of Jews anywhere in the Middle East outside the state of Israel. To this day. You could not have Judaism today, if it were not for the Jews of Iran.  MANYA: Houman Sarshar is an independent scholar and director of publications at the Center for Iranian Jewish Oral History in Los Angeles. He has edited a number of books, including Esther's Children: A Portrait of Iranian Jews.  SARSHAR: The history of the Jews in Iran begins about 2,700 years ago, when the first community of known Jews was taken to Iran. They are commonly believed to be one of the 10 Lost Tribes. And then when we fast forward to when Nebuchadnezzar came and destroyed the temple in Jerusalem and took Jews into captivity. Some years after that at 539 BCE on October 29, 539 BCE, to be exact, Cyrus the Great, the founder of the Achaemenid dynasty, liberated Babylon and gave Jews the permission to go back to Israel and rebuild the Second Temple. MANYA: Cyrus the Great – a Persian emperor particularly renowned among contemporary scholars for the respect he showed toward peoples' customs and religions in the lands that he conquered. According to the Book of Ezra in the Hebrew Bible, Cyrus even paid for the restoration of the Jewish temple in Jerusalem. SARSHAR: This is known as the Second Temple period in Jewish history, and under the Achaemenid dynasty, Jews participated in every level of society. And a few centuries forward, around the 5th Century, we know the Jews continue to live with many freedoms, because that is the era when the Babylonian Talmud was originally produced in Iran by Rav Ashi. So, you know, there was a thriving rabbanut (rabbanite) in Iran who had the freedom and the luxury and the time to be able to produce such an important document as the Talmud, which has become the cornerstone of all jurisprudence that we know, Western law, and everything. MANYA: The advent and arrival of Islam in Iran in the 7th Century CE changed circumstances somewhat. As was the case across the Middle East, all non-Muslims became dhimmis – residents who paid a special tax and lived under certain restrictions. The situation for Jews worsened in the 16th Century when the Safavid dynasty made the Shiite creed the dominant form of Islam in Iran. Fatwas made life for all non-Shiites quite difficult. SARSHAR: And for reasons that are still open to discussion, all of these restrictions were most vehemently imposed on the Jews of Iran. And because of these restrictions, all non-Shiites were considered religiously impure. And this religious impurity, kind of like the concept of the untouchable sect in India, they were considered pollutive. MANYA: Jews could not look Muslims in the eye. They were placed in ghettos called mahaleh where they could not leave on rainy days for fear the water that splattered on them could contaminate the water supply. They wore yellow stars and special shoes to distinguish them from the rest of the population. They were not allowed to purchase property from Muslims or build homes with walls that were higher than those of their Muslim neighbors. SARSHAR: They could not, for example, participate in the trade of edible goods because, you know, fruits and vegetables and meats carried this pollution. So Muslims could no longer consume the foods that were touched by Jews. And as a result, this created a certain path forward in history for the Jews of Iran.  They went into antique trades. They went into carpet trades. They went into work of textiles. They became musicians. And for the following 500 years, these restrictions kind of guided the way the Jews of Iran lived in that country, even though they had been there for thousands of years previously. MANYA: Houman said the 1895 arrival of the Alliance Israélite Universelle, a Paris-based network of schools for Jewish children throughout the Middle East and North Africa, including within the mahalehs in Persia, was the first step in a series of improvements for Jews there. SARSHAR: Previous to that, Jews were not allowed to get any kind of an education whatsoever. The only teachers were the Muslim clergy, and they refused to teach anything to Jewish students. So this allowed for the Jewish community to finally start to get a Western-style education, which was very important at that time, given all of the dynamics that were going on in society with modernity. MANYA: As educational opportunities increased in the middle of the 19th Century, so did opportunities for the courtiers and elite to travel and see the Western world as it industrialized and modernized, expanding international trade and sharing wealth more widely. SARSHAR: Often they would be sent by their families to go and try to see if they can, you know, find a way to expand the family's businesses and lives as merchants, and they would come back shocked. I mean, Iran was a place where you know of mostly mud brick homes and dirt roads and people riding around on donkeys. And imagine this is all you've known. You never see women walking around the street. The only women you have ever seen with your own eyes in your life are your mom, your sister, your daughter or your wife, and occasionally, sex workers. And that's it. So all of a sudden, you know, you travel a couple of months by boat and train, and you get to Paris, and it's impossible to try to even conceive of the experience. It must have been something like the Hegelian experience of the sublime. What can the world look like? And where is it that I live in, and why isn't my country the same as this? MANYA: By the early 20th Century, the Persian people concluded the answer to that question was in the rule of law. The reason the European nations provided such opportunity for the community at-large had to do with the fact that the law of the land was not arbitrary or enforced by religion or royalty. It was embedded in a constitution – a set of laws that define the structure of a government and the rights of its citizens – a Western tenet that reduced the power of the clergy and created a parliament called the Majles. SARSHAR: They were starting to read travel journals. They were starting to understand the perspective that Westerners had on Iranians, and those perspectives were often awful. You know, the Western world believed, for example –the country was corrupt to the bone in every respect.  So all of these things gradually led to a call for a constitution, the major pivot of which was the establishment of a legislature of law that would start to create a community where everyone can feel like they're equal in the eyes of the law and have something to gain by trying to improve the country as a whole. Iran became the first constitutional monarchy in the Middle East in 1906 when that revolution happened, it was a momentous event. And really, things really, really did, in fact, start to change. MANYA: In 1925, Reza Shah Pahlavi – an arch nationalist who wanted to propel Iran forward into the industrial age – took over the crown of Iran. He welcomed any Iranian citizen to participate in that agenda. SARSHAR: By now, we had a good two generations of Jews who had been French-educated by the Allianz Society.  They had all gone to France at some point in their lives, so they were able to participate in this industrialization of the country, given the language skills that they had and some of the connections they had built in the Western world. MANYA: Both World Wars in Europe took a massive toll on Iran. Despite declaring neutrality, Iran was occupied by European nations that took over the nation's agriculture, treating Iran as a pantry to feed the armies. Droughts and disease worsened the toll. SARSHAR: One of the lesser-known factoids about history is that during World War I, the nation that lost the most individuals as a result of the war was Iran. Above and beyond all European nations who were at war, because of a famine that had started in Iran. The same dynamic started to happen in World War II. MANYA: With nationalist fever sweeping Europe and Iran, the Allies feared the arch-nationalist Shah would go the way of Franco in Spain, Mussolini in Italy, and Hitler in Germany. They also feared the Shah would collaborate with Hitler's Germany to provide oil for the German oil machine and cease being the pantry the Allies needed it to be. In 1941, the Western powers convinced him to abdicate the throne to his son Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. And when the war ended, Iran was able to enjoy the same economic benefits as the rest of the world at peace time. Most importantly, it was able to profit from its own oil reserves, significantly boosting Iran's national income. SARSHAR: In 1941, it was really the beginning of what is commonly referred to by the scholars of Jewish Iranian history as the Golden Age of Iranian Jewry. From 1941 until the revolution in 1978, the Jewish community of Iran saw a meteoric rise to power and social wealth. Industries such as pharmaceuticals, banking, insurance, real estate development, and other major industries, the aluminum plastics industries in Iran, all were either directly owned by the Jews of Iran or managed under their management.  And during this period, really, we can say that for the first time, after 2,500 years, the Jews of Iran really started to experience the kinds of freedoms that they had not seen since the Achaemenid dynasty. And it is during this time that, you know, we see, really, that life started to change for the Jews of Iran, even though some of the age-old social dynamics were still there.  The institutionalized antisemitism had not been completely wiped out. But for the most part, things had changed because Iranian society in general was also being Westernized, light speed. And many educated people had realized that antisemitism was really looked down upon, you know, that kind of prejudice was really no longer acceptable in the world at large. So many, many sections of the community really had shifted, genuinely shifted. And some, even though maybe their feelings had not changed, knew that their antisemitism was something that they needed to keep private. MANYA: At that time, Iran also became a refuge for Jews fleeing Europe and other parts of the Middle East. On June 1, 1941, a brutal pogrom in Iraq known as the Farhud, incited by Nazi propaganda, targeted Jews celebrating the holiday of Shavuot. Nearly 200 Jews were murdered in the streets. The violence became a turning point for Iraqi Jews. Thousands fled, many stopping in Iran, which became a way station for those headed to Palestine.  In 1942, thousands of Jewish refugees from Poland who had fled across the border into the Soviet Union during the German invasion traveled on trains and ships to Iran. Among the refugees – 1,000 orphaned children.  As Zionist leaders worked to negotiate the young Jews' immigration to Palestine, the Jewish Agency established the “Tehran Home for Jewish Children” – a complex of tents on the grounds of a former Iranian Air Force barracks outside Tehran. More than 800 orphans, escorted by adults, most of them also refugees, moved from Tehran to kibbutzim in Palestine the following year. Later, in 1948, when most Arab League states forbade the emigration of their Jews after the creation of Israel, the Zionist underground continued to smuggle Jews to Iran at about a rate of 1,000 a month, before they were flown to Israel. SARSHAR: The Zionist movement was fairly strong in Iran. It was a very lively movement. The Balfour Declaration was celebrated in all of the Allianz schools in Iran, and very soon thereafter, the first Zionist organization of Iran was established. And truly many of its founding fathers were some of the leading industrialists and intellectuals in Iranian society, in the Jewish Iranian community for the years to come. It was not unlike the kind of Zionism we see today in the United States, for example. You know, the wealthy families of the Jewish communities in New York and Los Angeles, all are very passionate about Israel, but you don't see very many of them selling their homes and packing up and moving to Israel because they just don't want to do it. They feel like they're very comfortable here. And what matters is that a state of Israel should exist, and they are political advocates of that state and of that policy and of its continued existence, but not necessarily diehard participants in the experiment itself. Iranians, after the establishment of the State of Israel, were being encouraged to move to Israel, and the Israeli government was having a lot of difficulty with that, because a lot of Iranians were seeing that life had become better for them, and they weren't as willing to leave, despite the fact that the Kourosh Project provided airplanes to get Jews out of Iran. My own great-grandmother was one of those passengers. She is buried in Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. She was one of the early citizens of Israel who went to live out the Zionist dream. MANYA: Both sides of Einat's family – her mother and father's ancestors – were among those early Israeli citizens. Einat's father was born in Tel Aviv. His parents and grandparents had come from Yemen in the late 19th Century. Einat's mother Ziona was 10 years old when in 1948, the family left Kerman, a city in southeastern Iran known for its carpet weaving and woolen shawls. They arrived in Israel with their suitcases ready to fulfill their dream. But living the dream in the new Jewish nation was not easy. After all, the day after Israel declared its independence, Arab nations attacked the Jewish state, launching the first of a series of Arab-Israeli Wars. EINAT: The story of my mom, it's a very interesting story. The family didn't have much money. There wasn't like, rich family that left, very different story. No, both of my parents come from very, I would say, very poor family. My grandpa was, like, dealing with textile. He was like, traveling from town to town with fabric. And that's what they did. They put them in what's called ma'aborot, which was like a very kind of small villages, tin houses. My mom always said there were seven kids, so all of them in one room. In the winter it's freezing; in the summer, it's super hot. But it was also close to the border, so the one window they have, they always had to cover it so at night, the enemy cannot see the light inside that room and shoot there. Also in the ma'aabarot, nobody speaks the same language. So, it was Moroccan and Iraqi and nobody speak the same dialect or the same language. So, they cannot even communicate quite yet. MANYA: Most of Ziona's six siblings did not go to school. To make it possible for Ziona, her parents placed her in a foster home with an Iraqi family in Ramat Gan, east of Tel Aviv. EINAT: My mom's family decided that for her, she should get education, because most of the siblings didn't went to school or anything, So they put her in a foster home. In an Iraqi home, and she didn't speak a word there. So my mom, as a 10 years old, became a kid for foster parents that live in a center in Ramat Gan, where I basically grew up. And she got education, which was great. She learned also Iraqi, which is Arabic. So she speaks fluent Arabic, but she had not an easy life in coming to Israel from a different country. MANYA: Ziona has shared many of these stories with her daughter in the kitchen and dining room as they prepare and enjoy dishes that remind them of home. When she visited her daughter at her home in upstate New York at the end of the summer, Einat collected as many stories as she could over cutting boards, steaming pots, and sizzling pans. EINAT: There's a lot of story coming up, some old story that I know, some new stories. And it's really nice, because my mom is 84, 85. So, it's really nice to capture all of it, all of it. There is a lot of interesting stuff that happened during the first 10 years when she came to Israel.  That's the main, I think, I always talk about, like, how I grew up and how much food was a very substantial part of our life, if not the biggest part. You know, it's like, family can fight and this, but when it's come to the dinner, it's just change everything, the dynamic. For us, it was a big, significant part of everything. So obviously, most of these stories and memories come in while we're cooking or eating. A lot of time she used to talk about, and still talking about the smells, the smells of the flowers, the smells of the zafar (perfume). She still have the nostalgia from that time and talking very highly about what Iran used to be, and how great, and the relationship between the Muslims and the Jews back then. My grandpa's best friend was crying when he left, and he said: ‘Please don't go. Stay with us.' And he said: ‘I want to go to homeland.' So, they have a really great relationship. She's always talking, actually, about how they come for Shabbat dinner, the friends if they put the cigarettes outside of the door in Shabbat because they were observant. So cigarettes, lighter, everything, they keep it outside, in the garden, not coming inside the house. So a lot of mutual respect for the religion to each other. And I love that stories. It just showed what's happened when people take it extreme. MANYA: Einat's cookbooks and restaurant menus are filled with recipes from her own childhood and her parents' upbringing. To satisfy the appetite of her father, a former Israeli athlete, her house always had hummus and every weekend, the family made a hilbeh sauce --  a traditional Yemenite fenugreek dip made with cardamom, caraway seeds and chili flakes. Other recipes reflect her mother's Persian roots. And then there are recipes that, at first blush, seem to come out of left field, but are inspired by the Iraqi Jewish foster family that raised her mother, and the Mizrahi, Sephardi, and Ashkenazi neighbors that passed through the dining room and kitchen where Einat was raised in Bnei Brak.  Now a Haredi town east of Tel Aviv, it was then a diverse population of Jews from, well, everywhere. Einat still remembers standing on a stool next to the Moroccan neighbor in her building learning how to roll couscous. EINAT: One neighbor that was my second mom, her name was Tova, and she was Moroccan, so it was like, I have another Moroccan mom. But all the building was all Holocaust survivors. None of them had kids, and they were all speaking in Yiddish, mostly. So I grew up with a lot of mix. I wouldn't say, you know, in my time, it's not like our neighborhood. I grew up in Bnei Brak, and our neighborhood was very, it was before Bnei Brak became so religious like today. It was still religious, if you go really in, but we're close to Ramat Gan, and I have to say that it's, I would say, I didn't grow up with, it's very mixed, very mixed.  Wouldn't say I grew up just with Moroccan or Mizrahi, I say that it's very, very mixed. And my mom same. I think a lot of her friend is like, It's my mom would speak some Yiddish. She would do Kugel on Shabbat next to the jachnun and all the Mizrahi food. You know, this is the multi-pot and one things I love in Israel. You can see in one table so many different cultures. And that's something that would have happened in my house a lot. MANYA: That amalgam of Jewish cultures is reflected in her cookbooks Balaboosta and Shuk. It also shows up in her menu at the brick-and-mortar Balaboosta, a quaint Middle Eastern trattoria on Mulberry Street in Manhattan.  The name Balaboosta is borrowed from Yiddish meaning “a perfect housewife” – a twist on ba'al habayit, Hebrew for master of the house, or boss. But Einat insists that the term is no longer exclusively Ashkenazi, nor does it refer exclusively to a woman's domestic role. EINAT: An old friend, chef, asked me when I went to open Balaboosta, and I said, ‘I don't have a name.' She said: ‘What do you call a badass woman in Hebrew?' I'm like, ‘balaboosta.' She said, ‘It's a perfect name. We done.' Took five minutes to find this name, and I love it. It's really connected because for me it's so so much different things. You know, I always talk about the 20th century balaboosta. The balaboosta that outside going to work, the balaboosta that asking a man for a date. The balaboosta that it's not just like she's the housewife and the homekeeper. It's much more than that. Today, she's a multitask badass.  It's much more spiritual than what it is. I think it's the one that can bond the people together and bring them together and make peace between two parties clashing. So for me, it's much more than somebody that can cook and clean. So, much, much more than that. MANYA: Einat's parents became more religious when she was 12, which of course had the opposite effect on their daughter: she rebelled. When her time came to do her mandatory service in the Israel Defense Force, she was determined not to serve in a role typically assigned to women. She requested a post as a firing instructor. But after reviewing the high school transcript shaped by her rebellious adolescence, the IDF assigned her to the Nevatim Air Base where she served as a chauffeur for fighter pilots. EINAT: Back then most women would be secretaries giving coffee to some assholes. I was trying not to do that, and somehow I got very lucky, and I was in the same division, I was in the Air Force. I had amazing time for two years. I start the military a very different person, and left a very different person. I used to hang with a lot of bad people before, really bad people. And when I get to the military, I was a driver of pilots, it's the top of the top of the top in the hierarchy in the military in all IDF. So now I'm hanging with people that have the biggest ambition ever, and I'm learning new stuff, and everything opened up, even my language changed completely. Everything. I was want to travel more than I ever want before, and I have like, crazy dreams. MANYA: To make sure the elite pilots were well-fed, the IDF bused in a group of Yemenite grandmothers to provide ochel bayit, or home-cooked meals. Einat befriended the kitchen staff and helped out from time to time. Then in January 1991, she was tapped to cook a meal that probably launched her career. The IDF chiefs of staff had convened at Nevatim base to discuss the U.S. plan to bomb Iraq during the Gulf War and what Israel would do if Saddam Hussein retaliated with an attack on the Jewish state. But they needed to plot that strategy on full stomachs. A couple of pilots served as her sous chefs. That night, the Israeli generals dined on Chinese chicken with garlic, honey, and soy. And a rice salad. EINAT: It was definitely the turning point, the military.  I would say there is some values of relationship and working ethics that I wouldn't see anywhere else, and that's coming, I think because the military. They're waking up in the morning, the friendship, they're no snitching or none of this. It's to stand up for each other. There is so many other values that I grabbed from that. So when I start my culinary career, and I was in a fine dining kitchen, it was very helpful, very helpful. MANYA: After spending five years in a van driving around Germany – an extended celebration of freedom after IDF service --  it was time to get serious about a career. A culinary career made as good a sense as any. Einat worked as a waitress in Eilat and enrolled in culinary school. At the end, she marched into the kitchen of Keren, one of the first restaurants in Israel to offer haute cuisine. She got an internship, then a job. The former restaurant, run by Israeli Chef and television host Haim Cohen, is credited for reinventing Israeli cuisine. Now, as a restaurant owner and TV personality herself, Einat is largely credited for introducing Israeli cuisine to the U.S. But before she became the self-made Balaboosta of fine Israeli dining, Einat was America's Falafel Queen, made famous by two victories on the Food Network's show Chopped and her first restaurant – now a fast food chain called Ta'im Falafel. But her fame and influence when it comes to Israeli cooking has exposed her to a fair bit of criticism. She has become a target on social media by those who accuse Israelis of appropriating Palestinian foods – an argument she calls petty and ridiculous. So ridiculous, she has found the best platform to address it is on the stage of her new hobby: stand-up comedy. Cooking has always been her Zen. But so is dark humor. EINAT: I like comedy more than anything, not more than food, but close enough. EINAT/Clip: Yeah, this year was great here on Instagram, lot of hate comments, though. A lot about food appropriation, me making Arabic dishes. So let me clarify something here. I check my DNA through ancestry.com and I am 97% Middle Eastern, so I fucking bleed hummus. EINAT: It's very petty. Food, supposed always to share. Food supposed to moving forward.  It's tiring and life is much more complex than to even argue and have a debate about stupid things. I'm done. OK, yes, we're indigenous.I have connection to the land. My parents, my grandparents and great grandparents have connection to that land. Okay, I get it. Now we need to solve what's going on, because there was Palestinian that lived there before, and how we can, for me, how we change the ideology, which I don't see how we can, but how we can change the ideology, convince them that they want peace. And they want…I don't know. MANYA: Needless to say, in the year that has followed the attacks of October 7, stand-up comedy has not been the balm it once was. The attacks that unfolded that day by Iran-backed terrorists that killed more than 1,200 Israelis and kidnapped more than 250 more was simply too devastating. EINAT: I was broken there, my husband was with me, I was every day on a bed crying, and then going to work, and it was like I couldn't hear music, because every music thinking about Nova and my friends and then I couldn't see babies with a mom. Everything was a trigger. It was bad. We had a disaster of October 7 and then October 8 to see the world reaction was another. It's not just enough that we going through so much grief and need to kind of contain all that emotion and crazy and anger and rage and now we need to see the world's. Like, ok. I never thought there is antisemitism. It's something from the past, for my grandparents, for my mom a little, but it's not something in my generation, or my kids' generation. It's done, apparently, not. MANYA: The lack of sympathy around the world and among her culinary peers only amplified Einat's grief. As a way to push for a cease-fire and end U.S. support for Israel, nearly 900 chefs, farmers and others in the food industry signed a pledge to boycott Israel-based food businesses and culinary events that promote Israel. EINAT: I felt very, very alone, very alone. The first few months, I felt like, wow, not one call from anyone to check on me. It was pretty sad. At the same time, I'm in the best company ever Jewish community. There is nothing like that, nothing. MANYA: Her team at Balaboosta also checked in on their Israeli boss. But they too were scared. Soon after she posted pictures of the hostages on the window of her restaurant, she confronted a group of teenagers who tried to tear them down. EINAT: I stand in front of them and I said, ‘You better move fast'. MANYA: It's no secret that Iran helped plan Oct. 7. What is not as well known is how many Jews still live and thrive in Iran. Before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, there were nearly 100,000 Jews in Iran. Today, Israeli sources say the population numbers less than 10,000, while the regime and Iran's Jewish leaders say it's closer to 20,000. Regardless, Iran's Jewish community remains the largest in the Middle East outside Israel.  To be sure, the constitution adopted in 1906 is still in place nominally, and it still includes Jews as a protected religious minority. Jews in Iran have synagogues, access to kosher meat, and permission to consume wine for Shabbat, despite a national ban on alcohol. There's also a Jewish representative in Iran's parliament or Majlis. But all women and girls regardless of religion are required to wear a veil, according to the Islamist dress code, and Jews are pressured to vote in elections at Jewish-specific ballot stations so the regime can monitor their participation. Zionism is punishable by death and after Oct. 7, the regime warned its Jewish citizens to sever contact with family and friends in Israel or risk arrest. They also can't leave. Iranian law forbids an entire Jewish nuclear family from traveling abroad at the same time. At least one family member, usually the father, must remain behind to prevent emigration. But Houman points out that many Iranian Jews, including himself, are deeply attached to Iranian culture. As a resident of Los Angeles, he reads Persian literature, cooks Persian herb stew for his children and speaks in Persian to his pets. He would return to Iran in an instant if given the opportunity to do so safely. For Jews living in Iran it may be no different. They've become accustomed to living under Islamist laws. They may not want to leave, even if they could. SARSHAR: The concept of living and thriving in Iran, for anyone who is not related to the ruling clergy and the Revolutionary Guard, is a dream that feels unattainable by anyone in Iran, let alone the Jews. In a world where there is really no fairness for anyone, the fact that you're treated even less fairly almost fades. MANYA: Scholars say since the Islamic Revolution, most Jews who have left Iran have landed in Los Angeles or Long Island, New York. Still, more Jews of Iranian descent live in Israel – possibly more than all other countries combined. The reason why? Because so many like Einat's family made aliyah–up until the mid-20th Century.  It's hard to say where another exodus might lead Iranian Jews to call home. Einat will be forever grateful that her family left when they still could and landed in a beautiful and beloved place. Though she lives in the U.S. now, she travels back to Israel at least twice a year. EINAT: It's a dream for every Jew, it's not just me. It's the safe zone for every Jew. It's the one place that, even if we have, it's not safe because there is people around us that want to kill us. It's still emotionally. You know, I've been in Israel a few months ago, it's like, you always feel loved, you always feel supported. It's incredible. And it's still home. It's always going to be my home. MANYA: Persian Jews are just one of the many Jewish communities who, in the last century, left Middle Eastern and North African countries to forge new lives for themselves and future generations.  Many thanks to Einat for sharing her family's story. You can enjoy some of her family's favorite recipes in her cookbooks Balaboosta and Shuk. Her memoir Taste of Love was recently released in  an audio and digital format.  Too many times during my reporting, I encountered children and grandchildren who didn't have the answers to my questions because they'd never asked. That's why one of the goals of this project is to encourage you to ask those questions. Find your stories. Atara Lakritz is our producer. T.K. Broderick is our sound engineer. Special thanks to Jon Schweitzer, Nicole Mazur, Sean Savage, and Madeleine Stern, and so many of our colleagues, too many to name really, for making this series possible. You can subscribe to The Forgotten Exodus on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts, and you can learn more at AJC.org/theforgottenexodus.  The views and opinions of our guests don't necessarily reflect the positions of AJC. You can reach us at theforgottenexodus@ajc.org. 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“Today's Morocco is a prime example of what a great peaceful coexistence and international cooperation can be with an Arab country.” Eli Gabay, an Israeli-born lawyer and current president of the oldest continuously active synagogue in the United States, comes from a distinguished family of Jewish leaders who have fostered Jewish communities across Morocco, Israel, and the U.S. Now residing in Philadelphia, Eli and his mother, Rachel, share their deeply personal story of migration from Morocco to Israel, reflecting on the resilience of their family and the significance of preserving Jewish traditions. The Gabay family's commitment to justice and heritage is deeply rooted. Eli, in his legal career, worked with Israel's Ministry of Justice, where he notably helped prosecute John Ivan Demjanjuk, a Cleveland auto worker accused of being the notorious Nazi death camp guard, "Ivan the Terrible." Jessica Marglin, Professor of Religion, Law, and History at the University of Southern California, offers expert insights into the Jewish exodus from Morocco. She explores the enduring relationship between Morocco's Jewish community and the monarchy, and how this connection sets Morocco apart from its neighboring countries. —- Show notes: How much do you know about Jewish history in the Middle East? Take our quiz. Sign up to receive podcast updates. Learn more about the series. Song credits:  Pond5:  “Desert Caravans”: Publisher: Pond5 Publishing Beta (BMI), Composer: Tiemur Zarobov (BMI), IPI#1098108837 “Suspense Middle East” Publisher: Victor Romanov, Composer: Victor Romanov; Item ID: 196056047 ___ Episode Transcript: ELI GABAY: Standing in court and saying ‘on behalf of the State of Israel' were the proudest words of my life. It was very meaningful to serve as a prosecutor. It was very meaningful to serve in the IDF.  