Tag: annual campaign

Sumekh swipes out hunger

Rachel Sumekh is one of five speakers who will participate in FEDtalks Sept. 13. (photo from Rachel Sumekh)

University students with meal plans often end a semester or term with a surplus on their cafeteria swipe card. Whether because they skip a few breakfasts, go on vacation or eat in a restaurant the occasional night, some of the meals they pay for go unpurchased. In most instances, students are not reimbursed for uneaten meals.

When Rachel Sumekh was studying history at the University of California Los Angeles in 2010, she and some friends went to the cafeteria, stocked up on to-go food using the amounts remaining on their swipe cards and handed it out to hungry people on the streets of the city.

The dining provider didn’t like the gesture of goodwill, as it created an unanticipated run on to-go food. Sumekh talked it out with the administrators and created the pilot project for Swipe Out Hunger, an initiative that is now on 32 American college campuses, helping feed hungry people across the country. Sumekh will talk about the project here on Sept.13 at FEDtalks, the opening event of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver’s annual campaign.

The original idea, she admits, came from her friend Bryan Pezeshki, but he was busy continuing his studies – he’s now a doctor – and so Sumekh and a few friends carried it on as a side gig, meeting on Sundays and creating Swipe Out Hunger. In 2013, they decided to see what would happen if a full-time staff person were devoted to the project and Sumekh took on the job.

In such a venture, the humanitarian impulses of dining providers compete with their bottom line – unused amounts on meal cards means lower operating costs for them. So, in getting suppliers on board, Swipe Out Hunger organizers emphasize doing the right thing, while also implying there might be bad publicity if campus media discover food providers’ reluctance to participate in a program that fights hunger. Nonetheless, it is a challenge. Sumekh said students from about 300 different campuses have approached Swipe Out Hunger to start their own chapters, yet only about 10% of those have been successfully launched.

“So, it comes down to how difficult it is for universities to actually agree to implement this,” she said.

Originally focused on feeding hungry people in the communities around campus, Swipe Out Hunger has transitioned to focus mostly on addressing the hunger of students on campus.

Ironically, the problem of student hunger is exacerbated by an increasing accessibility of post-secondary education, she said. Financial aid and need-based scholarships are making it easier for young people from lower socioeconomic backgrounds to attend college. But, once there, they confront the realities of student life without money.

Educational institutions are giving financial aid, even full tuition in some cases, Sumekh said, but the students still have no money. “So who’s going to pay for their housing or their meals or their books or their transportation and all the other stuff?” She estimates that 75% of those benefitting from Swipe Out Hunger now are college students.

Sumekh says hunger leads to increased absenteeism, poor grades and dropping out. She pointed to a Canadian study that suggests 39% of Canadian college students cannot afford balanced meals and fear not having enough food at all. Almost half of the more than 4,000 students who participated in the study said they chose books, tuition and rent over healthy meals, one-quarter said the lack of good food affected their physical health and one in five said their mental health was affected. While there are no Swipe Out Hunger chapters in Canada yet, a similar program, Meal Exchange, exists here.

Universities are slowly coming to the awareness that their students’ well-being depends on healthy, sufficient diets, among all the other factors, Sumekh said. This is evidenced by the shift her organization has seen in the type of people who are approaching Swipe Out Hunger.

“Previously, 100% of the interest in our program was from students,” she said. “Now, over 50% of our interest is coming directly from administrators.… Universities are finally recognizing that they have students on their own campus who are going hungry and they have to do something about it.”

There has been a stigma around colleges acknowledging hunger among their students, she added, but this is diminishing in the face of recognition of the need.

Swipe Out Hunger also had a recent advocacy triumph. In June, thanks to pressure from Sumekh’s organization, the California state legislature and Governor Jerry Brown approved $7.5 million in funding to encourage colleges throughout the state to adopt a Swipe Out Hunger program, establish food pantries and hire staff to help students access nutritious food. So far, 1.3 million meals have been shared – and that number is likely to grow, as Swipe Out Hunger catches on in California and nationwide. Despite this success, Sumekh hopes her organization goes out of business.

“If there’s anything we believe, it’s that the old model of charity doesn’t work,” she said. “We don’t want to exist 20 years from now.”

Swipe Out Hunger is aiming for a systemic shift, where universities take it upon themselves to ensure that students’ needs are met, a universalization of an ad hoc program now on some campuses in which meals are provided to students in need.

While Swipe Out Hunger isn’t aimed specifically at Jewish students or any other cultural demographic, Sumekh credits both her Jewishness and assistance from the Jewish community for inspiring the initiative. The daughter of refugees from post-revolution Iran, Sumekh is excited to be sharing the stage at FEDtalks with Eric Fingerhut, chief executive officer of Hillel International, because she was involved with UCLA Hillel and got lots of support from the campus group when she was starting Swipe Out Hunger.

“When I was getting the program off the ground, I would go to Hillel and they would say, Rachel, whatever you need, tell us and we’ll make it happen,” she said. “It was an amazing way to see the Jewish community say, let’s just support this young Jew, even though what they’re doing isn’t just for Israel or just for Jewish people. If they’re doing something that’s living out our values, we should want to support that.”

For the full FEDtalks lineup and tickets, visit jewishvancouver.com/fedtalks2017.

Making discourse civil

Rabbi Jay Henry Moses will speak at FEDtalks on Sept. 13. (photo from Rabbi Jay Henry Moses)

While hate groups and their opponents across North America rally, and sometimes brawl, proponents of civil discourse are teaching people to communicate effectively across divides.

However, Rabbi Jay Henry Moses, who will speak in Vancouver this month, admits that those at the extremes may not be fertile soil for seeding civil discussion. It’s the vast majority in the middle of the bell curve he is interested in, the great number of people of goodwill who wish to debate agreeably but sometimes lack the skills to do so.

Moses is vice-president of the Wexner Foundation, which was founded by Ohio philanthropist Les Wexner in the 1980s to focus on the development of Jewish professional and volunteer leaders in North America, and public leaders in Israel. Moses will visit here as one of five speakers at FEDtalks, the opening event of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver’s annual campaign, on Sept. 13.

The Wexner Foundation has an upcoming summit on civil discourse and the topic permeates everything the organization does.

“The topic is of particular interest to us because, built into the fabric of all the programs that we run for leaders is the element of diversity,” he told the Independent in a telephone interview. “We have, since the very beginning of our work, always been very clear that we serve the entire Jewish people and the entire state of Israel and that the leaders who go through the programs that we run will be stronger and better leaders for having encountered those with different viewpoints, and learn from them. It’s actually long been part of the secret sauce of what makes our program successful … that we’ve managed to be able to bring together people who disagree with each other about important things but who share a common mission of one type or another. We’ve been able to bring them together and have the resulting cohorts be greater than the sum of their parts precisely because of that diversity.”

Nurturing an openness to diversity of opinion, particularly in the frequently contentious realm of Jewish and Israeli leadership, allows alumni of Wexner’s varied programs to bring some of that wisdom to the other circles of influence they occupy, he explained.

Inside and outside of the Jewish world, there are challenges and opportunities around civil discourse, Moses said.

“I am optimistic in the long run but realizing in the short run the hill that we have to climb is pretty steep,” he said. In the aftermath of Charlottesville and other conflicts, the chasm between the ideal and the real is evident.

“The ideal may be that everybody will be able to participate in conversations with people they disagree with and do so in the spirit of openness and learning and growth and not necessarily agree, but at least be able to occupy the same space and have the spirit of open-mindedness in their conversations and maybe get to better solutions because of talking with people who are speaking differently and so on,” he said. “That’s the ideal that we are working towards. The reality is that we have extremes on both ends. We have people whose adherence to their worldview and ideology is so extreme and so rigid that they have no interest in, nor ability to, engage in conversation – civil conversation – with people they disagree with.”

Focusing on these extremes is not a recipe for success, said Moses.

“We have to start by not focusing on them, [and] actually focus on those in the middle of the bell curve who may be on one side or another of any given ideological divide, but who are not closed off entirely to engaging with people they disagree [with],” he said. “I think the vast majority of North American Jews, if you want to talk about the universe that we are mostly influencing, are mostly in the middle of that bell curve somewhere. They are not extremists and [are] candidates for the kind of experiences that can enrich them, and enrich our community, by bringing people together who disagree in the right way.”

Providing people with the tools to express themselves and to listen to those with whom they disagree is an art, not a science, and Moses acknowledges he doesn’t have the silver bullet. But working toward civil discourse may be more urgent now, in the age of social media.

“When conversation is left to its own devices, especially in an era of social media, we often lead with less than our best selves,” said Moses, dryly. “So, having a structure within which to safely and carefully and slowly approach sensitive topics is really important. Letting it unfold organically, as it often does in social media is, in many cases, a recipe for miscommunication and breakdown of civil discourse.”

Bad experiences on social media, Moses fears, have actually made people more wary of having potentially difficult conversations in person.

“They are more hesitant to have conversations in person because they’ve seen online how quickly it can devolve into personal attacks or other really uncomfortable and difficult situations,” he said. “I think we are encountering people we disagree with all the time but I feel like we’re actually talking to them less because we feel we have nothing to talk about. We don’t know how to start those conversations, or we have had them end badly. We’ve had personal relationships damaged and much of that damage has happened online because things happen more quickly and at a greater distance. So, face-to-face conversation is suffering as a result.”

The essence of his message to the Vancouver audience will be that struggling to communicate civilly is not a new phenomenon, but it is made more urgent by contemporary developments.

“This problem is not new – it’s been part of our community’s challenge for centuries,” he said. “At the same time, we are in a moment where, because of a combination of a lot of these factors, it’s a crisis, you have a level of urgency that it may not have had before. I want to make the point that, although unhealthy disagreement has a long history in Jewish life, we also have baked into the fabric of our tradition amazing resources and a time-tested recipe for creating a culture of dissent that allows us to engage in a healthy way as a community. I’d like to address some of the ways we can use those principles from our tradition and from our history, sort of repurpose them for the 21st century, and create a new model for how we can rebuild that culture of healthy dissent using our own DNA and adapting it to our day.”

Before becoming vice-president of the Wexner Foundation, Moses was head of the Wexner Heritage Program. Originally created as a stand-alone foundation, and now based within the larger foundation, the Wexner Heritage Program’s mission is “to expand the vision of Jewish volunteer leaders, deepen their Jewish knowledge and confidence, and inspire them to exercise transformative leadership in the Jewish community.”

“As the director of that program for many years,” he said, “I worked with Jewish communities across North America to identify and then train volunteer leaders – high potential, promising, up-and-coming volunteer Jewish leaders who engage in a two-year program of study of Jewish history and Jewish thought and also of Jewish leadership. We basically are investing in these leaders to give them knowledge and inspiration to go back to their Jewish communal volunteer work with broader vision, more confidence, a deeper network and a sort of bolder vision of what the Jewish future can be and their own sense of responsibility for bringing us toward that future.”

There are several connections between the Wexner Foundation and other speakers at FEDtalks, Moses noted. Also at the Chan Centre podium will be Eric Fingerhut, president of Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life, of which the Wexner family has been very supportive. He also noted that Ruth Wasserman Lande, another speaker (profiled in the Independent Aug. 18), is a Wexner alumna.