These were highlights in my life, because they represented my core identity: as a Jew, as a Sephardic Jew, as an Israeli Sephardic Jew. These are the tenets of my life. MANYA BRACHEAR PASHMAN: The world has overlooked an important episode in modern history: the 800,000 Jews who left or were driven from their homes in the Middle East and North Africa in the mid-20th century. Welcome to the second season of The Forgotten Exodus, brought to you by American Jewish Committee. This series explores that pivotal moment in history and the little-known Jewish heritage of Iran and Arab nations. As Jews around the world confront violent antisemitism and Israelis face daily attacks by terrorists on multiple fronts, our second season explores how Jews have lived throughout the region for generations – despite hardship, hostility, and hatred–then sought safety and new possibilities in their ancestral homeland. I'm your host, Manya Brachear Pashman. Join us as we explore untold family histories and personal stories of courage, perseverance, and resilience from this transformative and tumultuous period of history for the Jewish people and the Middle East.  The world has ignored these voices. We will not. This is The Forgotten Exodus.  Today's episode: leaving Morocco. MANYA: There are three places Eli Gabay calls home: Philadelphia, the city where he has raised his children; Morocco, the land where his parents Rachel and Amram were born and his ancestors lived for generations; and Israel, his birthplace and original ancestral homeland. Eli has been on a quest to honor all those identities since he left Israel at the age of 12. ELI: On my father's side, they were all rabbis. On my mother's side, they were all businesspeople who headed synagogues. And so, my grandfather had a synagogue, and my other grandfather had a synagogue. When they transplanted to Israel, they reopened these synagogues in the transition camp in Be'er Sheva. Both families had a synagogue of their own. MANYA: For the past five years, Eli has served as president of his synagogue--the historic Congregation Mikveh Israel, America's oldest continuous synagogue, founded in Philadelphia in 1740. Descended from a long line of rabbis going back generations, Eli is a litigation attorney, the managing partner of a law firm, a former prosecutor, and, though it might seem odd, the Honorary Consul of the Republic of Nicaragua in Philadelphia. But the professional role that has brought him the most acclaim was his time in the 1980s, working for Israel's Ministry of Justice, decades after the Holocaust, still trying to hold its perpetrators accountable. CLIP - ‘THE DEVIL NEXT DOOR' TRAILER: Charges were filed today against John Demjanjuk, the 66-year-old Ukrainian native, who's accused of being a Nazi death camp guard named Ivan the Terrible. The crimes he was accused of… MANYA: We'll tell you more about that later. But first, we take you to the Jerusalem Israeli Gift Shop in northeast Philadelphia, a little slice of Israel on the corner of Castor Avenue and Chandler Street. [shofar sounds] Every day, amid the menorahs and shofars, frames and mezuzahs, Eli's 84-year-old mother Rachel Gabay, the family matriarch and owner of thisJudaica shop, is transported back to the place where she grew up: Israel. ELI: My father was a teacher all his life, and my mother [shofar sounds] runs a Jewish Judaica store that sells shofars, you can hear in the background. RACHEL: It's my baby. The store here became my baby. CUSTOMER: You're not going to remember this, but you sold us our ketubah 24 years ago. RACHEL: Yeah. How are you, dear? ELI: Nice. CUSTOMER: We're shopping for someone else's wedding now. RACHEL: Oh, very nice… For who? CUSTOMER: A friend of ours, Moshe, who is getting married and we wanted to get him a mezuzah. MANYA: For Rachel, Israel represents the safety, security, and future her parents sought for her when in 1947 they placed her on a boat to sail away from Morocco. By then, Casablanca had become a difficult place to be Jewish. Israel offered a place to belong. And for that, she will always be grateful. RACHEL: To be a Jew, to be very good… ELI: Proud. RACHEL: Proud. I have a country, and I am somebody. ELI: My father's family comes from the High Atlas Mountains, from a small village called Aslim.The family arrived in that area sometime in 1780 or so. There were certain events that went on in Morocco that caused Jews from the periphery and from smaller cities to move to Casablanca. Both my parents were born in Morocco in Casablanca. Both families arrived in Casablanca in the early 30s, mid 30s. MANYA: Today, the port city of Casablanca is home to several synagogues and about 2,000 Jews, the largest community of Morocco. The Museum of Moroccan Judaism in suburban Casablanca, the first museum on Judaism in the Arab world, stands as a symbol of the lasting Jewish legacy in Morocco. Indeed, there's been a Jewish presence in what is considered modern-day Morocco for some 2,000 years, dating back to the early days of the establishment of Roman control.  Morocco was home to thousands of Jews, many of whom lived in special quarters called “Mellah,” or Jewish ghetto. Mellahs were common in cities across Morocco. JESSICA: Morocco was one of the few places in the Islamic world where there emerged the tradition of a distinctive Jewish quarter that had its own walls and was closed with its own gates. MANYA: Jessica Marglin is a professor of religion, law, and history at the University of Southern California. Her research focuses on the history of Jews and Muslims in North Africa and the Mediterranean. JESSICA: There's a bit of a debate. Were these quarters there to control Jews and force them to all live in one spot and was it a sort of form of basically repression? Or was it a way to protect them? The first mellah, the one in Fez is right next to the palace. And so there was a sense that the Jews would be closer to the Sultan or the Sultan's representative, and thus more easily protectable. It could be interpreted as a bad thing. And some Jews did see it as an unfair restriction. But I would say that most Jews didn't question the idea that Jews would live together. And that was sort of seen as natural and desirable. And there was a certain kind of autonomous jurisdiction to the mellah, too.  Because Jews had their own courts. They had their own butchers. They had their own ovens. Butchers and ovens would have been kosher. They could sell wine in the mellah. They could do all these things that were particular to them. And that's where all the synagogues were. And that's where the Jewish cemetery was, right? It was really like a little Jewish city, sort of within the city. MANYA: Unlike other parts of the Middle East and North Africa where pogroms and expulsions, especially after the creation of the state of Israel, caused hundreds of thousands of Jews to abruptly flee all at once – spilling out of countries they had called home for centuries – Jews chose to leave Morocco gradually over time, compared to the exodus from other Arab countries.  JESSICA: When I teach these things, I set up Morocco and Iraq as the two ends of the spectrum. Iraq being the most extreme, where Jews were really basically kicked out all at once. Essentially offered no real choice. I mean, some did stay, but it was choosing a totally reduced life.  Versus Morocco, where the Jews who left did so really, with a real choice. They could have stayed and the numbers are much more gradual than anywhere else. So there was a much larger community that remained for years and years and years, even after ‘67, into the ‘70s.  Even though they kept going down, it was really, it was not like Iraq where the population just falls off a cliff, right? It's like one year, there's 100,000, the next year, they're 5,000. In Morocco, it really went down extremely gradually. And that's in part why it's still the largest Jewish community in the Arab world by far. MANYA: Morocco's Jewish history is by no means all rosy. In all Arab countries, antisemitism came in waves and different forms. But there are several moments in history when the Moroccan monarchy could've abandoned the Jewish population but didn't. And in World War II, the Moroccan monarch took steps to safeguard the community. In recent years, there have been significant gestures such as the opening of the Jewish museum in Casablanca, a massive restoration of landmarks that honor Morocco's Jewish past, including 167 Jewish cemeteries, and the inclusion of Holocaust education in school curricula. In 2020, Morocco became one of four Arab countries to sign a normalization agreement with Israel, as part of the U.S.-backed Abraham Accords, which allowed for economic and diplomatic cooperation and direct flights between the two countries. MANYA: Oral histories suggest that Jews have lived in Morocco for some 2,000 years, roughly since the destruction of the Second Temple. But tangible evidence of a Jewish presence doesn't date as far back. JESSICA: The archaeological remains suggest that the community dates more to the Roman period. There was a continual presence from at least since the late Roman period, certainly well before the Islamic conquests. MANYA: Like other parts of the Middle East and North Africa, Jews in Morocco were heavily concentrated in particular artisanal trades. Many were cobblers, tailors, and jewelers who adorned their creations with intricate designs and embellishments. Gemstones, carved coral, geometric designs, and symbols such as the Hamsa to bless the wearer with good fortune and protect them from the evil eye. JESSICA: And there were certain areas where they kind of were overrepresented in part because of stigmas associated with certain crafts for Muslims. So gold and silver jewelry making in certain parts of Morocco, like in the city of Fez, Jews were particularly overrepresented in the trade that made these gold threads, which are called skalli in Moroccan Arabic, and which are used to embroider sort of very fancy clothing for men and for women. Skalli for instance, is a very common last name for Jews.  MANYA: Jessica notes that in the 12th and 13th Centuries, Morocco came under the rule of the Almohad caliphate, a fundamentalist regime that saw itself as a revolutionary reform movement. Under the Almohad dynasty, local Christians in North Africa from Morocco to Libya all but disappeared.  Jews on the other hand stayed. She suspects Morocco developed its own version of crypto-Jews who superficially converted to Islam or at least lived outwardly as Muslims to survive.  JESSICA: There's probably more of a sense of Jews had more experience of living as minorities. Also, where else were they going to go? It wasn't so obvious. So whatever conversions there were, some of them must have stuck. And there are still, for instance, Muslim families in Fez named Kohen . . . Cohen. MANYA: Jews chose Morocco as a place of refuge in 1391, when a series of mob attacks on Jewish communities across Spain killed hundreds and forcibly converted others to Christianity. As opposed to other places in Europe, Morocco was considered a place where Jews could be safe. More refugees arrived after the Alhambra Decree of 1492 expelled Jews from Spain who refused to convert. That is when Eli's father's side of the family landed in Fez.  ELI: Our tradition is that the family came from Spain, and we date our roots to Toledo, Spain. The expulsion of the Jews took place out of Spain in 1492 at which time the family moved from Spain to Morocco to Fez. MANYA: At that time, the first mellahs emerged, the name derived from the Arabic word for salt. Jessica says that might have referred to the brackish swamps where the mellah were built.  JESSICA: The banning of Jews from Spain in 1492 brought a lot of Jews to North Africa, especially Morocco, because Morocco was so close. And, you know, that is why Jews in northern Morocco still speak Spanish today, or a form of Judeo Spanish known as Haketia. So, there were huge numbers of Iberian Jews who ended up throughout Morocco. And then for a long time, they remained a kind of distinctive community with their own laws and their own rabbis and their own traditions. Eventually, they kind of merged with local Jews. And they used Spanish actually, for decades, until they finally sort of Arabized in most of Morocco. ELI: My father's family, as I said, comes from a small town of Aslim. The family arrived in that area sometime in 1780 or so after there was a decree against Jews in Fez to either convert to Islam or leave. And so in a real sense, they were expelled from that region of Fez. There were Jews who arrived throughout the years after different exiles from different places. But predominantly the Jews that arrived in 1492 as a result of the Spanish expulsion were known as the strangers, and they integrated themselves in time into the fabric of Moroccan Jewry.  MANYA: For Eli's family, that meant blending in with the nomadic Amazigh, or indigenous people of North Africa, commonly called Berbers. Many now avoid that term because it was used by European colonialists and resembles the word “barbarians.” But it's still often used colloquially.  ELI: Aslim is in the heart of Berber territory. My father's family did speak Berber. My grandfather spoke Berber, and they dressed as Berbers. They wore jalabia, which is the dress for men, for instance, and women wore dresses only, a head covering.  Men also wore head coverings. They looked like Berbers in some sense, but their origins were all the way back to Spain. MANYA: In most cases across Morocco, Jews were classified as dhimmis, non-Muslim residents who were given protected status. Depending on the rulers, dhimmis lived under different restrictions; most paid a special tax, others were forced to wear different clothes. But it wasn't consistent.  ELI: Rulers, at their whim, would decide if they were good to the Jews or bad to the Jews. And the moment of exchange between rulers was a very critical moment, or if that ruler was attacked. MANYA: The situation for Jews within Morocco shifted again in 1912 when Morocco became a French protectorate. Many Jews adopted French as their spoken language and took advantage of educational opportunities offered to them by Alliance Israélite Universelle. The borders also remained open for many Jews who worked as itinerant merchants to go back and forth throughout the region.  JESSICA: Probably the most famous merchants were the kind of rich, international merchants who dealt a lot with trade across the Mediterranean and in other parts of the Middle East or North Africa. But there were a lot of really small-time merchants, people whose livelihood basically depended on taking donkeys into the hinterland around the cities where Jews tended to congregate.  MANYA: Rachel's family, businesspeople, had origins in two towns – near Agadir and in Essaouira. Eli has copies of three edicts issued to his great-grandfather Nissim Lev, stating that as a merchant, he was protected by the government in his travels. But the open borders didn't contain the violence that erupted in other parts of the Middle East, including the British Mandate of Palestine.  In late August 1929, a clash about the use of space next to the Western Wall in Jerusalem led to riots and a pogrom of Jews who had lived there for thousands of years. Moroccan Jews also were attacked. Rachel's grandfather Nissim died in the violence. RACHEL: He was a peddler. He was a salesman. He used to go all week to work, and before Thursday, he used to come for Shabbat. So they caught him in the road, and they took his money and they killed him there.  ELI: So my great-grandfather– RACHEL: He was very young. ELI: She's speaking of, in 1929 there were riots in Israel, in Palestine. In 1929 my great-grandfather went to the market, and at that point … so . . . a riot had started, and as my mother had described, he was attacked. And he was knifed. And he made it not very far away, all the other Jews in the market fled. Some were killed, and he was not fortunate enough to escape. Of course, all his things were stolen, and it looked like a major robbery of the Jews in the market. It gave the opportunity to do so, but he was buried nearby there in a Jewish cemetery in the Atlas Mountains. So he was not buried closer to his own town. I went to visit that place. MANYA: In the mid-1930s, both Amram and Rachel's families moved to the mellah in Casablanca where Amram's father was a rabbi. Rachel's family ran a bathhouse. Shortly after Amram was born, his mother died, leaving his father to raise three children.  Though France still considered Morocco one of its protectorates, it left Morocco's Sultan Mohammad V as the country's figurehead. When Nazis occupied France during World War II and the Vichy regime instructed the sultan to deport Morocco's Jews to Nazi death camps, he reportedly refused, saving thousands of lives. But Amram's grandmother did not trust that Morocco would protect its Jews. Following the Second Battle of El Alamein in Egypt, the Axis Powers' second attempt to invade North Africa, she returned to the Atlas Mountains with Amran and his siblings and stayed until they returned to Casablanca at the end of the war.  ELI: There was a fear that the Nazis were going to enter Morocco. My father, his grandmother, took him from Casablanca with two other children and went back to Aslim in the mountains, because she said we can better hide there. We can better hide in the Atlas Mountains. And so my father returned, basically went from Casablanca to the Atlas Mountains to hide from the coming Nazis. MANYA:  In 1947, at the age of 10, Amram went from Casablanca to an Orthodox yeshiva in England. Another destination for Jews also had emerged. Until then, no one had wanted to move to British-controlled Palestine where the political landscape and economic conditions were more unstable.  The British restricted Jewish immigration making the process difficult, even dangerous. Additionally, French Moroccan authorities worked to curb the Zionist movement that was spreading throughout Europe. But Rachel's father saw the writing on the wall and took on a new vocation. RACHEL: His name is Moshe Lev and he was working with people to send to Eretz Yisrael. MANYA: A Zionist activist, Rachel's father worked for a clandestine movement to move children and eventually their families to what soon would become Israel. He wanted his children, including his 7-year-old daughter Rachel, to be the first. RACHEL: He worked there, and he sent everybody. Now our family were big, and they sent me, and then my sister went with my father and two brothers, and then my mom left by herself They flew us to Norvege [Norway].  MANYA: After a year in Norway, Rachel was taken to Villa Gaby in Marseille, France, a villa that became an accommodation center for Jews from France who wanted to join the new State of Israel. There, as she waited for a boat to take her across the Mediterranean to Israel, she spotted her brother from afar. Nissim, named for their late grandfather, was preparing to board his own boat. She pleaded to join him. RACHEL: So we're in Villa Gaby couple months. That time, I saw my brother, I get very emotional. They said ‘No, he's older. I told them ‘I will go with him.' They said ‘No, he's older and you are young, so he will go first. You are going to stay here.' He was already Bar Mitzvah, like 13 years.  I was waiting there. Then they took to us in the boat. I remember it was like six, seven months. We were sitting there in Villa Gaby. And then from Villa Gaby, we went to Israel. The boat, but the boat was quite ahead of time. And then they spoke with us, ‘You're going to go. Somebody will come and pick you up, and you are covered. If fish or something hurts you, you don't scream, you don't say nothing. You stay covered.  So one by one, a couple men they came. They took kids and out. Our foot was wet from the ocean, and here and there they was waiting for us, people with a hot blanket. I remember that. MANYA: Rachel landed at Kibbutz Kabri, then a way station for young newcomers in northern Israel. She waited there for years without her family – until one stormy day. RACHEL: One day. That's emotional. One day we were sitting in the living room, it was raining, pouring. We couldn't go to the rooms, so we were waiting. All of a sudden, a group of three men came in, and I heard my father was talking. His voice came to me. And I said to the teacher, taking care of us. I said ‘You know what? Let me tell you one thing. I think my father is here.' She said ‘No, you just imagination. Now let's go to the rooms to sleep.'  So we went there. And all of a sudden she came to me. She said, ‘You know what? You're right. He insists to come to see you. He will not wait till morning, he said. I wanted to see my daughter now. He was screaming. They didn't want him to be upset. He said we'll bring her because he said here's her picture. Here's her and everything. So I came and oh my god was a nice emotional. And we were there sitting two or three hours. My father said, Baruch Hashem. I got the kids. Some people, they couldn't find their kids, and I find my kids, thanks God. And that's it. It was from that time he wants to take us. They said, No, you live in the Ma'abara. Not comfortable for the kids. We cannot let you take the kids. The kids will stay in their place till you establish nicely. But it was close to Pesach. He said, we promise Pesach, we bring her, for Pesach to your house. You give us the address. Where are you? And we'll bring her, and we come pick her up. JESSICA: Really as everywhere else in the Middle East and North Africa, it was the Declaration of the Independence of Israel. And the war that started in 1947, that sort of set off a wave of migration, especially between ‘48 and ‘50. Those were the kind of highest numbers per year. MANYA: Moroccan Jews also were growing frustrated with how the French government continued to treat them, even after the end of World War II. When the state of Israel declared independence, Sultan Mohammad V assured Moroccan Jews that they would continue to be protected in Morocco. But it was clear that Moroccan Jew's outward expression of support for Israel would face new cultural and political scrutiny and violence.  Choosing to emigrate not only demonstrated solidarity, it indicated an effort to join the forces fighting to defend the Jewish state. In June 1948, 43 Jews were killed by local Muslims in Oujda, a departure point for Moroccan Jews seeking to migrate to Israel. Amram arrived in Israel in the early 1950s. He returned to Morocco to convince his father, stepmother, and brother to make aliyah as well. Together, they went to France, then Israel where his father opened the same synagogue he ran in the mellah of Casablanca. Meanwhile in Morocco, the Sultan's push for Moroccan independence landed him in exile for two years. But that didn't last long. The French left shortly after he returned and Morocco gained its independence in March 1956. CLIP - CASABLANCA 1956 NEWSREEL: North Africa, pomp and pageantry in Morocco as the Sultan Mohamed Ben Youssef made a state entry into Casablanca, his first visit to the city since his restoration last autumn. Aerial pictures reveal the extent of the acclamation given to the ruler whose return has of his hope brought more stable conditions for his people. MANYA: The situation of the Jews improved. For the first time in their history, they were granted equality with Muslims. Jews were appointed high-ranking positions in the first independent government. They became advisors and judges in Morocco's courts of law.  But Jewish emigration to Israel became illegal. The immigration department of the Jewish Agency that had operated inside Morocco since 1949 closed shop and representatives tasked with education about the Zionist movement and facilitating Aliyah were pressed to leave the country. JESSICA: The independent Moroccan state didn't want Jews emigrating to Israel, partly because of anti-Israeli, pro-Palestinian sentiment, and partly because they didn't want to lose well-educated, productive members of the State, of the new nation. MANYA: Correctly anticipating that Moroccan independence was imminent and all Zionist activity would be outlawed, Israel's foreign intelligence agency, the Mossad, created the Misgeret, which organized self-defense training for Jews across the Arab countries. Casablanca became its center in Morocco. Between November 1961 and the spring of 1964, the Mossad carried out Operation Yakhin, a secret mission to get nearly 100,000 Jews out of Morocco into Israel. JESSICA: There was clandestine migration during this period, and a very famous episode of a boat sinking, which killed a lot of people. And there was increasing pressure on the Moroccan state to open up emigration to Israel. Eventually, there were sort of secret accords between Israelis and the Moroccan King, which did involve a payment of money per Jew who was allowed to leave, from the Israelis to the Moroccans.  MANYA: But cooperation between Israel and Morocco reportedly did not end there. According to revelations by a former Israeli military intelligence chief in 2016, King Hassan II of Morocco provided the intelligence that helped Israel win the Six-Day War. In 1965, he shared recordings of a key meeting between Arab leaders held inside a Casablanca hotel to discuss whether they were prepared for war and unified against Israel. The recordings revealed that the group was not only divided but woefully ill-prepared. JESSICA: Only kind of after 1967, did the numbers really rise again. And 1967, again, was kind of a flashpoint. The war created a lot of anti-Zionist and often anti-Jewish sentiment across the region, including in Morocco, and there were some riots and there were, there was some violence, and there was, again, a kind of uptick in migration after that. For some people, they'll say, yes, there was antisemitism, but that wasn't what made me leave. And other people say yes, at a certain point, the antisemitism got really bad and it felt uncomfortable to be Jewish. I didn't feel safe. I didn't feel like I wanted to raise my children here.  For some people, they will say ‘No, I would have happily stayed, but my whole family had left, I didn't want to be alone.' And you know, there's definitely a sense of some Moroccan Jews who wanted to be part of the Zionist project. It wasn't that they were escaping Morocco. It was that they wanted to build a Jewish state, they wanted to be in the Holy Land. ELI: Jews in Morocco fared better than Jews in other Arab countries. There is no question about that. MANYA: Eli Gabay is grateful to the government for restoring many of the sites where his ancestors are buried or called home. The current king, Mohammed VI, grandson of Mohammed V, has played a significant role in promoting Jewish heritage in Morocco. In 2011, a year after the massive cemetery restoration, a new constitution was approved that recognized the rights of religious minorities, including the Jewish community.  It is the only constitution besides Israel's to recognize the country's Hebraic roots. In 2016, the King attended the rededication ceremony of the Ettedgui Synagogue in Casablanca.  The rededication of the synagogue followed the re-opening of the El Mellah Museum, which chronicles the history of Moroccan Jewry. Other Jewish museums and Jewish cultural centers have opened across the country, including in Essaouira, Fes, and Tangier. Not to mention–the king relies on the same senior advisor as his father did, Andre Azoulay, who is Jewish.  ELI: It is an incredible example. We love and revere the king of Morocco. We loved and revered the king before him, his father, who was a tremendous lover of the Jews. And I can tell you that in Aslim, the cemetery was encircled with a wall and well maintained at the cost, at the pay of the King of Morocco in a small, little town, and he did so across Morocco, preserved all the Jewish sites. Synagogues, cemeteries, etc.  Today's Morocco is a prime example of what a great peaceful coexistence and international cooperation can be with an Arab country. MANYA: Eli is certainly not naïve about the hatred that Jews face around the world. In 1985, the remains of Josef Mengele, known as the Nazis' Angel of Death, were exhumed from a grave outside Sao Paulo, Brazil. Eli was part of a team of experts from four countries who worked to confirm it was indeed the Nazi German doctor who conducted horrific experiments on Jews at Auschwitz. Later that decade, Eli served on the team with Israel's Ministry of Justice that prosecuted John Ivan Demjanjuk, a retired Cleveland auto worker accused of being the notorious Nazi death camp guard known as “Ivan the Terrible.” Demjanjuk was accused of being a Nazi collaborator who murdered Jews in the gas chambers at the Treblinka death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland during World War II. In fact, Eli is featured prominently in a Netflix documentary series about the case called The Devil Next Door. CLIP - ‘THE DEVIL NEXT DOOR' TRAILER: …Nazi death camp guard named Ivan the Terrible. The crimes that he was accused of were horrid.  The Israeli government is seeking his extradition as a war criminal. And that's where the drama begins.  MANYA: Demjanjuk was convicted and sentenced to death, but the verdict was later overturned. U.S. prosecutors later extradited him to Germany on charges of being an accessory to the murder of about 28,000 Jews at Sobibor. He was again convicted but died before the outcome of his appeal. ELI: Going back to Israel and standing in court and saying ‘on behalf of the State of Israel' were the proudest words of my life. It was very meaningful to serve as a prosecutor. It was very meaningful to serve in the IDF. These were highlights in my life.  They represented my core identity: as a Jew, as a Sephardic Jew, as an Israeli Sephardic Jew. These are the tenets of my life. I am proud to serve today as the president of the longest running synagogue in America. MANYA: Eli has encountered hatred in America too. In May 2000 congregants arriving for Shabbat morning prayers at Philadelphia's Beit Harambam Congregation where Eli was first president were greeted by police and firefighters in front of a burned-out shell of a building. Torah scrolls and prayer books were ruined. When Rachel opened her store 36 years ago, it became the target of vandals who shattered her windows. But she doesn't like to talk about that. She has always preferred to focus on the positive. Her daughter Sima Shepard, Eli's sister, says her mother's optimism and resilience are also family traditions. SIMA SHEPARD: Yeah, my mom speaks about the fact that she left Morocco, she is in Israel, she comes to the U.S. And yet consistently, you see one thing: the gift of following tradition. And it's not just again religiously, it's in the way the house is Moroccan, the house is Israeli. Everything that we do touches on previous generations. I'm a little taken that there are people who don't know that there are Jews in Arab lands. They might not know what they did, because European Jews came to America first. They came to Israel first. However, however – we've lived among the Arab countries, proudly so, for so many years. MANYA: Moroccan Jews are just one of the many Jewish communities who, in the last century, left Arab countries to forge new lives for themselves and future generations.  Join us next week as we share another untold story of The Forgotten Exodus. Many thanks to Eli, Rachel and Sima for sharing their family's story.  Too many times during my reporting, I encountered children and grandchildren who didn't have the answers to my questions because they'd never asked. That's why one of the goals of this project is to encourage you to ask those questions. Find your stories. Atara Lakritz is our producer. T.K. Broderick is our sound engineer. Special thanks to Jon Schweitzer, Nicole Mazur, Sean Savage, and Madeleine Stern, and so many of our colleagues, too many to name really, for making this series possible.  You can subscribe to The Forgotten Exodus on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts, and you can learn more at AJC.org/theforgottenexodus.  The views and opinions of our guests don't necessarily reflect the positions of AJC.  You can reach us at theforgottenexodus@ajc.org. If you've enjoyed this episode, please be sure to spread the word, and hop onto Apple Podcasts or Spotify to rate us and write a review to help more listeners find us.

After an extended intermission, Dimitri and Khalid resume THE LAND BELONGS TO WHOM IT BELONGS and embark on a deep examination of the British Mandate in Palestine. We start with a close reading of epic TV showrunner David Simon's recent anti-Irish, anti-mook screeds about DA MUFTI and other Zionist tropes concerning the Mandate period, followed by some theoretical framing from “A Discourse on Domination in Mandate Palestine: Imperialism, Property and Insurgency” by Zeina Ghandour, the problem of epistemicide, Pete Shambrook's “Policy of Deceit”, British perfidy and gaslight diplomacy towards Faisal and the Arabs after World War One, sus Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points (attempt to outflank Lenin), clever manipulation of antiquities laws to slander/erase the legacy of Ottoman rule, the Jewish Agency's COINTELPRO/Mockingbird-tier espionage activities, and more. For access to premium SJ episodes, upcoming installments of DEMON FORCES, live call-in specials, and the Grotto of Truth Discord, become a subscriber at patreon.com/subliminaljihad.

Until Hamas is gone, Haviv Rettig Gur says, Gaza will be unable to recover after the war.The Times of Israel journalist and political analyst has emerged as a leading voice for the Israeli public and the Jewish world for deeper understandings of the war's developments. Haviv has covered Israeli politics — domestic and foreign — for nearly two decades and speaks internationally about Zionism, the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict, and Israel's future.Haviv was previously the director of communications for the Jewish Agency for Israel, and currently teaches history and politics at Israeli premilitary academies.Now, he joins us to answer 18 questions on Israel, including the country's leadership, Western media, and the Palestinian future.This interview was recorded on Sept. 9.Here are our 18 questions:As an Israeli, and as a Jew, how are you feeling at this moment in Israeli history?What has been Israel's greatest success and greatest mistake in its war against Hamas?Do you think Western media covers the Israel-Hamas War fairly?What do you look for in deciding which Knesset party to vote for?Which is more important for Israel: Judaism or democracy?What role should the Israeli government have in religious matters?Should Israel treat its Jewish and non-Jewish citizens the same?Now that Israel already exists, what is the purpose of Zionism?Is opposing Zionism inherently antisemitic?Is the IDF the world's most moral army?If you were making the case for Israel, where would you begin?Can questioning the actions of Israel's government and army — such as in the context of this war — be a valid form of love and patriotism?What do you think is the most legitimate criticism leveled against Israel today?Do you think peace between Israelis and Palestinians will happen within your lifetime?What should happen with Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict after the war?Where do you read news about Israel?Where do you identify on Israel's political and religious spectrum, and do you have friends on the “other side”?Do you have more hope or fear for Israel and the Jewish People?

A special report by the Jewish Agency's Global Aliya Center shows that the number of people who have opened aliya files since October 7 has surpassed 30,000. Shimon Shamila, the COO of the Aliya Unit of the Jewish Agency, said that while rising global antisemitism was a factor, many were also spurred by the war to be part of the Jewish nation in the land of Israel. He told reporter Arieh O'Sullivan that over 4,000 immigrants from the United States are expected to move to Israel this year. (photo: Tomer Neuberg/flash90)See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Israel is facing an existential crisis on all fronts. A devastating war in Gaza. Nonstop rocket attacks from Hezbollah in Lebanon. Drone attacks from the Houthis in Yemen. And the very real possibility of a full scale war with Iran that could break out at any moment. And yet, the man who has led Israel through one of its most tumultuous periods in its 76 year existence, Benjamin Netanyahu, maintains that he alone is the person most who can keep the country safe. Bibi's supporters argue that Israel's longest serving Prime Minister is the best leader for Israel at this moment. His political and wartime experience coupled with a diplomatic savviness gives him the tools necessary to navigate both the physical wars on Israel's borders and the increasingly tense relationship with allies and adversaries abroad. To his detractors, Bibi's failure in leadership created the conditions for the Hamas attack, and in his desperation to stay in office he has pandered to the extremists in his coalition, harming world opinion and undermining Israel's security and its relationship with its most important ally, the United States. For the sake of Israel's survival, safety, and security, they argue, Bibi must go. Arguing in favour of the resolution is Ruthie Blum. Ruthie is a columnist at Jewish News Syndicate and most recently she served as an adviser in the Israeli Prime Minister's Office. Arguing against the resolution is Avraham Burg. Avraham has served in a variety of high profile public positions in Israel, including as member of the Labor Party, Speaker of the Knesset, and Chairman of the Jewish Agency.   The host of this Munk Debates podcast episode is Ricki Gurwitz. Become a free member and vote on who you think won this debate at www.munkdebates.com To support civil and substantive debate on the big questions of the day, consider becoming a Munk Member at https://munkdebates.com/membership This podcast is a project of the Munk Debates, a Canadian charitable organization dedicated to fostering civil and substantive public dialogue - https://munkdebates.com/ Senior Producer: Ricki Gurwitz Editor: Kieran Lynch  

In this episode, Mijal and Noam are joined by special guest Rabbi Joe Schwartz, director of Makom, the Israel Education Laboratory of the Jewish Agency. They explore the complexities of Jewish identity, Zionism, and the evolving relationship between Israel and the global Jewish community, particularly in light of the events of October 7th. The discussion includes the challenges of bridging the gap between American Jewry and Israel, the implications of Israel's rightward political shift, and personal reflections on what it means to be a Zionist today. ------------ This podcast was brought to you by Unpacked, a division of OpenDor Media. For other podcasts from Unpacked, check out: Jewish History Nerds Unpacking Israeli History Soulful Jewish Living

Yaron Shavit, Deputy Chair of the Executive, The Jewish Agency for Israel

This past weekend, Israeli special forces rescued four hostages Hamas kidnapped on October 7 and held in Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp. Israelis were ecstatic about the news. Meanwhile, Israel's usual detractors in the West accused Israel of war crimes for harming “civilians” during the operation, apparently forgetting that Hamas chose to embed hostages within Gaza's civilian population. What does the hostage rescue mean for the prospects of saving the remaining 120 hostages? Will turmoil and resignations at the senior levels of Israel's national security government derail efforts to destroy Hamas? What does the future hold for this war amid growing threats from Hezbollah in Lebanon? Haviv Rettig Gur is The Times of Israel's senior analyst. Before joining the Times of Israel, he was a reporter for the Jerusalem Post. Haviv has reported from over 20 countries and served as director of communications for the Jewish Agency for Israel, Israel's largest NGO. He lectures on Israeli politics, the US-Israel relationship, the peace process, modern Jewish history and identity, and Israel-diaspora relations. Haviv lives in Jerusalem with his wife and two sons.Read the transcript here.