Moses has a request for the Vancouver audience: “Judge me kindly if I’m sharing the stage with Ruth, who is an extraordinarily impressive and charming person.”

For the full speaker list and to purchase tickets, visit jewishvancouver.com.

Tzedakah not charity

Rabbi Joseph Telushkin will be in Vancouver for FEDtalks on Sept. 13. (photo from HarperCollins)

A group of elderly retired men routinely gather in a Tel Aviv coffee shop and talk about current events. Given the world situation, their chats tend to be very downbeat. One day, one of the men in the group declares, “I am an optimist.”

His friends look at him in puzzlement and one of them asks, “You’re an optimist? So why do you look so worried?” And the man replies, “You think it’s easy to be an optimist?”

This is a joke Rabbi Joseph Telushkin tells when he speaks about Jewish humour – a topic on which he literally wrote the book. It also sums up his response to a question posed by the Jewish Independent in a recent telephone interview.

Telushkin is the author of more than a dozen books, including the two-volume A Code of Jewish Ethics, Jewish Literacy: The Most Important Things to Know About the Jewish Religion, Its People and Its History and The Book of Jewish Values: A Day-by-Day Guide to Ethical Living. He is routinely cited as one of North America’s most engaging thinkers and writers on Jewish topics and he has devoted his life to Jewish education.

“I am by nature an optimist,” he said, explaining that his study of Jewish history inspires pessimism, but Judaism’s promise of messianic redemption makes him an optimist. “Hence, I end up as an optimist with a worried look on my face,” he said.

Telushkin is one of five leading thinkers – originally there were four scheduled – who will speak at FEDtalks, the kickoff of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver’s annual campaign next month.

Telushkin’s lifetime devoted to Jewish education was motivated in part by his concern that Jewish religious devotion tended to emphasize ritual observances “as if ethics were necessary, but sort of an extracurricular activity.”

Judaism, he said, has important and uplifting rituals, such as Shabbat and the observance of the holidays. “But there are these incredible insights in Judaism that apply to us in every day of our lives.” That is why he wrote The Book of Jewish Values, which is an exploration of ideas and lessons that can be applied day after day.

Exploring these ideas, he said, can ameliorate some of the challenges facing the Jewish people, such as assimilation and intermarriage.

“If two percent of Jews were intermarrying, you could make a big fight and just do everything in your power to stop intermarriage,” said the rabbi. “Once you’re dealing with intermarriage rates approaching 50%, you can either write off the future of the Jewish people … or you can say, guess what, Judaism has things to teach Jews and non-Jews. If Judaism has something to offer people, it can offer it to non-Jews as well. That’s the role that Jewish education can play. We can model values that people can look at and feel enriched by.”

If Jewishness plays a central role in one’s life, Telushkin said, a person should want to share that with a spouse and model Judaism “in a way that would also make them want to share in Judaism.”

With Dennis Prager, Telushkin wrote the book Why the Jews?: The Reason for Antisemitism. The provocative thesis suggests that something particular about Jews inspires Jew-hatred; that Jews bring it upon themselves.

“Antisemitism, we argue, is ultimately a reaction to Judaism and its values,” Telushkin said, “to the Jewish concept of God, which denied the gods of the others, to the Jewish concept of law.”

The centrality of education in the Jewish tradition has led to personal and collective successes that, in turn, have inspired jealousy, he continued. This jealousy leads to antisemitism and it is indeed, Telushkin said, something inherent in Judaism that provokes this response.

“The reason Jews have succeeded, often much more than their neighbours, is because Judaism entered the world with a demand that no other religion had made: that everyone has to be educated – and you shall teach it to your children – and that focus on education led to greater success.”

Antisemitism, he added, is also inspired by the unique theological relationship between God and the Jewish people.

“There is no other religion that fuses religion and peoplehood the same way,” he said. “When Ruth converts to Judaism in the Bible, she says, amech ami, your people shall be my people, Elohayich Elohai, your God shall be my God.”

This connection between religion and peoplehood also defined antisemitism and the way it morphed during the Age of Nationalism. Until around 1800, when the world in which Jews lived was primarily a religious one, antisemitism focused on the God of the Jews and the rejections of the prophets of Christianity and Islam.

“When nationalism emerged, antisemitism was increasingly focused on the people who were Jews,” Telushkin said. Conversion to another religion would no longer erase Jewish national identity, and membership in a peoplehood, a nation, became the focus of antisemitism. “Hence, the greatest antisemitism in the world today is anti-Zionism.”

The most catastrophic forms of tyranny in recent history, Telushkin added, were direct refutations of Jewish values.

“What was Nazism if not a rejection of all the values that Judaism was trying to bring into the world? What was Soviet communism if not a rejection of all the values the Jews bring into the world?” he said. “Nazism and communism were both radical repudiations of the Jewish notion of God. They held that the state had the highest value. That’s why Soviet dissidents used to chant the song ‘I Fear No One Except God,’ because, in a totalitarian society, people who fear God think that there is something higher than the government, higher than the party. Today, of course, there is the danger of Islamists, people who claim to believe in God but who certainly don’t believe in a God whose primary demand of humans is ethical behaviour.”

At FEDtalks, Telushkin will speak on the topic, Tzedakah is Not Charity. The word charity, he said, suggests something done voluntarily, out of love. “While the word tzedakah derives from the word justice, which suggests that it’s not only a voluntary thing to give tzedakah, it’s an act of justice, which means not doing so becomes an act of injustice,” he explained. “What I want to emphasize is that Judaism is rooted in the notion of not just volunteerism but also obligation.”

By example, he suggested comparing two types of diets. People go on diets, he said, usually for one of two reasons – to be physically more attractive or healthier – but few are able to maintain a strict diet for a month or longer without breaking it.

“Because, in the final analysis, it’s voluntary,” he said. “Everyone knows people who keep kosher, who can go for years without eating foods that are forbidden because they feel commanded … when we do something out of a sense of commandment, we do so with a greater sense of consistency.”

Charities often suffer during tough economic times, he added, because people see charity as voluntary. But, even during tough economic times, people pay their taxes because they are afraid of the consequences of not doing so.

“So the notion of mitzvah in

Judaism is a notion of commandment, something is obligatory,” he said. “I emphasize that point because people consider mitzvah a good deed, but it’s really a commandment.”

FEDtalks takes place at the Chan Centre on Sept. 13. For tickets and more information, visit jewishvancouver.com/fedtalks2017. The Independent has invited all of the speakers to be featured in advance of the event. Last week: Ruth Wasserman Lande. Next week: Rabbi Jay Henry Moses.

Shibli: a model Israeli town

Ruth Wasserman Lande is one of the four speakers at FEDtalks, the kickoff event of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver’s annual campaign, on Sept. 13. (photo from Ruth Wasserman Lande)

In her “day job,” Ruth Wasserman Lande is deputy director-general of the Federation of Local Authorities in Israel, a position in which, among other things, she seeks out the best practices of municipal governments around the world and shares them with cities and towns in Israel. As a “volunteer, extracurricular” side gig, she is involved in a pilot project that could have massive implications for Israel’s cohesion, security, economic and social advancement and the place of minorities within the country.

She and a group of volunteers – many of them, like her, alumni of the Wexner Foundation’s Israel fellowship at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government – are turning a disadvantaged Bedouin village in the north of Israel into a model community that can be replicated across the country.

Improving the economic conditions and the integration of non-Jewish citizens into the Zionist project is crucial for Israel’s future, Wasserman Lande said in a telephone interview with the Jewish Independent, and the Bedouin population is critical to this undertaking. She will speak about the project and its potential impacts at FEDtalks, the kickoff event of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver’s annual campaign, next month.

The town of Shibli Um El-Ghanem has a population of 6,700, all of whom are Muslim Bedouins and many of whom serve in the Israel Defence Forces or alternative civil service. Bedouins in the country’s north have a long history as “exemplary citizens,” going back to service in the War of Independence, she said.

“The potential impact of the 180,000 Bedouins in the north is far larger than their absolute number, and the country’s strategic alliance with them since the establishment of the state has been, and remains, key to its national security interests,” Wasserman Lande has written. The pilot project will “serve as a positive example to others in the village who do not serve in the IDF, as well as other minorities, who find themselves in the crossroads between different vectors which threaten to draw them away from moderate integration into Israeli society.”

Wasserman Lande notes that Egypt’s poor treatment of its Bedouin population is to blame for some of the anti-government unrest in Sinai, while Israel’s comparative success in integrating Bedouins has dissuaded many in that community from becoming attracted to extremist movements. Success in this pilot project is integral, she contends, to cementing Bedouin allegiance to Israel and providing an example to other minority communities.

The project is a multi-pronged effort to identify and address challenges and opportunities within the town. It includes the establishment of a centre for scientific excellence, as well as a regional centre of United Hatzalah, the first aid brigade created and run by Charedi Jews, which is often first on the scene at emergencies, providing basic medical care until the arrival of Magen David Adom. It also includes the creation of a Bedouin Heritage Visitors Centre, which will represent northern Bedouin culture and heritage.

A regional industrial park serving Jewish and Arab communities in the Lower Galilee is intended to provide opportunities for employment and growth.

In analyzing the untapped assets of the town, Wasserman Lande and her team identified tourism as a potential source of economic growth. Shibli is located at the base of Mount Tabor, which is home to two important churches – one Catholic and one Orthodox Christian – and is located in a place of immense natural beauty. The churches attract 500,000 pilgrims a year, but the area has done little to maximize the economic potential of these visitors. When the model is replicated in other towns, she said, economic assets unique to each place will be identified.

Shibli was selected to test the model because it ticked many boxes, one of which was the cooperation of the local authorities, including a mayor who is a dual Canadian-Israeli citizen. It is also notable that the town is on Israel’s demographic and geographic periphery and is socioeconomically disadvantaged.

While there are tangible components to the project, there are also capacity-building aspects that target less visible obstacles to the success of communities like Shibli. The central government, through its various ministries, allocates significant financial resources to local communities, but some are better than others at doing the administrative work required to access funding and use it efficiently. While public aid may be available, Wasserman Lande said, obtaining it often depends on “being able to speak to the right people, open the right doors, do the right follow-up.” Successful use of funds also depends on confronting nepotism and a lack of transparency in some communities. Part of the project is to develop skills in local leadership.

Wasserman Lande sees the entire undertaking as a Zionistic one.

“The vision is Zionistic, my drive and incentive is Zionistic,” she said. “I’m thinking, what is good for my country? It is very important for my country strategically that this particular population is aligned with its interests.”

If successful, the project will advance the Zionist project within Israel and abroad, she said.

“That will create, if it’s a success story, a model formulation for other minorities,” said Wasserman Lande. “It will also be a flagship against BDS [the movement to boycott, divest from and sanction Israel] across the world as a beautiful, successful model formulation in a completely Muslim village. In a little bit of a later stage it can even serve as a potential bridge – a people bridge – between Israel and the Saudi Arabian Bedouins, Egyptian Bedouins … but we are not there yet. Furthermore, it will empower and enhance the Bedouins themselves, first and foremost those that live in that particular village.… That is something very, very special.”