Are You Getting the Full Story on Israel?  Have you ever wondered about the complexities and misconceptions surrounding Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? In today's media, it can be challenging to separate fact from fiction and gain a comprehensive understanding of the situation on the ground. In my latest podcast episode, I had the privilege of sitting down with the President of Israel for a candid conversation. The President shared valuable insights on the resilience and diversity of the Israeli people, the ongoing efforts to recover hostages, and the importance of fighting misinformation and anti-Semitism worldwide. To grasp the full depth and nuance of the President's perspective, I highly encourage you to listen to the complete podcast episode. Whether you have a long-standing interest in Israel or are just beginning to explore this topic, this conversation offers a rare glimpse into the challenges, hopes, and complexities that shape this region. President Isaac Herzog is a public official who has been working in the service of the State of Israel and its society for over twenty years. He was born in 1960 to Aura and Chaim Herzog, later Israel's Sixth President. For three years, Herzog served as the chairman of the Executive of the Jewish Agency for Israel. In July 2021, he was elected president by an unprecedented majority in the Knesset, and he entered office as the Eleventh President of Israel. What we discuss… (00:00) Global Misconceptions on Israel and Anti-Semitism (12:53) Israeli Ambassador Discusses Operation Rafah (17:10) Promoting Israeli Culture and Resilience (23:45) Positive Impressions of Israel …and more! Thank you to our sponsors: Magic Mind: Head over to www.magicmind.com/jen and use code Jen at checkout. Find more from Jen:  Website: https://www.jennifercohen.com/ Instagram: @therealjencohen   Books: https://www.jennifercohen.com/books Speaking: https://www.jennifercohen.com/speaking-engagement Find more from President Isaac Herzog: https://www.jewishagency.org/isaac-herzog-bio/

We have a special edition of this week's show: This week I talk to Haviv Rettig-Gur, who will be the featured speaker at the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas annual event on June 2.Haviv Rettig Gur is a veteran Israeli journalist who serves as senior analyst for The Times of Israel and is also a frequent guest on the Call Me Back and The Times of Israel podcasts. He has covered Israel's politics and foreign policy since 2005, reported from over 20 countries, served as director of communications for the Jewish Agency for Israel, Israel's largest NGO, and taught at prestigious premilitary academies. We'll have the links to Haviv's work and how to get tickets to the JCRC's event in the show notes.Haviv and I talk about what he's observing in the state of mind of Israelis, how politicians in Israel and the United States are getting plenty wrong in the war, and the misconceptions many have about the war – and Israeli-Palestinian relations – on this week's Who the Folk?! Podcast.JCRC Annual Event: https://minndakjcrc.org/event/2024-annual-event/Haviv on Twitter: https://x.com/havivrettiggurhttps://www.timesofisrael.com/writers/haviv-gur/

Naale Elite Academy is an international program jointly funded by the Israeli Ministry of Education and the Jewish Agency. It enables Jewish teenagers from the diaspora to study and complete their high school education in Israel for free

In this captivating episode of "Inside the Epicenter," we delve into the personal story of Natan Sharansky, a remarkable individual whose life has been shaped by resistance, resilience, and the fight for freedom. From confronting anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union to his time as a political prisoner, Sharansky's experiences offer profound insights into the struggle for human rights and the universal yearning for liberty. Join host Carl Moeller as he explores Sharansky's remarkable journey, encounters with Vladimir Putin, and reflections on the current geopolitical landscape. From the enduring legacy of Ronald Reagan to the complexities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, this episode is a thought-provoking exploration of history, ideology, and the pursuit of justice. Tune in as Natan Sharansky shares his compelling narrative, offering a unique perspective on the challenges and triumphs that define our world today. (00:05) Becoming head of Jewish Agency after release.(04:54) Struggle to make the West understand Soviet society.(07:22) Opposition, imprisonment, and eventual release from captivity.(10:02) Widespread anti-Semitism manipulated by a totalitarian regime.(15:30) Criticism of Israel links to anti-Semitism.(17:13) Resigned over land for terrorist cooperation with Arafat.(19:53) Met Putin, complimented interrogation skills, avoided meetings.(23:01) Talking about an established and enduring system with media control.(26:02) Unhappy citizens, testing West, conquered Crimea, war.(31:17) Jewish man's journey to religious activism.(32:50) Shared cell, fought for religious texts, Reagan readings.  Learn more about The Joshua Fund. Make a tax-deductible donation. The Joshua Fund Stock Media provided by DimmySad/Pond5 Verse of the Day: Matthew 19:26 - Jesus looked at them and said, with man, this is impossible, but with god, all things are possible.  Prayer Request:Pray that God continues to deliver Israel from all media attacks and misinformation.Pray that God grants people in Israel and the Middle East the grace to navigate difficult times and emerge victorious. Related Episodes:Christians Blessing Israel: How and Why? #170The Danger of Russia and Iran's Alliance #169Uniting Christians and Jews: A Spiritual Journey in Israel with Tatiana Mazarsky and Albert Veksler #168Understanding the War of Gog and Magog: Unveiling the End Times Prophecy #159 Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.

IDF hits Hezbollah sites in Lebanon after interception of suspicious aerial target that infiltrated Israeli air space. US expected to sanction two settlement outposts. Jewish Agency offers 100,000 NIS award for information leading to missing 9-year-old girlSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Dr. Misha Galperin is the President and CEO of The Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History. Misha is a Jewish American immigrant whose family fled Ukraine when he was a teenager. He has spent his long career leading Jewish organizations, including the Jewish Agency for Israel. He also serves as an advisor to Combat Antisemitism Movement and contributed to the White House task force that informed its National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism. A clinical psychologist by training, he also worked with refugees early in his career. The escalating situation on college campuses, including Cornell (he currently has a son enrolled at Cornell University, which recently experienced death threats against Jewish students) The role that Museums and other trusted institutions can and do play in combating antisemitism SPECIAL PODCAST SERIES PUTS JEWISH FUTURE FRONT AND CENTERThe Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History Partners with Tablet's Unorthodox Podcast to Share Ideas from its 2023 Conference PHILADELPHIA, Pa. (February 27, 2024) – Today, Tablet's Unorthodox podcast will launch a special six-part series, “Jewish Priorities: Life after 10/7,” in collaboration with the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History (The Weitzman) in Philadelphia. The Weitzman's Jewish Priorities Conference, held mere weeks after the horrific attack on Israel by Hamas terrorists, sought to kick off a global conversation and bring together some of the most distinguished Jewish leaders and thinkers worldwide in the U.S. for meaningful conversations about the future of the Jewish people, religion, identity, American Jews, the Holocaust, Israel, and many more topics. Now, Unorthodox will air six of the most compelling sessions in its special series. “Bringing these voices together during the most challenging time in recent history for Jews worldwide was a natural extension of the Museum's mission to unleash the power of education as an antidote to antisemitism,” said Dr. Misha Galperin, President and CEO of The Weitzman. “With this podcast series, these ideas will reach a wide audience and become part of the worldwide conversation on the Jewish people, antisemitism, and Israel.” The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon, TabletMag.com, or wherever you get your podcasts. “Jewish history, if you think about it, is really just a series of contentious revelatory and absolutely essential conversations,” said Tablet's Liebovitz. “These conversations became even more prescient after October 7, 2023, and with Jewish Priorities we have the privilege of hearing from some of the most astute and insightful thinkers out there. They may not always agree and they may not always have the answers but they ask all the right questions.” Unorthodox is the universe's leading Jewish podcast. Each week, hosts Stephanie Butnick, Liel Leibovitz, and Joshua Malina discuss Jewish people, news, and ideas. The conference and subsequent podcast were inspired by the fall 2023 release of “Jewish Priorities: Sixty-five Proposals for the Future of Our People,” (Wicked Son) an anthology edited by David Hazony. Established in 1976, The Weitzman is the only museum in the nation dedicated exclusively to exploring, preserving, and interpreting the nearly four centuries of American Jewish history from the dawn of our nation to the present day. The Jewish Priorities Conference, held October 22, 2023, signified a pivotal moment for The Weitzman, as it embraces the role of a nationwide leader and convener of Jewish thought leadership. The Museum is building upon this thought leadership work in 2024 with co-presented antisemitism lectures series with University of Pennsylvania and Gratz College, an upcoming conversation with New York Times best-selling author Yossi Klein Halevi, and the nationwide effort it leads for Jewish American Heritage Month. ABOUT THE WEITZMAN NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AMERICAN JEWISH HISTORYEstablished in 1976, and situated on Philadelphia's Independence Mall, the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History is the only museum in the nation dedicated exclusively to exploring and interpreting the American Jewish experience. The Weitzman presents educational programs and experiences that preserve, explore, and celebrate the history of Jews in America. Standing as a joyful bulwark against antisemitism, bigotry, and hate, The Weitzman serves to connect Jews more closely to their heritage and to inspire in people of all backgrounds a greater appreciation for the diversity of the American Jewish experience and the freedoms to which Americans aspire. www.theweitzman.org Tune in 10 AM - 12 PM EST weekdays on Talk Radio 1210 WPHT; or on the Audacy app!

Alexei Navalny was allowed one book in his Siberian prison. He chose Fear No Evil by former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky, who joins us for an important conversation today to speak about his correspondence with Navalny and his own experience in a Siberian forced labor camp. Why did Navalny return to Moscow, and to certain arrest? What were his aims? What is it like to be held in what Sharansky refers to as his “alma mater” -- solitary confinement? And given Navalny's murder, has Putin's regime etched another notch in its belt, or is it still doomed to fail, as Sharansky predicted long ago? We talk Putin, Hamas, liberalism and neo-Marxism with one of the greats.Natan Sharansky is a former Soviet refusnik, an Israeli politician, author and human rights activist. In 1978, Sharansky was convicted of treason and spying on behalf of the United States, and was sentenced to thirteen years imprisonment in a Siberian forced labor camp. Sharansky served as Minister of Industry and Trade from June 1996-1999. He served as Minister of the Interior from July 1999 until his resignation in July 2000 and as Minister of Housing and Construction and Deputy Prime Minister from March 2001 until February 2003. In February 2003, Natan Sharansky was appointed Minister without Portfolio, responsible for Jerusalem, social and Diaspora affairs. In November 2006 Natan Sharansky resigned from the Knesset and assumed the position of Chairman of the then newly-established Adelson Institute for Strategic Studies of the Shalem Center in Jerusalem. In June 2009, he was elected and sworn in as Chairman of The Jewish Agency for Israel, a post he still holds. Natan Sharansky is the author of four books: Fear No Evil (1988), The Case for Democracy (2004), Defending Identity (2008), and Never Alone: Prison, Politics, and My People (2020).Download the transcript here.Read the WTH Substack here.Read Navalny's letters to Sharansky here.

Dr. Danny Lamm AM is a well known Jewish community leader. He currently serves on the Board of Governors of the Jewish Agency for Israel. He served as the President of the Zionist Federation of Australia. He is President of the Mizrachi Organisation in Australia and a Past President of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry.

In this episode of DISINFORMATION WARS, host Ilan Berman speaks with Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor of digital watchdog Cyberwell about the post-October 7th proliferation of online antisemitism and misinformation, and how her company is working to keep social media platforms accountable. Bio: Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor is Founder and Director of CyberWell, an international technology-based non-profit that is working to combat the spread of antisemitism on social media. An Israeli lawyer, Tal-Or has provided analysis and consulting services to the Institute of National Security Studies, Israel's Ministry of Strategic Affairs and the Jewish Agency. Prior to launching CyberWell, she worked in the web intelligence sector, serving most recently as an executive at Argyle Consulting Group in Tel Aviv. Mentioned in this episode: Cyberwell's new report, "Denial of the October 7 Massacre on Social Media Platforms," available online at https://cyberwell.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Denial-of-October-7-Social-Media-Trend-Alert-CyberWell.pdf.

Alex Pierson speaks with Yaron Deckel, Regional Director to Canada of the Jewish Agency, now based in Toronto. Yaron was also a longtime journalist in Israel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eitan Chitayat is the Founder of Natie, an international branding agency. With living experiences in prominent cities like Hong Kong, London, Tel Aviv, New York, and Boston, Eitan brings a global perspective to his work. He has served as a judge in advertising's finest competition, the One Show, and has learned from industry-leading organizations such as BBDO, Ogilvy and Mather NYC, and Arnold Worldwide in Boston. His client list boasts illustrious names including Apple, Target, AT&T, and Google. Eitan created the viral video “I'm that Jew” viewed over 10 million times and has delivered a TEDx talk on why he created it. He is also a founding chapter member of the Entrepreneurs' Organization Israel. In this episode… What are the challenges in the world of building brands internationally? How do you effectively create eye-catching brands? Delve into Eitan Chitayat's approach to branding — understanding the specific thought process that lies behind every successful branding project. Know what's behind Eitan's decision to keep his agency Natie small, sharing the benefits of this approach, including his ability to be a hands-on, approachable, and present leader. Glean insights into the world of global branding in this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring Eitan Chitayat, the Founder of Natie. Eitan shares stories from his journey including launching Gmail in Africa, rebranding The Jewish Agency for Israel, and the branding of Sweet Victory. Listen as Eitan dismantles common misconceptions about Israel, taking down erroneous claims of genocide and apartheid while shedding light on the country's multicultural reality.

Meeting Andy Sarkany today was a true honor. Andy dedicates his time to educating young people across the country about the Holocaust. As a young survivor, he is a valuable source of firsthand information, especially considering that many older survivors have unfortunately passed away. It is crucial that we seize the opportunity to learn from individuals like Andy who can still share their powerful stories with us. Endre (Andy) Sarkany was born in Budapest, Hungary on October 31, 1936. The building he lived in was located inside the Budapest ghetto which is where he remained during the Holocaust. The building housed a nursery/kindergarten on the ground floor. The school was affiliated with the Jewish Agency of Hungary and was led by Mr. Eugene Polnay. The building also housed on the top floor a dance, acrobat, and ballet studio. These facts were significant in Endre's survival and that of at least 150 orphaned children. Endre's father was taken to Mauthausen concentration camp in the spring of 1944, fortunately, he survived. After WWII, Hungary became a communist nation. Although Endre graduated high school in 1955, he was not accepted to university because he was deemed an undesirable element of society. This label was given to anyone who owned a business before the communists took over the country. Endre was fortunate to escape Hungary after the October 1956 uprising and was able to immigrate to the United States.  He received his bachelor's degree from Tusculum College in Tennessee and his Master of Science degree in Applied Mathematics and Computer Science from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.  Endre worked for both the McDonald Douglas Corporation and the IBM Corporation. Over the past 10 years, Endre has been speaking to students about his personal experiences during the Holocaust, living under the brutality of the Soviet regime in Hungary, and finding a home in the United States. Andy is married, has a daughter and son, and five grandchildren.

There are initial signs of a coming wave of immigration to Israel in the wake of resurgent Zionism brought on by the war on Hamas and a spike in ugly antisemitism it the Diaspora. The Jewish Agency and the Ministry of Immigration and Integration are moving fast to help those who go beyond just queries to manifest moves. Reporter Arieh O'Sullivan spoke with Shai Felber, the director of the immigration and integration Unit at the Jewish Agency about the coming expected wave of aliya. (photo: flash90) See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this special ‘War Edition' of the show, Dan and Benny take a deep dive into the geopolitical context of the October 7th war with Col. (Res.) Dr. Eran Lerman. Together, they discuss the war's progress, impact, and possible outcomes both near- and long-term. About Col. (Res.) Dr. Eran Lerman: Colonel (Res.) Dr. Eran Lerman is a lecturer in the Shalem College Departments of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies and Strategy, Diplomacy, and Security and in the Tel Aviv University Department of Political Science. He is also the Vice President of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security and, since 2021, the editor-in-chief of Jerusalem Strategic Tribune. A historian by training and the former deputy for foreign policy and international affairs at Israel's National Security Council, Lerman has also served as director of the American Jewish Committee's Israel/Middle East Office and in senior positions at the Israel Defense Forces' Directorate of Military Intelligence. He holds a PhD in Government from the London School of Economics and a mid-career MPA from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. A third-generation “Sabra,” he is married to Annelies, the father of three, and the proud grandfather of four. A special message from Benny & Dan:Our thoughts and prayers go out to the thousands of victims - murdered, kidnapped, and injured - of the deadly Hamas attack on southern Israel on the morning of October 7th. This episode of the show is dedicated to the brave men and women of the IDF and Israel's security forces as they bravely serve to eliminate the destructive threats faced by Israel and the Jewish People both near and far - and to the People of Israel who are struggling at this unprecedented time. For those interested in donating to help the Israeli people in this time of need, please check out the following resources. Your help is highly appreciated at this urgent time:The Jewish Agency for Israel's Fund for Victims of Terror - CLICK HEREFriends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF) Emergency Campaign 2023 - CLICK HEREIsrael Trauma Coalition (ITC) - CLICK HEREJNF-USA Israel Resilience Campaign - CLICK HEREעם ישראל חי! Am Yisrael Chai! Additional Links:· Follow Dr. Lerman on X @EranLerman· Visit Dr. Lerman's page at Shalem College HERE.A special word about Israel travel from Kenes Tours: Saturday, October 7th will go down in infamy. Israel was brutally and horrifically attacked by Hamas terrorists who violently infiltrated the country and penetrated southern Israeli communities. Thousands of Israelis were murdered, terrorized, and kidnapped. Deadly rockets are being fired upon southern and central Israel from the Gaza Strip and upon communities in the northern Galilee from Lebanon. The Israel Defense Forces are working

In this special ‘War Edition' of the show, Dan and Benny cover updates on the war as well as discuss Israel's PR battle with special guests Joanna Landau, founder and president of Vibe Israel, and Haisam Hassanein, a fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies specializing in Israel's relations with Arab states and Muslim countries.About Joanna Landau:Best-selling author of “Ethical Tribing: Connecting the Next Generation to Israel in the Digital Era,” Joanna is an expert on country branding, Israel's soft power, and the unique challenges Israel faces when building its global reputation. Recognized by Forbes Israel as one of the 50 Most Influential Women in Israel, Joanna worked as a lawyer in Israel's high-tech industry, established two Tel Aviv-based start-ups, and is the Founder and President of Vibe Israel, a nonprofit that has generated over a billion positive mentions about Israel online. She is a director of Tel Aviv Global & Tourism, a governor of Tel Aviv University, and a member of the International Education Committee of Taglit-Birthright. Born in London and raised in Israel, Joanna lives in Tel Aviv with her husband, 3 children and 2 dogs.About Haisam Hassanein:Haisam Hassanein is an adjunct fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, where he is analyzing Israel's relations with Arab states and Muslim countries. He has published in The Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs, The National Interest, the Hill magazine, the New York Daily News, and The Jerusalem Post. He was the first Egyptian to be named a graduate school valedictorian by an Israeli academic institution. Hassanein also sits on the advisory board of Sharaka, a leading organization working to shape a new Middle East, built on dialogue, understanding, cooperation, and friendship.Our thoughts and prayers go out to the thousands of victims - murdered, kidnapped, and injured - of the deadly Hamas attack on southern Israel on the morning of October 7th, and is dedicated to the brave men and women of the IDF and Israel's security forces as they valiantly serve to eliminate the destructive threats faced by Israel and the Jewish People both near and far - and to the People of Israel who are struggling at this unprecedented time. For those interested in donating to help the Israeli people in this time of need, please check out the following resources. Your help is highly appreciated at this urgent time:The Jewish Agency for Israel's Fund for Victims of Terror - CLICK HEREFriends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF) Emergency Campaign 2023 - CLICK HEREIsrael Trauma Coalition (ITC) - CLICK HEREJNF-USA Israel Resilience Campaign - CLICK HEREעם ישראל חי! Am Yisrael Chai! Additional Links:Learn more about Vibe Israel – HERETo buy Joanna Landau's book, ‘Ethical Tribing: Connecting the Next Generation to Israel in the Digital Era' click HERE.Learn more about The Foundation for the Defense of Democracies –

The monstrosity of Hamas' attack on Israel is hard to fathom. This podcast, with Times of Israel reporter Haviv Gur, shares some insight into developments on the ground in Israel, tragedies that Israelis are experiencing real-time, and analysis of the political, religious, and military aspects of the conflict. He also gives us a glimpse into Israel's calculus following the attack – what do Israelis think Palestinians are thinking? Where are the roots of Palestinian extremism, how do the majority Arab Israeli population view the behavior of their neighbors? How has the fundamental understanding of regional cooperation changed, and where are we beginning to have clarity on the real aspirations of Palestinian leaders and other Middle East actors in the fall-out?These questions and more with Haviv Rettig Gur. Haviv is The Times of Israel's senior analyst. He has reported from over 20 countries and served as director of communications for the Jewish Agency for Israel, Israel's largest NGO. He lectures on Israeli politics, the US-Israel relationship, the peace process, modern Jewish history and identity, and Israel-diaspora relations. Haviv lives in Jerusalem with his wife and two sons.Download the transcript here.