Prior to beginning this project and her position as deputy director-general of the municipal authority, Wasserman Lande was an advisor to the late former president of Israel, Shimon Peres. From him, Wasserman Lande learned something that she said has served her well in this undertaking.

“I will say only one thing [about Peres]: he didn’t think that anything was impossible,” she said. “It was an inspiration for me. That’s really the driving force behind this whole project because I can definitely say from the bottom of my heart that it is very challenging.”

Wasserman Lande will be one of four speakers at FEDtalks on Sept. 13 – for tickets, visit jewishvancouver.com/fedtalks2017. The Independent has invited all four speakers to be featured in advance of the event. Next week: Rabbi Joseph Telushkin.

Record-breaking campaign

The record $8.5 million generated through the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver annual campaign will support programs and services on which thousands of Jewish community members rely, and includes $300,000 for community security initiatives. This campaign result is unprecedented and will provide more financial resources to address community needs than ever before.

“I would like to thank everyone who made a gift to the campaign. This record $8.5 million result ensures that our partner agencies can continue to provide critical programs and services, and is already funding important community security initiatives,” said Alex Cristall, campaign chair.

Funds from the campaign support social services, Jewish education, community-building, seniors services, youth services, and arts and cultural programs in the local Jewish community. Funds also support social services and programs for at-risk youth in Federation’s partnership region in northern Israel, and help Jewish communities in need around the world.

“We have a number of challenges ahead of us as a community,” said Stephen Gaerber, board chair, “including the dual issues of affordability and accessibility, engaging young adults and young families, addressing the needs of our growing seniors population and developing programs for the nearly half of our community who now live in underserved regional communities. The record result will help Jewish Federation and our partner agencies address these challenges.”

Over the past year, Federation has become increasingly aware of and concerned about the changing security landscape, and identified community security as one of five areas of opportunity in its 2020 Strategic Priorities.

“We listened to the concerns about community security expressed by our partner agencies, our donors and community members. We responded by making community security a central focus of the campaign and developed a matching gift program funded by a group of generous donors. This helped fuel the record result and enabled us to invest strategically in an issue that is front and centre in our community,” said Cristall.

The $300,000 raised is already at work addressing security needs faced by some high-traffic local Jewish organizations, including security guards and specialized security assessments, as well as additional security for several high-profile community events.

“Jewish Federation has taken the lead on community security for years, and our proactive approach was recently commended by Chief [Constable Adam] Palmer of the Vancouver Police department,” said Gaerber. “Given the threats received recently by our JCC, the fact that we were out in front of this takes on added significance. Every donor to the campaign can be very proud of having played a role in addressing this important issue while supporting the full depth and breadth of community needs at the same time. The record $8.5 million raised is a real testament to how we all care for our community.”

הגבוה ביותר עד כה

הפדרציה היהודית של אזור מטרו ונקובר ממשיכה להגדיל את היקף התרומות לקמפיין השנתי שלה, שהוא מקור ההכנסה המרכזי של הארגון ו-35 ארגונים היהודים הקשורים בה. בקמפיין של 2016 היקף התרומות עמד על 8.5 מיליון דולר. אשתקד הפדרציה היהודית גייסה תרומות בהיקף 8.3 מיליון דולר לקמפיין השנתי ואילו בשנת 2014 היקף התרומות עמד על 8 מיליון דולר.

כפי שכבר פורסם מתוך ה-8.5 מיליון דולר 300 אלף דולר יוקצו לטובת אמצעי ביטחון לשמירה על מוסדות ואירועים של הקהילה היהודית באזור ונקובר. זאת כולל השכרת מאבטחים לאירועים מיוחדים וקיום הערכות בטיחוניות בעת הצורך. לאור הגברת האנטישמיות ברחבי העולם והגידול באיומי הטרור, היה סביר להניח שהפדרציה תקצה משאבים אף גדולים יותר לטובת תחום הביטחון. בנושא האבטחה אומר יו”ר הקמפיין השנתי, אלכס קריסטל: “הקשבנו לחששות בנוגע לביטחון הקהילה, כפי שהובאו על ידי הארגונים היהודים השותפים שלנו, התורמים וחברי הקהילה. הפכנו את הביטחון בקהילה לנושא המרכזי של הקמפיין ופיתחנו תוכנית מיוחדת לתורמים נדיבים בתחום זה”.

כספי התרומות מהקמפיין השנתי מיועדים מדי שנה לתמיכה בארגונים היהודים המקומיים, בפעילויות ושירותים שהם מעניקים בתחומים חברה, החינוך, התרבות והאמנות. וכן עזרה לקהלי יעד חלשים יתר בעיקרם קשישים ונוער. חלק מהכספים יוקצו כרגיל ליטפול בפרוייקטים מיוחדים בישראל, במסגרת מתן החסות הקבועה של הפדרציה, שכוללת הענקת משאבים לשירותים חברתיים לאוכלוסיית נוער בסיכון בצפון הארץ.

קריסטל מוסיף כי היקף הכספים שגוייסו הפעם הוא הגבוה ביותר עד כה. יו”ר הקמפיין: “הכספים מבטיחים כי נמשיך לתמוך בארגונים השותפים שלנו שיוכלו להמשיך ולספק מגוון של שירותים ותוכניות שכל כך חיוניים לקהילה היהודית המקומית. ואילו יו”ר מועצת המנהלים של הפדרציה היהודית, סטיבן גרבר אומר: “יש לנו מספר אתגרים כקהילה כולל הנושאים הכפולים של אפשרויות ונגישות, מעורבות צעירים ובני משפחות צעירות, מענה לצרכים של אוכלוסיית הקשישים הגדלה שלנו, ופיתוח תוכניות עבור כמעט ממחצית מהקהילה שלנו אשר חייה כיום באזורים רחוקים בפריפרייה, שלא מטופלים על ידי שום ארגון. התוצאה של הקמפיין תאפשר לפדרציה היהודית ולארגונים השותפים שלנו להתמודד עם אתגרים אלה לטובת הקהילה”.

ללשכת הסטטיסטקה הקנדית אין נתונים מעודכנים לגבי פשעי השינאה במדינה. העידכון האחרון מתייחס לשנת 2014. אז המשטרה קיבלה מידע על 429 מקרים של פשעי שינאה בכול קנדה, בהם 213 הקשורים בקהילה היהודית. בוונקובר התרחשו בסך הכל באותה שנה 47 מקרים של פשעי שינאה.

ריו דה ז’ניירו וונקובר זכו באולימפיאדת ההכנסות ממיסחור

אולימפיאדת הקיץ ה-31 שנערכה בריזו זה ז’ניירו אשתקד ואולימפיאדת החורף ה-21 שנערכה בוונקובר בשנת 2010 הן המכניסות ביותר, מבחינת מכירת מוצרים ממוסחרים. כך עולה מנתוני דוח השיווק של הוועד האולימפי הבינלאומי שפורסמו בימים האחרונים.

על פי דוח השיווק של הוועד ההכנסות של האולימפיאדה בריו זה ז’ניירו ממוצרים ממוסחרים שברו את כל השיאים, והגיעו לכשלוש מאות ועשרים מיליון דולר. תקציב האולימפיאדה בריו זה ז’ניירו נאמד ב-11.9 מיליארד דולר. אולימפיאדת הקיץ בבייג’נג שנערכה בשנת 2008 הכניסה “רק” מאה ושישים מיליון דולר ממסחור. ואילו שאר אולימפיאדות הקיץ נמצאות הרחק מאחור.

האולמפיאדה של ונקובר הכניסה יותר מכל אולימפיאדת חורף בתחום מכירת המוצרים הממוסחרים, ופועל מדובר על סכום של חמישים ואחד מיליון דולר. תקציב האולימפיאדה בוונקובר נאמד בעשרה מיליארד דולר. הרחק מאחוריה אולימפיאדת החורף של סוצ’י שנערכה בשנת 2014 והכניסה שלושים וחמישה מיליון דולר ממוצרי מיסחור.

Strength in numbers

Left to right, Yael Rubanenko Horwitz, Wendi Klein, Debbie Jeroff and Lisa Pullan at Choices on Oct. 30. (photo from Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver)

For the 12th year in a row, hundreds of women of all ages gathered to celebrate the choice they made to strengthen our community through tzedakah at this year’s Choices event. Co-chairs Debbie Jeroff, Wendi Klein and Yael Rubanenko Horwitz and their committee worked for months to make the event a success, and brought the room to life with their chic black-and-white theme.

“Each of us [came] with our own story, history, talents and tragedies,” said Lisa Pullan, chair of women’s philanthropy for the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver annual campaign, as she addressed the packed ballroom at Congregation Beth Israel on Oct. 30. “But what unites us is the choice that we have made to stand together in support of our Jewish community.”

With more than 400 women in the room, including 36 first-time attendees, Pullan declared that “there is definitely strength in numbers.” Case in point is the more than $2,064,000 that was raised through women’s philanthropy last year, accounting for 25% of the 2015 Federation annual campaign’s record $8.3 million total. “Together,” Pullan remarked, “we are making a lasting impact on the community that we love.”

A highlight of the event every year is the inspirational speaker, and this year’s keynote speaker, Talia Levanon, was no exception. As director of the Israel Trauma Coalition (ITC), she and her team provide trauma care and emergency preparedness and response to affected communities in Israel and around the world. ITC is a global leader in providing aid and support to local professionals working in the field in crisis zones.

“Seeing how the ITC social workers in crisis zones have to work through their own traumas to help others was particularly powerful,“ said Pullan. “Talia showed a video in which one of the ITC workers was talking to a client on the phone and had to talk her through a rocket firing, while simultaneously getting out of her own car, lying on the ground and dealing with it herself. It helped us understand in a visceral way the trauma that Israelis experience.”

Community member Stephanie Mrakovich also spoke at the event, sharing the moving story of how her family discovered their Jewish roots and how she came to find her place as a leader in our community. She shared her personal and touching account of her dying grandmother’s revelation of the family’s Jewish heritage. Her remarks can be found at jewishvancouver.com/stephanie-mrackovich-choices-speech.

Choices is the signature campaign event for women’s philanthropy. While the speakers and the theme change each year, what stays the same is the focus on the great work in the community that is made possible by women’s commitment to the mitzvah of tzedakah. To donate or for more information on the annual campaign and the services and organizations it helps fund, visit jewishvancouver.com.

– From e-Yachad, published by Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver

Helping build brighter future

Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver and the local Jewish community recently hosted Ethiopian-Israeli students Mazal Menashe and Ahuva Tsegaye. (photo by Cynthia Ramsay)

Every second year, the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver hosts two Ethiopian students from the Interdisciplinary Centre in Herzliya. This allows the students to come to Canada and intern in their chosen fields, giving them not only the educational experience but an advantage in finding work after graduation. The students also act as ambassadors for Israel while in the community and interacting with various local groups.