Join America's Roundtable (https://americasrt.com/) radio co-hosts Natasha Srdoc and Joel Anand Samy with Herzl Makov, president, The Menachem Begin Heritage Center in Jerusalem. Israel at War | Focusing on the terrorist attacks carried out by Iran-backed Hamas killing over 1,300 Israelis including 27 Americans. Over 3,000 Israelis have been wounded, and 150 Israeli hostages including some 20 Americans have been taken from Israel by Hamas into Gaza. Mr. Makov provides an update on the realities on the ground, the challenging road ahead, and the significance of the US-Israel partnership in confronting terrorism and instability in the Middle East. The discussion also focuses on Iran, the state sponsor of terrorism and how the rogue nation's ambition in acquiring nuclear weapons may adversely impact the region and the world. The conversation also highlights the life and legacy of Menachem Begin, and the mission being accomplished by the Menachem Begin Heritage Center in Jerusalem (https://www.begincenter.org.il/about-the-center/?lang=en). Learn more about The Menachem Begin Heritage Center in Jerusalem: https://www.begincenter.org.il/about-the-center/?lang=en Herzl Makov is CEO of the Menachem Begin Heritage Center, a national center to commemorate (https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/culture/new-documentary-explores-the-life-and-career-of-menachem-begin-669434) Israel's sixth prime minister. Under his leadership, the Center has grown to become one of leaders in Zionist and democratic education led by the values of Menachem Begin, serving the thousands of young people and soldiers who participate in its programs every year. Serving as a fighter pilot in the Israeli Air Force, obtaining the rank of major, his squadron participated in the IAF's bombing of Osirak (https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/israels-raid-on-osirak-40-years-on-669985), Iraq's nuclear reactor, in 1981 – under the orders of Menachem Begin. This decision established what was called “the Begin Doctrine” – no country with the declared aim of destroying Israel would be permitted to acquire the means to do so. Makov holds a degree in Public Policy from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, was one of the founders of Ein Prat: the Academy for Leadership and served as chairman of the Board of Directors. He served as director of the Prime Minister's Office and held positions in the Jewish Agency and the World Zionist Organization before taking up his position at the Begin Heritage Center. A Special Briefing by The Friends of the Menachem Begin Heritage Center | Call to Action | Israel at War | October 18 and 19, 2023: (https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdTcU7aBt9gMA2djr-DPJpEhqjscUDlLGmIq0rVyuepeZFqow/viewform) americasrt.com (https://americasrt.com/) https://ileaderssummit.org/ | https://jerusalemleaderssummit.com/ America's Roundtable on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/americas-roundtable/id1518878472 Twitter: @BeginCenter @ileaderssummit @AmericasRT @NatashaSrdoc @JoelAnandUSA @supertalk America's Roundtable is co-hosted by Natasha Srdoc and Joel Anand Samy, co-founders of International Leaders Summit and the Jerusalem Leaders Summit. America's Roundtable (https://americasrt.com/) radio program - a strategic initiative of International Leaders Summit, focuses on America's economy, healthcare reform, rule of law, security and trade, and its strategic partnership with rule of law nations around the world. The radio program features high-ranking US administration officials, cabinet members, members of Congress, state government officials, distinguished diplomats, business and media leaders and influential thinkers from around the world. Tune into America's Roundtable Radio program from Washington, DC via live streaming on Saturday mornings via 65 radio stations at 7:30 A.M. (ET) on Lanser Broadcasting Corporation covering the Michigan and the Midwest market, and at 7:30 A.M. (CT) on SuperTalk Mississippi — SuperTalk.FM reaching listeners in every county within the State of Mississippi, and neighboring states in the South including Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Tennessee. Listen to America's Roundtable on digital platforms including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon, Google and other key online platforms. Listen live, Saturdays at 7:30 A.M. (CT) on SuperTalk | https://www.supertalk.fm

Join Dan Feferman and Benny Scholder for the return of Jewanced as we present a special live podcast covering Swords of Iron - The Simchat Torah War.Taped Live on Friday, October 13, 2023, day 7 of the war, this will be the first in a series of episodes we're broadcasting to bring you ongoing updates and snapshots of the progress of this unfolding war - a horrific, devastating, and pivotal moment in the history of Israel and the Jewish People. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the thousands of victims - murdered, kidnapped, and injured - of the deadly Hamas attack on southern Israel on the morning of October 7th, and is dedicated to the brave men and women of the IDF and Israel's security forces as they valiantly serve to eliminate the destructive threats faced by Israel and the Jewish People both near and far - and to the People of Israel who are struggling at this unprecedented time. For those interested in donating to help the Israeli people at this time of need, please check out the following resources. Your help is highly appreciated at this urgent time:The Jewish Agency for Israel's Fund for Victims of Terror - CLICK HEREFriends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF) Emergency Campaign 2023 - CLICK HEREIsrael Trauma Coalition (ITC) - CLICK HEREJNF-USA Israel Resilience Campaign - CLICK HEREעם ישראל חי! Am Yisrael Chai!

Today's guest for this special episode of Danger Close is journalist Haviv Rettig Gur. Haviv is a senior political analyst for The Times of Israel.  Haviv served as a combat medic in the Israel Defense Forces, was the Director of Communications for the Jewish Agency for Israel, and was a correspondent for The Jerusalem Post. You can follow him on X @havivrettiggur  SPONSORS: Navy Federal Credit Union: Today's episode is presented by Navy Federal Credit Union. Learn more about them at https://www.navyfederal.org/ Black Rifle Coffee Company: Today's episode is also brought to you by Black Rifle. Purchase at http://www.blackriflecoffee.com/dangerclose and use code: dangerclose20 at checkout for 20% off your purchase and your first coffee club order! Danger Close Apparel: Check out the new Danger Close apparel. https://shop.officialjackcarr.com/ Danger Close is an IRONCLAD original.

Summary Brig. Gen. (res.) Erez David Maisel (Twitter, LinkedIn) joins Andrew (Twitter; LinkedIn) to provide a crash-course in Israeli Intelligence history. Erez is a researcher and former head of the IDF's International Cooperation Division.  *FULL SHOWNOTES & FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE* What You'll Learn Intelligence Early history of intelligence in Israel The origins of Israeli intelligence organizations Preparing for a Nazi invasion of British Palestine The shift from British to American influence on Israeli intelligence Reflections The challenge of survival Conflict and compromise, or lack thereof And much, much more … *FULL SHOWNOTES & FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE* Episode Notes This week on SpyCast, Andrew was joined by Erez David Maisel to discuss an overview of the history of intelligence and espionage in Israel. This episode is the first in our 5-part series on Israeli Intelligence. In this month-long series, SpyCast takes a deep dive into the ins and outs of intelligence and espionage in Israel – its intricate history, agencies, major successes and failures, and current state. In this first episode, Erez helps us to lay out a broad roadmap of the history of Israeli intelligence, providing an excellent foundation of knowledge to build upon in the coming weeks. Stay tuned! And…  Erez is an alumni of the University of Haifa, which sits atop the northeastern slope of Israel's Mount Caramel mountain rage. On the western side of the range, you can find the The Nahal Me'arot / Wadi el-Mughara Caves, a UNESCO World Heritage Site that documents over 500,000 years of the history human evolution.  Quotes of the Week “I would say that from 1909 until probably the early eighties of the 20th century, the biggest threat is survival. You know, this fear that somebody … would come and do something. And we have to protect ourselves from that.” – Erez David Maisel. *FULL SHOWNOTES & FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE* Resources  SURFACE SKIM *SpyCasts* Kenya, East Africa, and America with African Intelligence Chief Wilson Boinett (2023) Irish Garda Intelligence Chief with Assistant Commissioner Michael McElgunn (2023)  Israeli Military Intelligence with IDF Brig. General (Res.) Yossi Kuperwasser (2023) Hitler's Trojan Horse – Nazi Intelligence with Nigel West (2023) *Beginner Resources* Israel Profile: Timeline, BBC (2019) [Timeline of important events] The Israel-Palestine conflict: a brief, simple history, Vox, YouTube (2016) [10 min. video] Zionism, Encyclopedia Britannica (2023) [Short background article] *FULL SHOWNOTES & FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE* DEEPER DIVE Books A State at Any Cost: The Life of David Ben-Gurion, T. Segev (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2019) A History of the First Arab-Israeli War, B. Morris (Yale University Press, 2009) The Sword And The Olive: A Critical History Of The Israeli Defense Force, M. Van Creveld (PublicAffairs, 2002) One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs Under the British Mandate, T. Segev (Picador, 2001) Primary Sources  The Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel (1948) Israel Requests Recognition From the United States, Jewish Virtual Library (1948) Presentation of the Jewish case by representatives of the Jewish Agency, Jewish Virtual Library (1947) The Balfour Declaration, Center for Israel Education (1917) The Sykes-Picot Agreement (1916) The Jewish Question and the Plan for the Jewish State, Center for Israel Education (1896) *Wildcard Resource* While this episode focuses mainly intelligence over the past 100 years, the history of espionage in Israel goes back much further.  Check out the Story of the 12 Spies from a portion of the Torah to learn more about biblical spies!  *FULL SHOWNOTES & FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE*

Recorded on September 29, 2023 We begin with a short discussion about the death of Senator Dianne Feinstein at age 90. We then touch back on our previous show about Naomi Wolf, Naomi Klein, and political doppelgangers, with a preview of what we will be discussing in depth when we return to this topic. We then break down this week's X (formerly Twitter) space, hosted by Ben Shapiro and featuring Elon Musk and a number of prominent Zionist personalities, who we are referring to as the Neo Parushim. We discuss the space itself and some of the people involved, the #BanTheADL campaign, and why this is the natural result of Elon Musk's campaign against the ADL designed to further weaponize  the global push to dictate the definition of Anti Semitism." https://twitter.com/benshapiro/status/1707137454304821373 https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1lDGLPvzDvRGm https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpMPoBIK8N8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhaDlA5SIL0 https://www.edge.org/library https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Agency_for_Israel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Nordau https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marketplace_of_ideas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump:_The_Art_of_the_Deal https://x.com/leahmcelrath/status/1707450845967642787 https://twitter.com/leahmcelrath/status/1129207174830469120 https://x.com/lakotaman1/status/1707760392234012689 https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/26/world/middleeast/israels-outspoken-envoy-is-wise-to-us-ways.html https://mishpacha.com/front-row-seat-to-history/ Gadi Taub https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-sqFBlfpPc https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/06/18/donald-trumps-new-world-order https://www.bollyn.com/elbit-the-hellerstein-connection-to-9-11 https://jewishcurrents.org/elon-musk-the-jews-and-the-adl-with-know-your-enemy --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/the-antedote/support

World Jewish population is modestly growing to nearly 16 million, and is approaching the number of world Jewry before the Holocaust. This according to the demographic report published by the Jewish Agency over Rosh Hashana. The main growth is of course in Israel, but the American Jewish community and a few others in the Diaspora are also on the rise. Professor (emeritus) Sergio Della Pergola of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem who did the basic research and wrote the report for the Jewish Agency, told reporter Arieh O'Sullivan that there were about 25 million people around the world who were eligible for Israeli citizenship under the Law of Return. (photo: Yonatan Sindel/flash90)See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On this WPN Call #267, Dr. Jim Garlow is joined by Danielle Mor, the Vice President for Israel and Global Philanthropy at the Jewish Agency for Israel. She discusses the fighting and violence occurring in Ethiopia, and what we can do to help.      Website: https://www.jafina.org/     Dr. Jim Garlow has partnered with Pastor Mario Bramnick and Adam Schindler to bring you World Prayer Network (WPN), which seeks out Holy Spirit given strategies for how to be an effective and contagious Christ-follower in our present national situations. WPN hosts weekly prayer calls to seek out strategies for the transformation of nations, including our own. During these live calls, we share briefings from key leaders and then pray into what we see and hear from the Lord.     Follow us on social media:  facebook.com/wellversedworld twitter: @wellversedworld instagram: @wellversedworld www.wellversedworld.org      

Tune in for a conversation with Yotam Politzer, CEO of IsraAID, a leading Israeli humanitarian aid organization and longtime partner of AJC, about the group's mission and the impact of sharing Israel's expertise and technology to help millions worldwide after crises hit. Yotam also shares his personal journey and how he found his passion for humanitarian work. Additionally, hear what our podcast community at AJC Global Forum 2023 in Tel Aviv had to say when we asked: why do you love Israel?  *The views and opinions expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views or position of AJC.  Episode Lineup:  (0:40) Podcast Listeners (2:47) Yotam Politzer Show Notes: Learn: Crossing the Red Sea: Israel and Africa in 2023  Listen: Israel's Reasonableness Law: What it Means for Israel's Democracy and Security Follow People of the Pod on your favorite podcast app, and learn more at AJC.org/PeopleofthePod You can reach us at: peopleofthepod@ajc.org If you've enjoyed this episode, please be sure to tell your friends, tag us on social media with #PeopleofthePod, and hop onto Apple Podcasts to rate us and write a review, to help more listeners find us. __ Episode Transcript: Transcript of Podcast Listener Segment: Manya Brachear Pashman:   This week, we bring you voices from Tel Aviv. I spoke with Yotam Politzer, the CEO of IsraAID, about the importance of sharing Israel's expertise and technology with the world's most vulnerable.  But first, hear from some podcast listeners who stopped by our podcast booth at AJC Global Forum 2023 to tell us why they love Israel. Listeners, the mic is yours.  Corey Sarcu: My name's Corey Sarcu, I'm from Chicago. Hannah Geller: My name is Hannah Geller, and I'm from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Irvin Ungar: My name is Irvin Ungar. I'm from Burlingame, California, which is near San Francisco. Corey Sarcu: As for why I love Israel, there are so many reasons. I think, culturally, Israel is kind of a crazy place. Everyone is very welcoming. They're almost aggressively welcoming in a way, like one of the first things, they meet you for five minutes, and they're already calling you achi, which means my brother, it goes along with the whole theme that really the Jewish people, we're all one big family, and Israel is just the natural manifestation of that in the state. Hannah Geller: I love how in Israel, I can walk on the street, I can be on the bus with someone, and a stranger will invite me to Shabbat dinner. I love how the woman at the pool will just hand her baby over to me if she has something else to be tending to–and I've never seen her in my life. Irvin Ungar: The reason I love Israel is probably-I've been here several dozen times. And the first time I arrived, I do remember feeling like I was coming home, and I'm still coming home. The question is why I left if I'm still coming home, and I've been here that many times, but nonetheless, that's the way I feel. I'm with my people. I'm with my people when I'm not in Israel. These are like my brothers. So I'm here. That's why I'm here. ___ Transcript of Interview with Yotam Politzer: Manya Brachear Pashman:   Yotam Politzer joined IsraAID, Israel's preeminent humanitarian aid organization, in 2011. In fact, he was the NGO's second employee. Since then, he has flown on dozens of aid missions personally helping more than a quarter million people after some of the world's worst disasters. In 2017, he took over IsraAID as its chief executive officer and has since expanded the reach of Israeli disaster aid around the world. Earlier this year, he received the Charles Bronfman Prize, a $100,000 award given to a Jewish humanitarian under 50. Yotam is with us now, in Tel Aviv. Yotam, welcome to People of the Pod. Yotam Politzer:  Thank you. Thanks for having me. Manya Brachear Pashman:   So first, thank you for all that you are doing to quite literally repair the world. Tell us about your upbringing and what led you up that particular Jewish professional path. Yotam Politzer:  So, I wasn't thinking that I would end up chasing disasters around the world in places like the tsunami in Japan, or the Ebola outbreak, or most recently, Afghanistan, where we had a very dramatic operation. I grew up in a small village, in a small Moshav in the north part of Israel. My father is a social worker, my mom was a school counselor, and had a beautiful childhood. And before my military service in the IDF, I did something-it's kind of a gap, we call it in Hebrew Shnat Sherut, which translates to service year. And it's kind of a volunteering year before the military service. And I did that with youth at risk, many of them are from Ethiopia, Ethiopian Jews. It was an incredible year, probably one of the most meaningful years of my life and I kind of developed my passion not just for service, but also for working with people from other cultures, essentially, using humanitarian work not only to save lives, but also to build bridges. And I learned so much from the Ethiopians that I worked with at that time. And then after my army service, like every Israeli, I followed what we call the hummus trail. Which is this crazy phenomenon with about 50,000 Israelis every year are traveling, backpacking after the army to kind of clear their heads from the tension of the service. Most people go to India or South America, I went to India. And it's called the hummus trail because the locals are starting to make hummus for the Israelis that are traveling. So I was following the hummus trail- hummus was not highly recommended. In India it has a bit of a curry taste to it. But ended up arriving to Nepal. And I was planning to trek in the Himalayas. And I did that for a couple of weeks. And then I saw an ad that invited backpackers to volunteer with street children in Nepal, of all places. I thought well, it sounds cool. Oh, you know, I'll do it for a couple of weeks, I'll continue to Thailand or wherever I was going. I ended up staying there for three and a half years, really fell in love with that kind of work. I came back to Israel and want to start my life and two weeks after I came back to Israel, that was 2011 the tsunami in Japan happened. Mega disaster, more than 20,000 people lost their lives, half a million people lost their homes. And IsraAID, which was at that time, a tiny organization with basically one employee and a few volunteers, offered me to lead a relief mission to Japan. And again, I was supposed to go for two weeks and I ended up staying there for three years.  So that's how it kind of all started for me. And interestingly for IsraAID, it used to be a disaster response organization, and it's still part of our DNA, but in Japan we realized that for us our impact could be not just immediate relief and pulling people out of the rubble and giving them medical support, etc. Also we need to look at long term impact. In Japan, a rich country, the third-largest economy, they didn't really need our support with immediate relief. But what we supported them with was trauma care for children. Which, again, is an area that unfortunately, in Israel, not because everything is so perfect here, but because of our, you know, ongoing challenges from the trauma of the Holocaust to the ongoing conflict, we really developed this expertise to help children cope with trauma.  So that's all how sort of how I started. And then from Japan, I went to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, which was terrifying. I remember every night I used to wake up full of sweat. It's one of the symptoms of Ebola, but thank god, I'm okay. And then I led a mission in Nepal, after the earthquake they had in there, we actually had a very dramatic search and rescue operation. And we found the last survivor of the earthquake, was a woman who was trapped under the rubble for six days without food or water.  And then I led a relief mission to Greece with a Syrian refugee, actually also in partnership with AJC's, some of AJC's team members actually joined me. And it was amazing, because these people were considered our enemies, and then all of a sudden, they receive support from us.  We can touch base on that later. But so basically, I was chasing disasters until 2017, when I was offered to co-lead the organization, first as a co-CEO, and then from 2019, as the global CEO. So now, you know, we started as employee number two. Now we have about 350 of us in 16 countries. And it's just an amazing privilege. And I'm still learning every day. That's what keeps me going. Manya Brachear Pashman: In 16 countries, how are those countries identified and selected as locations for IsraAID? Yotam Politzer: So, so for Israel, and it may sound bad, but for us, disasters are opportunities. And it doesn't mean that we sit down and wait for disaster to happen, they will happen, whether we like it or not. And it could be, you know, climate related disasters like a hurricane or tsunami, or earthquake, or manmade disaster, like what's happening in Ukraine, or in Afghanistan, when the Taliban took over, or it could be even a pandemic, like, well, we all just experienced a global crisis.  So whenever there's a crisis somewhere in the world, and it could be in a neighboring country like Turkey, where we just had an earthquake or in you know, the most remote places on earth like Vanuatu, near Fiji, we have an emergency response team that will deploy, many times in partnership with AJC. But we will send an emergency response team to essentially to do two things, one, to provide immediate relief, but to look for partners. And the partnership part is crucial, because we can't really do anything by ourselves. Manya Brachear Pashman: What about inside Israel? Yotam Politzer: So when you asked me how do we decide where to go, we decide where to go, where we have resources and partners who are interested in the type of expertise that we can provide. And this expertise is what we're bringing from Israel, whether it's water technology, trauma care that I mentioned, and other areas of response. We also know that so right now mentioned 16 countries, we have teams on the ground in Ukraine, actually responding to, you know, the bombing of the dam, just two days ago, our team was actually on the ground a few kilometers away from there. So thank God, they're safe. And but the good news is that we were able to respond immediately and we already have team on the ground. We have teams in Colombia supporting Venezuelan refugees. We have many teams in Africa, supporting the drought and some of the conflicts in South Sudan and elsewhere. The teams are not just Israelis. The Emergency Response Team deploys from here but very quickly, we identify local team members. So out of our 350 employees, many of them are actually local members of the communities that we train and support and they take the lead which is much more sustainable, because our end goal is not to be needed. Our end goal is to live the know-how and the capacity in the country, in the community, so they can support themselves. Manya Brachear Pashman:    What about inside Israel? Do you do anything– Yotam Politzer:  No, I mean, our mandate, IsraAID- it was established 22 years ago, actually by a group of activists and the vision was to bring Israeli expertise to the world's most vulnerable communities around the world, essentially saying, you know, Israel, again, not because everything is so perfect here, because of our challenges, we developed technologies, and techniques and methodologies that could and should be shared with disaster areas around the world. So many of the original members were actually  doctors and nurses, and people who were active here on a day to day basis, but wanted to share these know-how, and expertise with the world. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Why? Why not just keep it for yourselves? Yotam Politzer:  First of all, for several reasons, one, because we are global citizens. And we are influenced and influencing the world. And we should be a force for good. And it's really just the right thing to do. To that one, too, because we actually have an added value. We have unique expertise and unique experience that people don't have, everyone calls Israel, the startup nation, right. So we see ourselves as the humanitarian wing of the startup nation. And we also a little bit, South Korea says we think we should do more as Israelis and as a trade. So we're doing the best we can, we are reaching millions, but we should reach billions. So and the third reason, and that's also one of the reasons the organization is called East trade is that it's also an opportunity to build bridges. And I think that's where the agency partnership is crucial, because AJC is all about building bridges, right? Between the Jews and the world, if you will. And that's where I think there's such a beautiful alignment of values and of the mission and vision of how, again, terrible crisis and tragedies could be, could become a game changer in building bridges. And these bridges are, you know, could be built with Syrian refugees who are considered our enemies. I remember, I was called a Syrian guy, you know, after we pulled out his daughter, in Greece, and we treated her, she almost drowned. She told me my worst enemy became my biggest supporter, or a group of 200 Afghans that we pulled out that are now sending me Shabbat, Shalom every every Shabbat. So that's kind of the obvious, right? But, there's a lot of bridges that needs to be built also with our friends, you know, you know, whether it's in Guatemala, which is a country that's very, you know, supportive of Israel, but like, but we are supporting them. So our goal at Israel is not to, we're not here to do diplomacy work, or we're not dealing with politics. But at the same time, we do see ourselves as representatives of the Israeli civil society. And we do see how an added value of our work is these very strong bridges that are being built both on the high level and on the People to People connection. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Have you ever encountered people who are not willing to accept help from Israeli agencies? Yotam Politzer:  So honestly, it almost never happened. In 99.5% of the cases, people were very happy to receive support from Israelis, and from IsraAID. Sometimes people did not expect it. So I would say they were positively shocked to receive support. But, I think they were happy for several reasons. One is because it actually helped. Two is because we're not just there for short term, we're actually staying long, longer than most organizations. So we arrived in the first 72 hours, but we are typically, you know, staying at an average of five years, in an area. So we build trust. And, and people see that it's not just, you know, a token support.  Three, we have a very strong kind of multicultural team, right. When I mentioned the Syrian refugees, we had a lot of Arab Israelis, people who speak Arabic, who were able to provide the support. So it's not only professional, it's also a strong cultural understanding, and many of our local team members. The only cases I would say, which was a little bit complicated and challenging, was when we actually worked inside countries that don't have diplomatic relations with Israel. So when we worked with Syrians we didn't work inside Syria worked with Syrians who escaped. Same with Afghanistan. We help people evacuate from Afghanistan, but we didn't send our team inside. We did send our team inside Iraq, inside Bangladesh.  And for security reasons, mainly, our local partners knew where we were from, but the local government didn't. So we had to be much more careful in terms of our visibility. We couldn't wear our t-shirts and our logos and you know, mainly for safety and security reasons for our staff. That's that's obviously a challenge. I mean, politics is there, whether we like it or not. Manya Brachear Pashman:   So in those situations, do you feel like you make headway with the citizens with the public that you're helping, that may have a long term effect on how the governments consider Israel in the future? Or is that something that you care about? Yotam Politzer:  I mean, we do care, we are from here, and your organization is called IsraAID, and probably my life would have been easier if I would be working for the UN or working for Doctors Without Borders, or for other organizations that don't have any affiliation with Israel, right. So we do care, we do care about building bridges. And we do care about changing people's perspectives. One story that I have was from Sierra Leone, West Africa, during the Ebola crisis, we worked with the First Lady. And, she was shocked to receive support from the other side of the world, from Israel. She said, you came from Israel, all the way, I promise that, you know, when Sierra Leone will be Ebola free, me and my husband will come to visit Israel, and she actually followed her promise. So you know, that was like a very clear kind of diplomatic aspect.  Now, when we went to Malawi, also in partnership with AJC, following the terrible cyclone that they had, the President was the one who welcomed us and said, how excited he is for the support. When we talk about the Syrian refugees we have supported over the years, we worked there for six years, about 120,000 of them. So we do believe it goes a long way, right? It's not just one or two people. It's not just anecdotal. Whether it will lead to a political change in the Middle East, maybe hopefully, it definitely does change the perspectives of hundreds of 1000s of people. Manya Brachear Pashman:   What is the budget of of IsraAID? Yotam Politzer:  So this year, we're close to $23 million. Yeah. We tripled ourselves in the last two years. Again, not because everything is great, but because the world has gone mad. And it was a series of events that, you know, that we responded to whether it's, you know, Afghanistan, and Ukraine, of course, is an ongoing disaster and Turkey and others. So yeah, so we are in $24 million, we are growing, and planning to grow to $50 million in the next few years.  Which is really what we believe we need in order to continue responding in the countries that we are in have some kind of an emergency fund that enables us to respond to new crisis. By the way, I want to say that that's where AJC's has been an incredible partner, because AJC, I think, supported us in more than 20 countries over the last few years. And one of the main challenges is that there's a disaster in Country X, and we need seed funding, we need to be able to deploy immediately.  And that's typically what AJC provides. So and by the way, it's in places that are all over the media, like Ukraine, for instance, or in places like Malawi, that no one heard of. And that's crucial, because we know, unfortunately, that media attention equals to donor attention. So when things are in the media, it's much easier to raise funds, it's also limited, right? It's usually like a week or two, and then people move to the next tweet. When you're an expert, you probably know that.  But AJC has been there on both kind of the more high profile and low profile and really has been an incredible partner that really enabled us. Because once you're on the ground, it's not only that you're saving lives, which is, you know, our main goal, it's also you build partnership and relationship and you're able to communicate to the world that you're doing that so you can raise more money. So, so deploying quickly is important for several reasons. And AJC, you know, basically enabled us to do that. So that's huge for us. Manya Brachear Pashman:   If someone wants to volunteer for IsraAID, are there opportunities to do that? Yotam Politzer:  There are opportunities to do that, although I do have to say something because–we were based more on short term volunteers in the past. And there's a serious problem with that. Many people who come for a short term are actually doing more damage than good. I mean, they come with great intentions. But they start something that, you know, there's no continuation or if there's a lot of pictures with children in Africa, it's a very criticized field. Now, having said that, there are still people who have specific expertise–surgeons, for example, eye surgeons, you know, in a few days of volunteering, they could save people's lives, right. So, we're not against it, it needs to be people who are highly skilled, or people who can commit for long term. And we do take insurance, for example, college students, mainly graduate students, not so much undergrad, from specific fields who are looking for professional fellowships or internships in many of the countries. So there are definitely opportunities both for younger and for people who are young at heart. But the expertise or the long term commitment is crucial. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Responding to those kinds of crises, how does that reflect Jewish values? In other words, how do some of these crises contradict or violate Jewish teachings, Jewish values? And how much of a role does that play in you coming in to address it? Yotam Politzer:  So I think, you know, our team, just to clarify, is not just Jewish, right? We have Jews, Christians, Muslim, Buddhist, you know, other people. So it's a very diverse team, from any perspective, definitely, from a religious perspective. However, I think many of our team members are inspired by Jewish values. I mean, there's the obvious one of tikkun olam, which, you know, I think it almost became a buzzword, I heard so many people use it. So we almost don't use it because it became such a buzzword, but essentially, how we interpret this Jewish value is our responsibility to look beyond just our community. And to support the world's most vulnerable communities and really, literally repairing the world are supporting the repairment of the world. So that's kind of the clear connection, I don't I do think that everything that related to helping the strangers, right, people who are not just from our immediate community, is something that we strongly, strongly believe in.  I mean, there's a story that I always share about Ukraine. You know, if you're a Ukrainian Jew 80 years ago, you are-during the World War Two. You are at the bottom of the bottom of the barrel right? You're likely to be slaughtered by the Nazis or by their Ukrainian collaborators. And today in Ukraine, the Jewish community is a big Jewish community, they are receiving so much support, which is amazing to think about it from a historical perspective, they are entitled to support from the Israeli government and from the Jewish Agency. And from the JDC, from so many great organizations who are focusing on supporting Jews in Ukraine. I don't know if you heard that. But in the beginning of the war, when millions of people fled Ukraine, the Jews were told the Jewish refugees were told to put a sign with the letters I-L for Israel, and they were taken out of the lines, and prioritized.  So it's unheard of like, the tables have turned right. Which is amazing. However, what we take from it is that we have responsibility. And that's why it's so important that now Jews and Israelis show the world that we support everyone, not just Jews. And that we are different, and that we are there for everyone. And we are there even for people who are considered our enemies. Manya Brachear Pashman:   My last question is, I have to admit, every time you've talked about vulnerable people, I hear you say valuable, I just misheard you. But then I think, well valuable, vulnerable, one in the same. And I'm curious, what you have learned from the communities and people that you've served in this capacity, and also whether they have gone on to teach and volunteer and help and pay it forward? Yotam Politzer:  It's a great question. And I like it, I never heard this... But that's exactly how, not only me, but all of our team members feel like–vulnerable, our communities are also extremely valuable. And in many places, we see our role, not just in bringing the expertise and know-how but actually, in a way putting a spotlight on local expertise and local know-how. And that's how, in many of our countries of operation, now, the people who are leading the response are actually local members of the community, who received some training and support from us, but actually bringing their own cultural expertise.  And we've been learning so much from these people, again, from languages to cultures to how you find very innovative solutions when there are very limited resources. It's a really two way street, of learning. And now, many of our team members on the regional level, actually, when there is a crisis in a neighboring country, together with our team from Israel, they respond.  So now in Malawi, for instance, we sent a team from Israel and Kenya, together, when there was another crisis in the Caribbean, we sent a team from Dominica. So, because they know they're there, so practically, it's much quicker and they understand the local culture and context. So, definitely a big part of our role is to build this global team of disaster responders who can respond to disasters, both globally and locally and in the region. So we see how that becomes more of a bigger part of our strategy now to utilize local and regional resources, to support communities at risk. So it's not only, we're coming from the west, sort of with this know-how, we're combining that with local know-how and expertise. Manya Brachear Pashman:   You're not just parachuting in and imposing your solutions. Yotam Politzer:  Exactly. We co-create solutions. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Yotam, thank you so much, I really appreciate you sharing this time with us. Yotam Politzer:  Thanks for having me. And thanks for a wonderful partnership with AJC throughout the years. Manya Brachear Pashman:   If you missed last week's episode, be sure to listen to AJC Chief Policy and Political Affairs Officer Jason Isaacson break down last week's passage of Israel's Reasonableness Standard Law and what it means for Israel's democracy and security.  