This year, Federation hosted Mazal Menashe and Ahuva Tsegaye. While in Vancouver for the month-long internship, the students stayed with host families Sam and Sandra Reich in Richmond and Ben and Nancy Goldberg in Vancouver; they spoke at synagogues, churches and schools.

photo - Mazal Menashe
Mazal Menashe (photo from JFGV)

In 1991, when Operation Solomon airlifted 14,325 Ethiopian Jews to Israel in 36 hours, Menashe and Tsegaye were babies. Tsegaye’s mother, who was a midwife, gave birth to her alone on the way to Addis Ababa for the airlift, on the outskirts of Gondar. Menashe, granddaughter of Qes (Ethiopian for rabbi) Menasse Zimru, was born in Addis Ababa while her mother and father awaited the Israelis.

Menashe and Tsegaye both grew up in Israel, overcoming poverty and occasional racism to become successful young women.

Upon arriving in Israel, Tsegaye’s family lived first in Jerusalem, then Haifa, then Kfar Hahoresh in the north and, finally, Migdal Haemek, where they still live today. Her mother is a homemaker, and her father, who works for the city as a street cleaner, is now semi-retired.

Menashe’s family first moved to an absorption centre in Mabu’im in the south, near Beersheva. They lived there for a year before moving to Netivot, where they stayed until Menashe was 6, and then to Ashdod, where they live today. Her mother is a caregiver for the elderly and her father works in a factory.

Both Menashe and Tsegaye served in the Israel Defence Forces.

Menashe was drafted to the IDF in 2010, and completed training in the Logistics Corps as an outstanding soldier. After serving in the Paratroopers Brigade for two months, she was asked to go into officers’ training, which she did, becoming responsible for a company of 150 soldiers. When she was released from the army after five years, it was with the rank of lieutenant.

Tsegaye served for six and a half years, the only member of her family to become an officer. She served in an air traffic control unit in the air force as an instructional officer, and completed her service with the rank of captain.

“Serving in the IDF was the most empowering experience of my life,” said Tsegaye. Menashe agreed.

photo - Ahuva Tsegaye
Ahuva Tsegaye (photo from JFGV)

Menashe and Tsegaye didn’t meet in the IDF, but rather at the Interdisciplinary Centre, where they are both enrolled. In August, Jewish Federation brought them to Vancouver to work as interns in their respective fields: Menashe in law and Tsegaye in organizational psychology.

“We feel so blessed, so appreciative for what the Jewish Federation has done for us,” said Tsegaye. “And we are very grateful to have the platform to be advocates for Israel abroad.”

Both Menashe and Tsegaye have faced many challenges to get where they are now. Ethiopians in Israel face racism, poverty and challenges related to cultural and linguistic integration. The two students were both present at the mass protests that took place in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem last year calling for an end to racism and police brutality against Ethiopian-Israelis.

Menashe and Tsegaye broadcast strength and optimism. “We cannot wait for other people to save us,” they agreed. “We are not waiting for a savior, we will work hard and make the change ourselves.”

The power to shape their own lives, and their optimism about their ability to make the lives they want, are recurring themes in Menashe and Tsegaye’s conversation. This is fitting for members of the generation that is changing the realities of Ethiopian-Israeli life in Israel. “Our generation is entering the professional classes,” noted Menashe. “We are making a new future for Ethiopian-Israelis.”

Tsegaye added that the younger generation of Ethiopian-Israelis gives her hope. She told of going to a kindergarten where a nephew is enrolled and seeing a black doll. “I had never seen a black doll before in my entire life,” she said. “The younger Ethiopian-Israelis are much more integrated. They see themselves as Israelis.”

For community members wanting to support Jewish Federation programs such as this one, the annual campaign runs to Nov. 30. For more information, visit jewishvancouver.com.

Matthew Gindin is a freelance journalist, writer and lecturer. He writes regularly for the Forward and All That Is Interesting, and has been published in Religion Dispatches, Situate Magazine, Tikkun and elsewhere. He can be found on Medium and Twitter.

More funds for security

Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver has launched this year’s annual campaign under the leadership of Alex Cristall, general chair. The campaign is the Greater Vancouver Jewish community’s central fundraising initiative and closed last year with a record $8.3 million result. The campaign is one of the primary fundraising opportunities through which Federation will grow the financial resources required to meet the goals outlined in its 2020 Strategic Priorities. These priorities will guide the organization’s work on behalf of the community through the year 2020 and beyond.

“We are very excited that Alex Cristall has taken on the role of chair of this year’s campaign,” said Ezra S. Shanken, Jewish Federation’s chief executive officer. “Alex has a passion for making our community stronger, and he is an extraordinary leader in terms of addressing the goals outlined in our 2020 Strategic Priorities.”

The priorities address five key areas of opportunity:

  • Affordability: helping community members struggling with the high cost of living in the Lower Mainland.
  • Accessibility: reaching the nearly half of community members who live in underserved areas.
  • Seniors: planning for the needs of our growing seniors population.
  • Engagement: connecting young adults and young families to ensure community continuity.
  • Security: continuing to address evolving community security needs proactively.

While the campaign benefits all areas of need in the Jewish community, the particular focus of this year’s campaign is security. Jewish Federation is leading the development of a comprehensive, long-term approach to keep the Lower Mainland’s Jewish community ahead of the curve. In recognition of the need for a community-wide strategy, Federation established the community security advisory committee. The committee’s mandate is to provide a leadership role in assessing the risks facing community institutions and to propose and evaluate specific strategies to mitigate these areas of concern.

Growing security needs requires increased financial resources to address them. Federation has worked with a group of donors to create a matching gifts program to jumpstart the funding and create awareness among donors.

“I am very pleased to announce that every new or increased gift will be matched, with the matching amount allocated to local community security initiatives that will benefit every Jewish organization in our community,” said Cristall. “Community security is an issue that affects every single one of us every time we set foot in a Jewish institution, take part in a Jewish program or attend a community event. Through the Federation annual campaign, it is an issue we can all play our part in addressing.”

The annual campaign runs to Nov. 30. For more information on the campaign or the 2020 priorities, visit jewishvancouver.com/2020.

Helping youth at risk

Beit Vancouver is a centre for youth at risk in Kiryat Shmona. (photo from Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver)

The Etzbah HaGalil, or Galilee Panhandle, is the northernmost part of Israel, a “finger” of land extending into Syria and Lebanon, with its southeastern border also touching on Jordan. Militarily and geopolitically vulnerable, Etzbah HaGalil is also far removed from any urban centres, rendering it somewhat cut off from Israel’s economic and cultural heartlands, as well as its government infrastructures. For all of these reasons, young people growing up in Kiryat Shmona, one of the Etzbah’s major towns, face particular challenges.

Add to the above the fact that many immigrants are drawn to the Etzbah by cheaper housing. As in any other country, newcomers to Israel have a particular need for social services and community institutions to help them integrate into society and flourish. Yet those are the very things that have been hard to find in the Etzbah. Enter Beit Vancouver, a centre for youth at risk in Kiryat Shmona.

Originally built by the British Jewish community campaign (United Jewish Israel Appeal) in the early 1980s and held by the Israeli Housing Ministry, the youth centre that would eventually become Beit Vancouver was built near a major public high school in Kiryat Shmona. Inadequate operating support left it deserted for many years and the centre was in need of rescue in 2004 when the Partnership2Gether Coast-to-Coast steering committee identified it as a high-priority project in the region. P2G is a partnership between Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver and five other Jewish communities across Canada, and the steering committee includes representatives from the Canadian and Israeli communities in the partnership.

In 2005, three Vancouver-based families (the Diamond, Heller and Libin families) visited the region and donated funds for the renovation and renewal of operations at the centre. Beit Vancouver was scheduled to open July 11, 2006, but that day turned out to be the first day of the Second Lebanon War, which delayed the centre’s opening until September 2006.

The initial operating years of Beit Vancouver were strong, with rapid growth. An infusion of funds from the Israel Emergency Campaign beyond the initial commitments from the core funders helped.

Juvenile delinquency dropped dramatically in the region and, in 2008, the centre was singled out for national recognition for excellence in providing services to youth.

Unfortunately, 2009 saw both a reduction in funding and changes in staff that led to a decline in the centre’s effectiveness. A visit by Vancouver Federation staff in 2009 inspired a strong intervention with the city administration to force attention to the state of the program and building. Three core partners – Vancouver Jewish Federation, Kiryat Shmona and the Rashi Foundation – each committed to a revitalization of Beit Vancouver, with ongoing operating funding at a sufficient level.

photo - At the launch of the Friends of Beit Vancouver recognition wall on a mission led by Anita and Arnold Silber, Arnold Silber addresses the audience. He is joined by, left to right, Nissim Malka, mayor of Kiryat Shmona, and Eran David from Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver’s Israel office
At the launch of the Friends of Beit Vancouver recognition wall on a mission led by Anita and Arnold Silber, Arnold Silber addresses the audience. He is joined by, left to right, Nissim Malka, mayor of Kiryat Shmona, and Eran David from Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver’s Israel office. (photo from Federation)

The centre reopened in March 2010 and the level and quality of programming has grown steadily. When a financial crisis in Kiryat Shmona caused the closure of all other community centres in the city, Beit Vancouver stayed open, providing full-scale services to hundreds of youth on a daily basis.

“This centre is really essential for the youth of Kiryat Shmona,” said Ezra Shanken, Vancouver Jewish Federation chief executive officer. “The community is lacking many things we take for granted. There is no movie theatre in Kiryat Shmona. It is incredibly important that the youth there have somewhere to go.”

And, not only that, but the Beit Vancouver building has been used for emergency housing and relief for Israeli children in communities under attack. For example, when under fire from Gaza, children from Sderot were bused to Beit Vancouver.

Federation currently funds three programs at Beit Vancouver: [email protected], Merkaz Ma’ase and Youth Futures. Krembo’s Wings is under review to be funded for 2017.

[email protected] is an education program that helps high school students achieve high-level computer skills. The program has produced 5,000 graduates and is the only one of its kind in the region that integrates Muslim, Jewish and Christian youth in joint activities.

Merkaz Ma’ase is a leadership program for young adults designed to deliver equal opportunities and social mobility. It engages at-risk youth in a year of volunteer service after they graduate high school and before they begin their army service.

Youth Futures is a community-based intervention that aims to help children in junior high who are notably at risk for failure or withdrawal. Children are referred to Youth Futures by teachers, social workers and others who observe their need for help, shown by poor attendance, failing grades and behavioral problems. The child is paired with a trustee who acts as a bridge between the child, the family, the school and the public system.

Lastly, Krembo’s Wings provides weekly social activities for young people living with any type of motor, cognitive or sensory disability. The program helps these children become part of community life.

Shanken encourages Vancouver Jews to make Beit Vancouver part of their Israel trip. “Having a place that bears our name creates a bridge that can connect our communities,” he said.

Vancouverites can designate donations for Beit Vancouver through the Federation’s annual campaign, which was launched last week. For more information, visit jewishvancouver.com.

Matthew Gindin is a Vancouver freelance writer and journalist. He blogs on spirituality and social justice at seeking her voice (hashkata.com) and has been published in the Forward, Tikkun, Elephant Journal and elsewhere.