Join us for an exclusive conversation featuring three women leading transformation in the Middle East. Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin, Chairperson of the Israeli Export Institute, speaks to promoting Israeli exports and fostering economic growth; Gadeer Kamal-Mreeh, a Senior Envoy at The Jewish Agency for Israel, discusses fostering connections and supporting Jewish communities in the region; and Aviva Steinberger, Director of Innovation Diplomacy at Start-Up Nation Central, touches on harnessing innovation and technology for positive change. Led by AJC Abu Dhabi Program Director Reva Gorelick onstage at AJC Global Forum 2023 in Tel Aviv, this conversation offers valuable insights into the transformative efforts shaping the Middle East today. *The views and opinions expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views or position of AJC.  ___ Episode Lineup:  (0:40) Reva Gorelick, Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin, Gadeer Kamal-Mreeh, Aviva Steinberger ___ Show Notes: Listen: People of the Pod: 'Signed, Sealed, Delivered?': Exploring Israel's Declaration of Independence with People of the Pod and Israel Story Watch: AJC Global Forum: Women Driving Change in the Middle East - video of the full session, as heard on this week's episode. More sessions from AJC Global Forum 2023 Follow People of the Pod on your favorite podcast app, and learn more at AJC.org/PeopleofthePod You can reach us at: peopleofthepod@ajc.org If you've enjoyed this episode, please be sure to tell your friends, tag us on social media with #PeopleofthePod, and hop onto Apple Podcasts to rate us and write a review, to help more listeners find us. __ Transcript of Interview with Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin, Gadeer Kamal-Mreeh, Aviva Steinberger: Manya Brachear Pashman: The role women play in pursuing peace and progress in the Middle East is too often overlooked. But my colleague AJC Abu Dhabi Program Director Reva Gorelick is not one to leave such an important stone unturned. At AJC Global Forum 2023 in Tel Aviv she led a fascinating conversation on "Women Driving Change in the Middle East." This week's podcast brings you a portion of that conversation with Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin, Chairperson of the Israeli Export Institute, Gadeer Kamal-Mreeh, a Senior Envoy at The Jewish Agency for Israel, and Aviva Steinberger, the Director of Innovation Diplomacy at Start-Up Nation Central. We open with Reva posing a question to Gadeer. Reva Gorelick: Gadeer, in your career, you have broken barriers in many ways. And I'm going to read because there's so many ways that I want to make sure that I get them right, as the first non Jewish broadcast anchorwoman here, both in Hebrew and Arabic, and then as the first Druze woman to serve as a member of Knesset, what have you learned about the appetite for change and for representation of historically marginalized communities in this part of the world specifically? And how did these trends track with what you're now seeing as an emissary for the Jewish Agency in America? Gadeer Kamal-Mreeh:   Good morning. So long story short, so much, I learned so much. I'm still learning, I'm still growing, I'm still listening. And I'm still amazed to see the social impact of simply our existence, simply of being or living or achieving or talking to each other. And look at us today, this morning. The first of us, each one of us, based in different countries, speaking different language, different religion, different fields, but we are social agents. And this is what my father told me, always, as a child, you are a social agent. You are not privileged to live your life in a way that you are consuming reality, you have to shape reality.  And I did social activism even without knowing that I'm doing social activism. I broadcasted my first TV show when I was 12 years old. I believe in people, I believe that we have the ability to change reality. And then being in those positions as first, as firs, as first, when you are how I always introduce myself by saying hello, my name is Gadeer. I am an Israeli but not a Jew, I am an Arab but not a Muslim, I am a minority within the Arab minority, my mother tongue is Arabic, married religion is Druze. I'm a proud Israeli citizen..good luck. So having such a unique identity, and being the first in those positions is something that a stranger would not understand the complexity and the beauty that you have. And so I started to write my book because I'm afraid that we cannot have, we don't have enough time to talk about it.  But I learned so much the most important thing that I learned is engage, engage, engage. It doesn't matter where it doesn't matter how it doesn't matter with whom. Engage as a social agent and activate your role in shaping public opinion. I had so many stories in my life, Reva, in which I was amazed and telling myself, Yes, we can. Yes, we can. Being the only woman in so many rooms, I'm sure that Ayelet and Aviva also understand what does that mean to be the only woman. Nobody asked you if you want to represent women, you are a representative of women. So talk, represent, share their stories. And two weeks ago, we were in DC and we initiated some of the prestigious forum that you will hear about, and we were 18 successful leaders in Washington DC, but guess what? I was the only woman. And I told them guys, I got used to this in my villages in the Druze community, we are still a conservative community. Okay, but in DC in the 21st century, I am the only woman? Hey, wake up. Then I understood that okay, we did so much, we achieved so much in the last decades, last century, but we are not there yet. You know, like reminding ourselves in some countries we have no ability to vote, we have no ability to even, no right to be elected. Okay, we did, we promoted, we leverage our skills we went, we learned, we achieved. But even now today, we are not there. We don't have yet absolute gender equality.  Look at the numbers. In our current government, there are zero CEOs of ministries, five of 33 ministers are women. 25% of MK members of parliament today are women. We are talking about 30 from 120. So the up-bottom policy is also, you know, reflecting the atmosphere. There are huge ramifications of who we are, who is working with me, who are my colleagues. So we are trying to lead. We are the head, the CEO, the founder, but we need to work much more hard to achieve. And this is our role.  So the most important advice, in my opinion, that I can share here is lead. Don't wait for opportunity, take the opportunity, and I am really trying to target here, women, especially young women, excuse me, men, you have your exclusive club, you take care of each other. I believe that behind every woman, there is no man. There is a circle of women to support her, to give her the chances, to help her, to leverage her skills, to teach her. And I believe that it is our role as leaders at first, to empower women to be there for each other and to take the number much higher.  Because so many researchers found that and it's proven that our ability to read reality is much better than men. We see the macro perspective, the empathy, the way of dealing things, the multitask. And all those things affect the atmosphere in our companies, in our organizations, in politics, in the Knesset. So do it, engage and lead and don't wait for the opportunity. Take the opportunity and lead. Reva Gorelick: Thank you. I want to just follow up on one point that you brought up, Ayelet, I'm gonna go off script a little bit and just ask, you brought up a question about representation in government. And we're not there in most parts of the world, we're not nearly anywhere where we where we need to be and where we should be at this point. When we're looking at government representation and gender parity in government, what should we be striving for? And how do you see that gender parity and representation as a barometer for social change and policy change? Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin: I think it is a little bit frustrating to admit the truth. We felt that we were going forward, and then we were kind of pulled back. And it's really up to us. I've got to say something, and I've got to be very frank about it. Politics is a shitty business. I worked with Yitzchak Rabin when I was 20 years old. And at 25, I had so much political power, I couldn't believe it. And I still didn't run for the Knesset, because of the men around me, you know, for them. I was 25 years old. Why should I run for the Knesset? Nowadays, it's much more reasonable to do so, to make such a crazy decision.  But then I decided to go to the Knesset only after I already had three kids, a full career, a lawyer and board member and owner of a company, everything, that's when I decided, okay, now I'm gonna bring everything into the home, you know, and run to the Knesset. And it's a very, very difficult and non rewarding life. Even today, I tell people, I'm a politician, because I don't want people to think that politics is such a bad thing, you know, it's so important to understand, Gadeer, forgive me, she's also a politician, you know, this is not a bad thing.  You know, this is, you know, the kind of my IP, you know, that's what I bring to the, to the table, my ability to speak to people and my ability to solve problems to, to do a lot of things, you know, that probably people with, with different skills, other people will be scientists and doctors, I really, really wanted to be an MD, but that's for another session. But what we need to do is make sure that from the very, very start at kindergarten, I'm not educating my daughter, I'm educating her brothers. Her brothers need to know that she can be Prime Minister, if she would like. That she could do anything that she could want. That's the idea. Because we used to say, once upon a time for socialization, okay, so let's take care of the girls. Nuh-uh. We need to take care of all of them, of both genders, because this is what we need to do.  Because till today, and especially in a very, very complex society, like Israel, where we have both very, very strong liberalism, alongside in spite of you know, in spite of the situation in the Knesset, still very, very strong Bible values that, you know, the values that we share, and conservatism, that is not only Jewish, okay. I mean, there's no, no doubt there is, you know, is there a strong draft of conservatism from the Jewish part, but also we know well from the non Jewish parts. So the idea is, you know, people like Gadeer, I never heard you speak about what your father told you, that you should change reality. But that's exactly it. It's up to us to shape reality and shaping reality, from Facebook, from Meta, that Sheryl Sandberg used to say, speak at the table. You know, when you go through board minutes, you see that the women don't speak as much as the men. It's not only Okay, so we got to the table, but do we speak there?  And I noticed once you know that Shabbat dinners, my daughter doesn't speak as much as her brothers. She's kind of reluctant. Maybe she'll make a mistake. Maybe she'll make it out and I'll correct her. God forbid I'm a terrible mom in these things. You know, I never have patience. So I say to the boys, I say, now you sush. And I give her the front seat. And this is so important to do. And up until, you know, we'll realize that and act on it, we will unfortunately, especially in such a divided society, like our own, we'll stay in the same situation.  As long as people for instance, in primary parties, people still vote for one woman, you know this like, that's like the one token woman that we vote for. Now, on the other side, on the left wing, it's not as much as that. But again, we don't see as many women. I think in Yesh Atid actually, Yair [Lapid] made a huge effort. Also, Benny [Gantz] made a huge effort to bring more women on board. But these are different. You know, these are different kinds of parties. By the way, if you ask me, what's better for women? Nowadays, primaries or non primaries, you'd be surprised to hear: non primaries. Non primaries. Primaries are not necessarily the best way to bring women to the front seat. Reva Gorelick: Thank you for sharing that. And bringing that into the conversation of you, I want to come back to you. Aviva, you hold the role of Director of Innovation Diplomacy. It's not a phrase that I had heard much before we started having these conversations. And I'd love for other people to hear about it some more. From your experience in Israel's tech and startup world. Can you talk to us about the cascading effects of empowering women to be agents for change in their respective fields? Aviva Steinberger: Yeah, so innovation diplomacy is a made up term. And you know, if you think about science, diplomacy, or economic diplomacy, that's generally diplomacy that's meant to further goals around science and economics. And in this case, you're looking at focusing on innovation to further diplomacy. The idea is leveraging what's coming out of Israel in the tech sector, leveraging this brand that we have as the startup nation, to build ties. So with the signing of the Abraham Accords, really created the opportunity for normalization, as we know, and countries in the region are investing a lot of money, billions of dollars, to create their own innovation ecosystems.  And they're looking at their neighbor, Israel, and Israel as a now welcome citizen of the region that everybody can play with. And saying, How can we learn from the Israel journey, Israel's journey over the last 30 years going from a resource economy where our main export was oranges, to a knowledge based economy where our main export is anyone know? Tech. Yep.  So digital, we call it digital oranges, right? The drones flying over the citrus fields and around the world, measuring the health of the fruit in the trees, etc. So really this journey and what went into building an ecosystem? What did the government do 30 years ago that enabled and incentivized foreign investment, where's the academia, where is tech transfer happening both at the university level, also in hospital levels, where what is the role of incubators and accelerators and investors. So looking at the whole ecosystem, sharing that knowledge and using that, as what I call a frictionless tool to engage with our neighbors in the region, because if you're talking about some of our shared challenges, I mentioned before, water security, and energy security and the impacts of extreme weather. Those issues don't know geographic boundaries.  And so we are all dealing, especially in the region, one of the most vulnerable to climate change, for example. By the way, in America, climate change is very politicized. In the region, it is not at all because if you don't pay attention to the impacts of climate change in the region, your people aren't going to have clean water, they're not going to have food, they're not going to have energy, electricity. And so these are not political issues. These are what I call frictionless issues, that we can sit around the table and say, we must collaborate in order to find solutions.  So innovation diplomacy is really about focusing on the role that innovation plays to create these relationships. As it relates to women. I think women play, can play and do play a unique role into driving this forward. First of all, you know, we spoke about it a little bit and Gadeer, you mentioned this idea of women being social change agents. There's something I mean, I don't think this is unique and exclusive to women, but it's definitely emphasized in women and when we walk into a room, as professionals, we are wearing a lot of hats.  You might not see them, but I think everybody on this stage is wearing a number of hats. Some of us are politicians, we're leaders in our communities, in our societies, in our companies, on boards. But we're also daughters and sisters potentially and mothers, some of us and friends, and maybe the head of a kindergarten parent group that has to worry about making sure everybody has the cake for the end of the year party. I mean, these are all things happening at once in our heads. And that's just my own. I'm sorry. I don't mean to project. Gadeer Kamal-Mreeh:   The Sarah Jessica Parker cloud. Aviva Steinberger: Yeah, exactly. And I think the invitation that we're putting out to women and the engagements that we have is, bring all of those hats with you into a room. I mean, sometimes they're not necessarily relevant but the engagement at the personal level, at the business level, at the values level, sharing ideas for the vision of what the future, the region could look like. That's really where the connection I mean, I witnessed and sorry, I'm going to share I witnessed and embrace between these two friends who hadn't seen each other in a long time. And I overheard Gadeer say this is the hug of two strong women. That's something unique to women.  And, I think if we create the space where that happens, those ties, then feed into trusting networks, where I know that my friend, who I just met last month and spent two and a half days with, who is running a business in Nigeria, and is looking for funding. And I'm connecting with a funder in the UAE who's looking for women-led ag-tech businesses, I'm suddenly making that connection and putting them in touch. And you create these networks of trust that create opportunity. And so it's an opportunity that leads to more women sitting around the table making decisions on investments, more women sitting around the table making decisions around what kind of solutions to pursue, and where these cross regional, cross border synergies could happen.  And that I believe in my heart of hearts, is where we're charting a path to a new future for the region. I don't think it's naive to say, we are on the cusp of a new dynamic in the Middle East. Because of these opportunities, and because of these opportunities to engage. I will also say just in terms of numbers-wise. Globally, women representation we spoke about in politics, but women representation, as CEOs and founders of companies, is an abysmal 8% cap, no matter where you go, you're gonna hit that 8-9% number. When I first heard this, I immediately started checking our stats in Israel, because I was like, that's, that can't be in Israel. Israel is just hovering around 10. And we are a global leader.  This is an improvement. And you're talking about after seeing efforts. And if you look at the numbers coming out of the universities, women are very well represented today at the academic level and computer sciences. You're talking about graduates that are hovering around 50%, if not more at some university. So you think, okay, you know, we're charting a path for a better future. But that doesn't translate. The reality doesn't translate into seeing more women, founding companies, leading companies. And that is a gap that needs to be addressed. And the jury's still out on what's the silver bullet to get there. But I think it is in creating opportunities.  And Ayelet also spoke about this, this mentoring, I think, in particular in the region. I mean, from the United States, I'm American, living in Israel, for the last 25 years, I have not had a challenge finding women to model, women to reach out to and say, you know, I can track this path. And this is where I can see myself being as a future leader. But women in the region don't necessarily have that network, and creating these networks where you can access a vision for what future female leadership looks like and see it and get there and not be the only woman in the room, that has tremendous power. And that's really what we're driving to see in the business and tech community. Manya Brachear Pashman: If you missed last week's episode, be sure to tune in for our live recording from Tel Aviv with one of Israel's top podcasts, Israel Story. Host Mishy Harman and I joined the grandson of Moshe Kol, one of the 37 signers of Israel's Declaration of Independence as part of Israel Story's latest series, “Signed, Sealed, Delivered?” Don't miss it.

Two of the Jewish world's leading podcasts, People of the Pod and Israel Story, are teaming up to bring you inside the making of ‘Signed, Sealed, Delivered?' – the latest series from Israel Story that explores the lives of the signatories of Israel's Declaration of Independence and their descendants. Recorded live at AJC Global Forum 2023 in Tel Aviv, the episode features Mishy Harman, host of Israel Story, and Eran Peleg, the grandson of signatory Moshe Kol (born Moshe Kolodny). Tune in to hear Eran's lasting memories of his grandfather, the strong Zionist values he instilled in his family, and why the Declaration of Independence matters 75 years later. *The views and opinions expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views or position of AJC.  ___ Episode Lineup:  (0:40) Mishy Harman and Eran Peleg (42:35) Yehudit Kol Inbar and Mishy Harman  ___ Show Notes: Listen: People of the Pod: Israeli President Isaac Herzog in Conversation with AJC CEO Ted Deutch People of the Pod: Two Ukrainian Refugees Reflect on Escaping War, and Life in Israel– Live from AJC Global Forum 2023 Israel Story: Episode 89 - Moshe Kol  Follow People of the Pod on your favorite podcast app, and learn more at AJC.org/PeopleofthePod You can reach us at: peopleofthepod@ajc.org If you've enjoyed this episode, please be sure to tell your friends, tag us on social media with #PeopleofthePod, and hop onto Apple Podcasts to rate us and write a review, to help more listeners find us. __ Transcript of Interview with Mishy Harman and Eran Peleg: Manya Brachear Pashman:   As many of our listeners know, People of the Pod recorded not just one but two episodes in front of a live audience at AJC Global Forum 2023 in Tel Aviv. We also took the show on the road and did a few more interviews in Tel Aviv and in Jerusalem. You'll hear those episodes in the months to come. This week, we bring you our second live show in partnership with one of Israel's most popular podcasts: Israel Story.  Welcome to the second live podcast recording here at AJC Global Forum 2023 in Tel Aviv. So on Monday, you heard two very different perspectives from two women who fled war torn Ukraine and landed here in Israel, their new home. Today, you will hear the story of Israeli Moshe Kol, born Moshe Kolodny, in 1911, in what is now Belarus. He was one of the 37 founders of the State of Israel, who signed Israel's Declaration of Independence. We're bringing you this live show together with another podcast that you might enjoy, Israel Story. Think This American Life except it's This Israeli Life. Broadcasting in English since 2014, each episode introduces us to the wide array of characters who make up this diverse and dynamic democratic nation.  In honor of Israel's 75th year of independence, the team at Israel Story set out to find the closest living relative of all 37, who signed Megilat Ha'atzmaut. In March, they began rolling out what I would call audio portraits of those 37 people. Portraits about who they met, what they could tell us about the 37 people who signed that founding document. They call the series, 'Signed, Sealed, Delivered?' And since March, we have met eight of Israel's founding mothers and fathers. Over the next several months we will meet the other 29 including Moshe Kol, through the lens of his daughter. Today, you get a special preview through the lens of his grandson. With me to talk about 'Signed, Sealed, Delivered?' is the host of Israel Story, Mishy Harman, and the grandson of Moshe Kol, Eran Peleg.  Mishy, Eran, welcome to People of the Pod, live in Tel Aviv.  So Mishy, I will start with you. The title is not 'Signed, Sealed, Delivered,' it's 'Signed, Sealed, Delivered?' What's with the question mark? Mishy Harman:   Well, first of all, that's a good question. I mean, it's always difficult to adjust with your intonation to indicate a question mark. But I think that this is a real question. When we began this series, it was actually before the last elections which took place in November, and before this unprecedented wave of democratic, cry for democratic values in this country in light of the government's judicial reform. And we set out to ask, there is this founding document, its status, its legal status is unclear. It's the best way I think, to think of it is, it's some sort of moral compass for our country. And, you know, interestingly, the only action item that actually exists within the Declaration of Independence is to formalize the Constitution, which of course, never happened. So we want to say, to ask the question of what this document actually is in Israeli society, whether we live up to the promise of the words and the ideas that were described within it, whether we haven't. In which ways we have or we haven't, and we wanted to do this through the prism. I'm sure every citizen of Israel has something to say about this and we wanted to do it through the prism of the descendants of the people who signed this document who you know with, with strike of their pen birthed, this country. Actually Moshe Kol call was in Jerusalem at the, on the day of the declaration. There were 11 out of members from Moetzet Ha'am who were who were stuck in Jerusalem, that was besieged and didn't participate in the, in the ceremony, which was here in Tel Aviv. So I think your grandfather signed something like a month later, during the first ceasefire, the different members of Moetzet Ha'am were brought to Tel Aviv by plane actually, to sign. But we wanted to ask, well, here we have this group of people. And it's an interesting group, because the first thing to say about it is that there are no non Jews who signed Megillat Ha'atzmaut, and that's, I think, a very important thing to keep in mind. But when you look at the group of these 37 signatories, it's a little bit like a pointillist painting. So when you look from afar, it looks like a pretty monolithic group of Polish and Ukrainian and Russian Labor Party operatives. But when you come closer, you actually see that there was a dazzling diversity among the signatories. There were ultra-orthodox Jews, and there were atheists, and there were revisionists. And there were communists. And there were people who were born in the middle of the 19th century, and there were people like Moshe Kol, who was the second youngest signatory who was born in 1911, I think. And they represented very different ideologies. And we want to see if a generation and a half or two afterwards whether that diversity had expanded, or shrunken. And to what extent these people who are closest to the ones who imagines the state, how they think about the place we live in today. Manya Brachear Pashman:   So 25 signed in Independence Hall, just a little ways from here, actually, here in Tel Aviv, 11, we're in Jerusalem under siege, including your grandfather, two women. Hm. But there was a lot of diversity in the group. That said, I know that they–oh, one in America, I forgot about one in America. They organized it alphabetically. When they signed it, though, even though they signed it at different times? Mishy Harman:   With the exception of David Ben-Gurion, who signed first. Everyone else signed alphabetically, and they left little spaces for them. Some of them signed terribly. Like, even though it was the founding document of the state, they couldn't sign on the right line. And actually right underneath Ben-Gurion is the signature of Daniel Auster who was the mayor of Jerusalem. His surname is Auster, which begins with an aleph. So he was the first to sign. And he recalled how Ben-Gurion berated him because his signature was just like some sort of scribble and Ben-Gurion said, don't you understand the importance, the historical importance of the document you're signing. I think your grandfather's signature actually is sort of legible, right?  Eran Peleg:   Yeah, you can read it. Mishy Harman:   I don't know if you sort of, when you were a boy, when you went up to the Declaration of Independence and sort of pointed to your grandfather's signature with pride or something.  Manya Brachear Pashman:   One of the women you interviewed said that her father or grandfather, I don't recall, but she remembers practicing and practicing the signature beforehand. It was an exciting, it was such an exciting moment. So going back to the organization, how did you organize the episodes? And how did you decide the sequence of how you would release the episodes? Mishy Harman:   So we decided not to follow the order in which they appear on the scroll. We did start with David Ben-Gurion. An episode in which his grandson who was really his, the closest person, I would say to him in the family, including his own children, talked about Ben-Gurion. And interestingly, Yariv Ben-Eliezer, Ben-Gurion's grandson, has quite radical views about Israel today. And he thinks of Israel as an apartheid state and says that his grandfather would be very, very upset, and that the whole dream sort of went down the drain.  So it was important to us in the next episode to present a pretty different view. So the next episode was the son of Zerach Warhaftig, who was one of the leaders of the Religious Zionist movement. And is a sort of mainstream right winger today. We do try to take into account, you know, gender. So even though there were only two female signatories, we obviously tried to interview as many women as we could who are descendants. Some sort of political variation, we also do try to have episodes have a theme, so whether it's economy or socialism, or tourism or you know, Yemenite Jewelry, or women's rights. So it's not just about the, about the signatory himself or herself, but also sort of about the things that were most important to that person. Manya Brachear Pashman:   I tried to as we were, as we were planning this and planning this episode, I tried my hand at tracking someone down from Israeli history and tracking down descendants. And I told your producer that it just made me even more impressed by the work that went into this project, because it was damn near impossible to find who I was looking for. Tell us how you tracked everyone down? Or are there some really good stories about how you connected the dots and landed the right, right person. Mishy Harman:   So all of the signatories of the Declaration of Independence are dead. The last one, who was the only one who was younger than your grandfather, Meir Vilner, died about 20 years ago. 14 of the 37 have children who are still alive. In fact, your grandfather, you were just telling me that all of his three daughters are still alive. So that was quite straightforward to find the children. When you start getting into grandchildren and great grandchildren, it becomes quite messy, there are 1000s of descendants. There were only three ultra orthodox Haredi signatories, but they have many, many descendants. And there becomes an interesting question of who you choose, right? Because depending on who you choose, you can tell a very, very different story. And we always tried to prefer people who knew their ancestor, and had firsthand experiences with them. But also to try and maybe we'll get into this a little bit later, but to try to demonstrate a variety of opinions today, too. So it is an interesting fact that the vast, and maybe maybe you'll talk about this, but it is an interesting fact that the vast majority of the descendants of the signatories of the declaration are in what you might call today, the sort of center and center left camp in in Israel, who are concerned about assaults on Israeli democracy. And in fact, the Declaration of Independence has, in recent months, become a rallying cry for the demonstrations. Suddenly the Declaration of Independence, you can't you can't escape it. It's everywhere. The municipality of Tel Aviv, hunger, massive replica, on the building. In demonstrations. There's sort of resigning of the Declaration of Independence, it's really, it's really become an icon, basically. And it was important for us to also show that there are descendants who think otherwise. And so for example, in episodes that haven't yet come out, their descendants who wonder why we even talk about Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, they say democracy is an important concept. It's some sort of Hellenistic fossil. It's not a Jewish value. We don't think that that should even be something that we aspire to. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Interesting. Interesting. Eran, how did you get the call that Israel Story was putting this together? Do you recall that day? Eran Peleg:   The truth is, I don't remember exactly. Because I've had numerous conversations with them. I think it was probably towards the end of last year at some point. And again, as Mishy said, it was before kind of all these events happened here in Israel. Very happy because I thought, you know, it's, as you say, now it's like the declaration is everywhere. Yeah, people talk about it all of a sudden people, you know, it's, we see it everywhere. But for many years, I mean, hasn't been much discussed, actually. So I was kind of saying, Ah, yeah, it was the 75th anniversary, the State of Israel is coming up. Some chance that we'll get something about it, but that wasn't expecting much. And I was quite happy, to have the opportunity to talk about the declaration, my grandfather, obviously. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Tell us a little bit about your own upbringing and what Moshe Kol was like as a grandfather. Eran Peleg:   Well, I was just telling Mishy, I mean, quite a small family. My grandfather Moshe or as we called him, Saba Misha, grandfather Misha. You know, he had three daughters. Elisa, Sari, who's my mother and Yehudit, who is the younger one. And altogether, you know, a bunch of grandchildren, seven grandchildren. But that's, that's pretty much it. And so we're a very close family. Every Friday night, for example, we would all gather at my grandparents house and have Shabbat dinner there that was like, you know, you had to be there was no discussion about it or negotiation. So even like, my friends always know that if we want to go out on Friday nights, always after dinner at Saba Misha and my grandmother Keta's house. So we spent a lot of time together. At the point when I was growing up already, my grandfather was obviously getting less involved with state affairs.  When I was seven years old, he kind of retired essentially, in 1977. So I had the opportunity to spend time with him actually, both here and also they took me abroad on a couple of trips with them. So it was very interesting. He was a very kind man, very interesting man.  I thought he was very smart. The Zionist project was kind of his life mission, if you like. So he was always talking in some way about it. He was always involved even after he retired he was involved in various different projects. Some of them had to do with coexistence within Israel, between Arabs and Jews, Druze, he was very involved with the Druze community, actually, he made good friends there. So even after his retirement, he continued to be active. And so I had the great privilege of kind of knowing him until I was 19 years old when he passed away. And really learned a lot from him. Manya Brachear Pashman:   When did you learn that he had signed the Declaration of Independence? Eran Peleg:   I don't remember exactly, frankly. And this is one of the interesting things is that I don't remember much discussion at home about the Declaration of Independence. And I think my mother and aunt as well, I don't think, I think they'll probably agree with that even at an earlier stage. And it's quite interesting that he never made a big deal about it, definitely. And I think that in a way, he, although obviously, in hindsight, it was, and maybe at the time, it was a big event, but to him it was I think, and look at here, I'm kind of interpreting, this is my perspective on it. I think to him, it was one necessary and important, obviously, but you know, one necessary step in the big project, and the big project was, you know, establishing and building the Jewish state, the state of Israel. But I don't think if you asked him probably what was the highlight of kind of what was the most important thing you did in your life? I'm not sure if he would have said signing the Declaration of Independence. For example, I think— Mishy Harman:   He would have said bringing over 100,000 kids from the Diaspora. Eran Peleg:   Exactly yeah, so he was head of youth Aliyah for 18 years after the Holocaust and after the establishment of the State of Israel. To him, I think that was his kind of big, the big thing he you know, he accomplished more than anything else, and he was even later a minister, a cabinet minister, and so he did you know, many other things, but I think that was probably to him, the highlight of his career, Zionist, you know, and the declaration was kind of, you know, one step, kind of  a necessary step, but just, you know, one step along the way. Manya Brachear Pashman:   So why was he invited to sign that day? Eran Peleg:   So, and maybe Mishy, who's more of a historian can, perhaps, can you shed more light on this? But what I know is that, you know, the signatories were invited, it was based on kind of a, it was a party basis, or there were different movements, as Mishy mentioned, within, you know, Zionism or wasn't specific Zionism, because it really, it was supposed to represent the people who were living here actually ex the non Jews, right?  Mishy Harman:   Though interestingly, there probably would have been non Jews who would have agreed to have been part of this effort, I mean, your grandfather was involved in, in the cause of Christian Arabs from the North, who were, who were removed from their villages, Iqrit and Biram and stuff like that. Those kinds of people were actually allies of the Zionist movement in those days. And it's, it's possible, although Druze leaders- Eran Peleg:   It's possible, although, I mean, it's difficult, I think, for us sitting here now to know, because we have to remember this was like, it was a very tense time and, you know, we just had the War of Independence, kind of breaking out and all that. So it's difficult to say, I think. So he was representative of one of the movements, one of the factions within the Zionist movement, he was part of the, what they called, at the time, the General Zionists, Tzionim Haklaliym. And I think he was one of six representatives, I think of the General Zionists. And already at the time, he was a prominent leader within, you know, the kind of centrist Zionism. He was very early on in his life, he was already head of the, what was called the Noar Hatzioni, the movement, the global leader of the Noar Hatzioni. From there, so he kind of knew, he attended several of the Zionist congressional,l the conferences along the years, he was already a member of the executive committee of the Jewish Agency at that point. So he already had a certain position or statue within the kind of Zionist Movement. And as one of the leaders of the General Zionist, he was invited to participate in Moetzet Ha'am, which were the signatories of the declaration. Manya Brachear Pashman:   You said, I'm sorry, the first thing you said, he was the global leader of, and I didn't quite hear what you said. Eran Peleg:   The Noar Hatzioni movement. Manya Brachear Pashman:  What is that?  Eran Peleg:   It was a youth movement. One of the, at time it still exists, actually. Interestingly, less so in Israel, actually. But in some countries in South America, I know it still exists. Today it's quite small, then it was a decent youth movement. That's actually how we met my grandmother. Because my grandmother was involved in the Noar Hatzioni in Belgium in Brussels. She was one of the heads of the Noar Hatzioni there, and and he has kind of part of his job as the Global Head, whatever of the movement, he was traveling and went to see all these different, all these different places. And that's how he ended up in Brussels where he met my grandmother. Manya Brachear Pashman:   You mentioned earlier that some of the descendants had evolved, drifted away from their ancestors, ideologies, political perspectives or philosophies. I'm curious, what your team found was it was did that account for most of the interviews that you did? Or a minority? I mean, did you find that in most of the interviews, the philosophies were kind of embedded in the family DNA? Mishy Harman:   It's interesting. Most people are quite similar to their fathers, grandfathers, uncles, mothers, and so on, so forth. But, and, of course, I mean, the important thing to remember is that we're talking in a completely different worlds now, right? If you think about Israeli society today, and you think about our chances of ever agreeing on a single document or a single vision of this state, that's you have to be crazy, basically, to think that that's possible.  I mean, we live in such a fragmented and fractured society today, that getting a group that is in some way representative of the country to agree on what this country actually is, what this project that we call Israel, really is, today seems almost unimaginable. And I think, honestly, that it was pretty unimaginable at the time too. I think that they had other things going for them that in the background that allowed them to reach this moment of agreement. Which, you know, there were, as Eran just said, that we were in the middle of a war and it was, seemed like an existential war, right. We were gonna live or die. This all came together very, very quickly. You know, people understood that this was this opportunity, the British Mandate was about to end, there was going to be a power vacuum, the Zionist movement had an opportunity to declare statehood, which was something that, you know, in the Jewish psyche, had been a dream for 2000 years, 1900 years.  And they weren't going to, there was some sense of sort of, I would say, communal responsibility, which, you know, there's this word in Hebrew that is difficult to translate, really, which is Mamlachtiut, it's really some sort of sense of, of being part of a larger state collective, that that wasn't going to allow them even if they disagreed with a specific phrasing or a specific idea to be the one saying, No, I'm going to I'm going to be the sole naysayer in this otherwise historic opportunity. And that's what got a lot of people on board, right. I mean, otherwise, how, and I know, they're all these stories about sort of vague phrasings whether they refer to God or don't refer to God or whether they can be interpreted in other ways, and so on and so forth. Today, we're a much more blunt society today. People would want things to be said very, very clearly. And we just unfortunately, and then I'd be interested to hear what you think. But I don't think that as a collective we share any clear understanding of what we can agree on. At least it doesn't seem that way today. Eran Peleg:   It's definitely, I agree. But I still remain optimistic, maybe it's my nature. But I do think that, you know, we've seen, you know, the huge amount we've achieved here in such a short period of time. And I do think that, you know, in some ways the values and political views are more clear now than they were back then. As you say, because of everything that was going on at the time, and they, and they were really occupied with kind of let's build this state more than anything else. You know, they put a lot of other things aside, frankly, it's not that they didn't have views about the economy about, you know, they had views about other other things about education, economy, it's just that they said, let's put this aside for now. And let's focus on the main project or the main mission.  And they hope to get to the other stuff. Well, they actually promised to put together a constitution, which I guess, but the truth is, it was, frankly, with historical perspective, I think it was very difficult because they were actually set a date. I think. They said that until the, you know, the declaration was signed in May. And they said by October 1st, something like that, I think it's a very short period of time after they already want to have a constitution. And I think that probably wasn't realistic.  Also because there was a war going on. And they were occupied with, you know, just existence, or survival. But also, because, you know, views were not, you know, really clear on many different issues, and they didn't have the opportunity to discuss them really yet. United States, for example, putting together a constitution, the Constitution came really only I think, like more than 150 years after people landed, with the Mayflower. So there was a long time where they were already living together. And also then, there was a very serious job around putting together the American Constitution here, they, they were trying to put it together a middle of a war and just wasn't realistic.  Mishy Harman:   I think that this is particularly interesting for American listeners, because 75 years is a long time, but it's also almost no time at all. And what we feel lucky about with this project is that we're able to still touch these people, who, before they sort of drift into the realm of becoming historical figures in in books and research papers and stuff like that, and we can, we can talk to two sons and daughters, who remember these people as real as real people. And I think, you know, that's unimaginable, obviously, in the American context. And we tend to, we tend to attribute so much importance to phrasings and to wordings, of these kinds of declarations of, and we forget that at the end of the day, these are people who are writing writing these words within within specific historical context and bringing themselves and you know, Moshe Kol, for example, is signing, signing his name on on this scroll of independence. You know, a few years, four years, I don't know, after, after his parents and sister are murdered in the Holocaust, and that was the story of many of the signatories. And as it was saying, it was in the middle of the war and 1% of the population was killed in this war. I mean, they're writing these words, both without sort of knowing what we know today that 75 years hence, Israel is going to be around and Israel is going to be this thriving country with a cantankerous democracy. It was, I think, in many ways, sort of a prayer or a wish, of what, of what this place could be. Many of them came from, you know, socialist backgrounds or from small villages and stuff like that, and suddenly found themselves here in this radically different environment than anything that they had known previously. And they were trying to imagine, well, what can we imagine a just society being? And another interesting thing is that, sort of patriotic symbols like the flag and like the Declaration of Independence, which for years had been essentially owned by the right in this country have in the last year. Eran Peleg:   Less so the Declaration. Mishy Harman:  The declaration was a little more in the right. But have been completely appropriated by the protest movement, right? I mean, if you go here to Kaplan on Saturday night, which I strongly recommend everyone to do, whether you agree with the protests, or not just because it's a really, it's an incredible, incredible sight for anyone who cares about democracy, to see what these protests are like. You'll see basically a sea of flags, of Israeli flag. So that's, for me, that's a fascinating development.  Manya Brachear Pashman:   But doesn't it belong to both? I mean– Eran Peleg:   I mean, it definitely does. But, you know, the flag was, you know, is always perceived as a bit kind of nationalistic kind of, has this kind of flavor to it. But yeah, but you're right, it obviously belongs to both. Manya Brachear Pashman:   They're just embracing it in different ways.  Mishy Harman:   One question that I would have to you about who things belong to is whether, sorry, I don't know if you– is whether being the grandson of one of the signatories of the Declaration of Independence, makes you feel different about your own ownership of this place? Whether it sort of casts a shadow of responsibility.  Eran Peleg:   I don't think I'm in a position of privilege or entitlement different from anyone else. I happen to be his grand, yeah, grand grandson. But, but what I think I do have, which maybe some other people don't, I do have, I think, a good sense of history, at least, kind of understanding where we've come from, you know, etc. And I think that's something that sometimes I see missing with other people, maybe that gives me a slightly different perspective on things. So, for example, I see, you know, because we're the generation that was already born into the state of Israel. For us, it was like a given that, right? Self-evident, it's given. And I see especially with people who, like us, some people. It does make me angry when some people might say, I don't like what's going on, I'm just gonna go elsewhere. And to me, like, that makes me angry. But I don't think it makes me angry. Because I'm the son of Moshe Kol, I think it makes me angry, because at least I have an understanding of, you know, what's been put into this project already.  And the efforts that have been made, and obviously, you know, people have given their lives as well, I mean, soldiers, for us to be where we are today as well. So, just kind of thinking that, Oh, you know, Israel will always be there for us, even if we go elsewhere, then we decide to come back, right. If we want, we can always come back. But no, that's not the case. Israel wasn't always here.  I mean, you have to understand that we have a very, very special situation or position where we have the State of Israel, it's such a valuable thing. We can't just give it up, you know, just like that, okay. And you can't just take it for granted that we'll be here or that it's here, that we'll be here when you decide one day to come back from wherever you're going.  Manya Brachear Pashman:   Maybe you don't feel that Israel belongs to you. But do you belong to Israel?  Eran Peleg:   Definitely. Yeah. It's definitely the case.  Manya Brachear Pashman:   Do you ever, and I actually, I address this question to both of you. Wouldn't it be great if we could make plans. But if you had complete control over the universe, and your future, do you foresee ever leaving Israel? Mishy Harman:   Eran? Eran Peleg:   Again, it's very difficult to know what the future holds. But I see Israel as my home, I've actually had the opportunity to go abroad and come back. And part of the decision to come back was because this is my home. And my home also consists of the fact that my family's here, obviously. So it's a family, family reasons as well. But also, definitely, also Zionism played a role in my decision. I've lived 12 years outside of Israel, but my assumption was always that I'm there for a limited period of time, and I'm going to come back at some point. And that's actually what happened. And so, to me, Israel is where it's place for me.  Mishy Harman:   So I don't totally know what the word Zionism really means. Today, and something I think about a lot. My grandparents, who were of the same generation of Eran's grandparents, and also very active in the Zionist movement and in building the state. So not quite the blue-bloodedness of signing the Declaration, but they met in the early 30s. They were both students, they were both British, and they met because my grandfather, who was later on Israel's ambassador to the US for many, many years and the president of the Hebrew University, he was the he was the head of the student of design a student union at Oxford, and they met at a debate in which he debated my grandmother who was the head of the anti Zionist Student Union at the London School of Economics and she was an anti Zionist not because she had any particular beef with the Zionist movement but because she was an internationalist and she didn't believe as many others in the in the years between the wars, but leave she did believed in the concept of nation states and, of course, then spent the remainder of her life in the service of this particular nation state. But she was a tremendous presence in my life, she lived to be almost 100 and lived across the street from us.  So I'll just share with you very quickly, one of the sort of formative memories of my life is that in 2006, she was already a very elderly woman in her mid 90s. She, we were and not totally with it all the time. At that point, we were watching television together and it was the Second Lebanon War. And she sort of perked up out of nowhere. And she said, Look what a strange thing we're talking about, there are hills to the north of here, that have vegetation, and have wildlife, and have flowers. And we've drawn a line in the middle of those hills. And we call one side of that line, Israel and the other side of that line Lebanon. And there are people living on both sides of that line. And what the TV is saying is that when Moti Cohen's life is destructed, or he's injured, because a Katyusha missile fell on his building, or something, we need to be deeply, deeply sad. And Ahmad Salman''s life is destructed because the Israeli Air Force bombed his village or something, no one's saying that we need to be happy, but we can basically be kind of indifferent.  And she said, I don't know Moti Cohen. And I don't know Ahmad Salaman, but I'm equally saddened by the hurt that both of them are feeling. And that was that statement that stayed with me and stays with me, till today.  So my connection to this place, I would say, is less from an idealistic point of Zionism, in sort of the classic sense of Jewish self determination. And more from the fact that I was born here, and I grew up here. And the park in which I played soccer, growing up still exists, and the streets, in which I, you know, walked hand in hand with my first girlfriend still exist, and my family are here, and my friends are here. And I like the food that I am accustomed to eating my entire life. And in some fundamental way, this is my home. So, you know, Madison, Wisconsin, or London are not my home in the same way. So that's what makes me want to be here and in the spirit of the Declaration of Independence, try to make our country live up to the lofty and beautiful ideals that that set out to achieve. Manya Brachear Pashman:   That's beautiful, both of you. Both beautiful answers. Before we go, I do want to talk about, you've mentioned that a couple times, maybe the absence of God and democracy, those words from the declaration, and I'm just curious if you could both share your thoughts on: does that matter? And is it mattering today? If those words were embedded in the document, would anything be different today, possibly? Mishy Harman:   I think the absence of the word God was very intentional. And there's a lot of historical documentation about that. And I think the absence of the word democracy was less intentional in that. I mean, I don't want to bore you with a lot of technicalities. But democracy did appear in previous drafts of of the Declaration of Independence, and was ultimately taken out but not because I think that anyone had any sense that they wanted to be less…yeah, the the intent of Israel being a democracy, I think it's very clearly stated that Israel will come into existence based on the guidelines of the United Nations and the Partition Plan that called for the creation two democratic entities here.  I think the Declaration of Independence talks about equality and about freedom of religion and, and in all the main tenets of democracy. So, I think that the Declaration of Independence does, as a document does appeal to a wide variety of people even today. I think that you know, it would be more difficult Today to write a founding document, that in the current makeup of Israeli society that doesn't refer to God and doesn't refer more clearly to the divine. Eran Peleg:   But there is some implicit- God is implicity present. I think there's a- Mishy Harman:   Tzur yisrael (rock of Israel). Eran Peleg:   Exactly, right.  Mishy Harman:   Which was sort of a very famous kind of pie style compromise, of saying things and not saying them at the same time. Mishy Harman:   And maybe as the last thing to say, which opens up a whole other conversation with you, if you maybe want to invite us again, to the podcast, we can discuss, is that, you know, the Declaration of Independence set in place, a notion which I think to most signatories did not seem like a contradictory notion of a Jewish and democratic state. And I think we're grappling till this day with whether those terms are contradictory whether a democracy can be a Jewish state, whether a Jewish state can be a democracy, I think all of them signed the Declaration thinking that this was a possible outcome. And I don't think that they thought that these terms would come to clash in the ways that they have.  And I think till today, we're dealing with that legacy of this sort of impossibly simple and yet impossibly difficult coupling of terms, which we're now living in a moment in which we're trying to understand whether the signatories were right, whether this is a possibility. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Mishy, I hope you don't mind me asking you a personal question to close us out. And that is, I know you lost your father shortly before the debut of this series. It is dedicated in his memory. And you just shared a story about his mother, I believe that was your paternal grandmother. I'm curious as your team was having all of these conversations, you and your team were having these conversations with children and grandchildren, about the people they love their legacies, did that shape any of the conversations you had with your father in his final days, because you were working on it kind of simultaneously. Mishy Harman:   Sure. My father would have loved this series very much because it represented his Israel. It's also Eran's Israel, which is an optimistic Israel, which sees the good in people and the potential and the dream of this project that we began here. I think he would have been very interested, he knew many of these characters who we're talking about. I think he would have also been saddened to hear that a lot of them are dismayed by where things have gone. And I think he was as well. He was the greatest Zionist that I could imagine. And that he really believed. Zionism is a sort of catchphrase in which you can insert almost anything that you want into it. But I think his most fundamental belief, which he attributed to the heart of Zionism was a belief and the quality and a belief that people are people and the belief in education, and the belief in the spirit of the Jewish people. And in this really miraculous entity that we've created that allows us to ask these fundamental, difficult questions about our past. And for me, it's very, very meaningful to be able to dedicate this series to his memory. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Thank you so much to both of you for joining us. Thank you for the series. I encourage everyone here to listen to episodes of- Mishy Harman:   And the next episode that's coming out on Monday is about Moshe Kol.  Manya Brachear Pashman:   Oh, perfect timing. Wonderful. And thank you both for joining us.  Mishy Harman:   Thank you. Eran Peleg: Thank you very much. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Thank you, audience. Manya Brachear Pashman: To listen to Israel Story's special series on the Declaration of Independence or any other regular episode, you can subscribe to Israel Story wherever you get your podcasts. Just don't forget to also subscribe to People of the Pod and our award-winning series, The Forgotten Exodus. To learn more about Moshe Kol, here's a sneak peek of Israel Story's interview with  his daughter, Yehudit Kol Inbar, the former director of the Museums Division of Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. Excerpt from Israel Story - Episode 89 - Moshe Kol:  Yehudit Kol Inbar: He was eating grapefruit and he was crying, because for him it represented, ‘wow, we are in Israel and we have a grapefruit that we ourself grew it.' He was very proud and happy with the feeling that they're building a place for the Jewish people. Mishy Harman: That's Yehudit Kol Inbar, the daughter of Moshe Kolodny, who - for nineteen years - headed the Jewish Agency's Youth Immigration Division, and was responsible for bringing more than 100,000 unaccompanied minors to Israel from eighty-five different countries. Despite being among the founders of at least seven kibbutzim and five youth villages, and later on holding senior cabinet posts, he considered that immigration effort to be his greatest public achievement. It was, he once said, a project that had no equivalent in the annals of human history. Manya Brachear Pashman: To listen to the rest of the episode, head to the link in our show notes. Our thanks once again to host Mishy Harman and the staff at Israel Story for sharing these incredible stories with us at AJC Global Forum 2023 in Tel Aviv.   

If you're a YJP (Young Jewish Professional), chances are your life is awesome. You may be hit up to go bowling with some friends. Guess what? It's a Moishe House event and it's free of charge! You may later sign up for a young adult retreat through NuRoots to tap into Torah Study while exploring the great outdoors. You will likely run into that old friend from BBYO whom you enjoyed Hebrew school with at your local synagogue. You may host a Shabbat event and even more amazing: The price of that meal will be subsidized by OneTable (CEO and Founder Aliza Kline was on this podcast). The possibilities for Jews are endless! You don't have to be in your 20s to enjoy these programs. You can be a recent parent, a senior citizen, or even a newborn. There is a guarantee that a Jewish non-profit impacted your life one way or another. Why is this network so strong? Gary S. Cohn of Painted Rock Advisors is a non-profit and philanthropic advisor. He helps organizations run smoothly while helping entrepreneurs and philanthropists allocate their wealth to the right organizations. With these contributions, Cohn has impacted the Jewish and non-Jewish world in numerous ways. Chaz Volk, host of Bad Jew, interviews Cohn to understand why it's more than just money that makes these non-profits run. Volk, having produced Cohn's Podcast, The Road to Philanthropy, is aware of his passion and drive, helping Gary showcase his talents to the Bad Jew community. About Gary S. Cohn: Gary brings over thirty years of non-profit and development experience to his work as a trusted advisor. Gary became the Executive Director of Temple Emanu-El in San Francisco from 1991-2007. Temple Emanu-El is one of the leading congregations in Reform Judaism with over 2,000 families founded in 1850. There he managed all business aspects of the congregation plus membership services and program. Gary was responsible for an annual budget of $15 million and an endowment equities and real estate of over $40 million. In 2008 he became the Regional Director of American Technion Society in the Pacific Northwest (Silicon Valley to Seattle) raising about $15-$20 million a year to support the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. From 20015 until 2020 Gary held Senior Vice President/Major Gift roles at Alzheimer's Association and the Jewish Agency for Israel. In 2020, Gary founded Painted Rock Advisors. Painted Rock Advisors provides services to the philanthropic and non-profit communities. His podcast, The Road to Philanthropy debuted in 2021 and now has over 6,000 listeners. Gary serves on the Board of Directors of Hillel 818 and Safe Parking Los Angeles where he is Chair of Governance at both non-profits. Previously served on the Board of Directors of the American Red Cross-Bay Area, the San Francisco Food Bank and Bentley School. He was on the Advisory Board of City National Bank in Northern California from 2000-2007. Gary is a graduate of California State University at Long Beach and received his BS from the College of Business. He was honored as Alumnus of the Year for the College of Business in 2009. Gary lives in Woodland Hills with his partner, Paula and has a daughter, Erica, who works in the entertainment industry. Connect with Gary S. Cohn: https://linktr.ee/RoadToPhilanthropy www.paintedrockadvisors.com Connect with Bad Jew: Join our online community HERE: https://linktr.ee/badjew BadJewPod@gmail.com Ig @BadJewPod TikTok @BadJewPod

Our series continues with Moshe Kol (Kolodny), who - for nearly two decades - headed the Jewish Agency's Youth Immigration Division, and was responsible for bringing more than 100,000 unaccompanied minors from 85 different countries to Israel. Stay connected with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and by signing up for our newsletter at israelstory.org/newsletter/. For more, head to our site or The Times of Israel. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Take the survey here: https://jewishunpacked.com/uihsurvey It was the spring of 1948, and in just a few short weeks, the British were scheduled to ship out, leaving Palestine to the Arabs and Jews who had been waging war against each other for six months. But beyond the bombs and the bullets, another war raged behind the scenes. One that continues to this day. The war for the soul of the Jewish state. This is the story of Israel's declaration of independence – and of its ongoing evolution as a modern state. ~~~~   Sources: https://docs.google.com/document/d/10VpS6Bh1JQ-4HTxatuSJHq4y9P1HyT9KhGSiFk-TqFk/edit?usp=sharing ~~~~  This Israel@75 mini-series is generously sponsored by the Jewish Agency for Israel - North American Council, and Ari and Jody Storch.

Today, the Etzion bloc is home to more than 20,000 Jews. But back in 1948, roughly 500 Jews lived in the tiny parcel of land nestled between Hebron and Jerusalem. The four isolated, vulnerable kibbutzim of the bloc were an easy target for Arab attacks. But the Jews of Etzion weren't going down without a fight. And the Palmach – the Haganah's elite strike force – would do anything to keep these tiny communities strong and well-supplied. Like sending a convoy of 35 fighters weighed down with supplies through miles of hostile territory.  But war is hell. And the story of Gush Etzion, and the brave convoy that supplied it, is both a tragedy – and a story of brotherhood, heroism, and resilience in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. ~~~~   Sources: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1REJt_UGndGrngPsww3Ra4PLBcKJB67xBM6Sd3TVG_nE/edit?usp=sharing ~~~~  This Israel@75 mini-series is generously sponsored by the Jewish Agency for Israel - North American Council, and Ari and Jody Storch.

You probably know the story of Israeli independence: Ben Gurion declared a Jewish state on May 14, 1948. The next day, multiple Arab armies invaded. And though the war was long and brutal, the Jewish state emerged victorious. That story is true. But it's incomplete. Because the war for Israel didn't start on May 15, 1948. It started back in November of 1947, the morning after the UN voted to partition Palestine into two states. And if you want to understand Israeli history, you have to understand the six bloody months that preceded its creation… ~~~~   Sources: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KEyXoESRtJWiULNjtXUXMokGHKtKRIj62Fmz29cXx3I/edit?usp=sharing ~~~~  This Israel@75 mini-series is generously sponsored by the Jewish Agency for Israel - North American Council, and Ari and Jody Storch.