conferences

Zionism wins big in Vegas

BC students at the StandWithUs conference in Las Vegas March 15-18 included, left to right, Adar Latak, Alexis Moscovitz and Ethan Doctor. (photo by Pat Johnson)

What happens in Las Vegas doesn’t stay in Vegas. That was the defiant message from Roz Rothstein, the chief executive officer and co-founder of StandWithUs, as she welcomed about 1,000 Jewish and pro-Israel high school and college students, alumni, activists and assorted allies to the organization’s conference in the Nevada city, March 15 to 18. They assembled to become more informed and empowered, to return to their campuses and communities to advance the fight against antisemitism and antizionism.

Among the delegates were about 100 Canadians, including 15 BC students, as well as Vancouverite Zara Nybo, StandWithUs Canada’s campus and high school manager for Western Canada.

StandWithUs, a pro-Israel advocacy and education organization, provides leadership training and educational programs to students at hundreds of schools, as well as operating many other initiatives, including legal supports for Jewish and pro-Israel individuals and groups.

Among the BC students were four Leventhal high school interns and 10 Emerson fellows, who are part of the organization’s college and university track, Nybo said.

Students are selected based on demonstrated leadership in pro-Israel activism. They attend two immersive educational international conferences like the Vegas meeting during their year of service and are required to initiate several Israel-related programs in their communities or on campus.

Delegates heard from a roster of noted speakers in plenary sessions and more intimate, often hands-on breakout sessions.

The intensive morning to late-night schedule included speakers like New York Times columnist Bret Stephens; singer, dancer and online influencer Montana Tucker; sociologist David Hirsh, who is head of the London Centre for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism; Loay Alshareef, a Saudi-born activist who advocates for normalization with Israel; Luai Ahmed, a Yemeni-Swedish journalist; Oct. 7 survivors, including Omer Shem Tov, who was held hostage for 505 days; and scores of others.

photo - New York Times columnist Bret Stephens — New York Times columnist Bret Stephens (photo by Pat Johnson)

Stephens, the New York Times columnist, spoke of the revolutionary impact the potential fall of the Iranian regime could have on regional and global affairs but also warned of unintended consequences.

“Regime change is not at all easy,” he said. “There are all kinds of imponderables.”

The state could spiral into chaos and even more bloody and brutal repression than the government has already brought down on anti-regime protesters, he said.

“I do think there is, in fact, quite a plausible scenario [of regime change] – not now, not during this war, but in six months or a year – if [it’s] a militarily crippled and humiliated regime that is still under sanctions, still cannot pay its bills, cannot pay its civil servants, cannot pay its soldiers,” said Stephens.

Iranian street activists, he said, need to “kick this regime when it’s down.”

“If anyone can do it, 90 million Iranians, 88% of whom, at least, despise the regime and had the courage to come out and cheer when the late ayatollah was killed … I think that that creates conditions in which I can see it happen,” he said.

Ahmed spoke of his ideological and physical journey from being an antisemitic young man in Yemen to a new life in Sweden advancing coexistence with Jews.

“It is our duty as reformist Arab Muslims to stand with our Israeli and Iranian brothers and sisters to reject radical Islam, to fight radical Islam,” he said. “It is our duty to fight the terrorists who occupied my country, who believe that firing ballistic missiles at Jews is more important than feeding the starving population of Yemen.

“Radical Islam occupied Iran, Yemen, Lebanon, Gaza,” he said. “Radical Islam married my mother off at the age of 8. Radical Islam is our problem and, today, I stand here as a Yemeni who was taught to hate Jews. And I’m telling you something that radical Islamists fear the most: Jews and Israel are not our enemies.”

Alshareef shared a similar transformation.

“I used to be hardcore antizionist,” he said. “I used to be deeply antisemitic. In my local mosque, I repeated after my imams, ‘Death to Israel, death to Jews, death to Zionists,’ without ever having met a Jew or a Zionist before. Today, thank God, I no longer believe in that cancerous ideology that not only impacts the Jewish community, but it also impacts my community as well.… A society that learns to hate Jews more than loving our own children is not a healthy society.”

photo - Loay Alshareef, a Saudi-born activist who advocates for normalization with Israel — Loay Alshareef, a Saudi-born activist who advocates for normalization with Israel. *(photo by Pat Johnson)*

After Oct. 7, 2023, Alshareef decided to visit Israel.

“I learned that the Jewish community and Israelis were desperate for peace, that the vast majority of Jews and Israelis do not want war with us,” he said. “They want peace, and they are very desperate for this peace. That is something that no one had ever told me until I went to Israel myself to see the truth. I then took it upon myself to try to hammer this newfound truth to my friends and family members. And, since then, I’ve been creating content, sharing the hidden truths about Israelis and Jews that my society either dismisses or is completely unaware of.”

Students shared their experiences with antisemitism and bias from teachers, administrators and fellow students. A high school student explained how he helped get an ahistoric and antisemitic handout removed from his school’s curriculum – it had gone unchallenged since 1998. In plenaries and breakouts, individuals shared personal experiences of harassment, discrimination and loss of friendships.

StandWithUs does not only educate but also uses the law to seek fair outcomes in cases of discrimination.

The conference heard from Yael Lerman, founding director of Saidoff Law, a legal arm of StandWithUs, which includes a team of attorneys backed by a network of hundreds of pro bono lawyers and law firms.

“Imagine being a Jewish student in a high school where there are very few other Jewish kids,” Lerman said. “Day after day, classmates taunt you. They call you ‘dirty Jew’ and ‘Zio,’ they send antisemitic messages. Sometimes, they shove you or punch you. You never know when the next message or the next attack is coming. The school knows about it. Nothing changes. Then you reach out to StandWithUs Saidoff Law. Our attorneys step in. We represent you, we fight for you, and we win. We secure a transfer to a new school, and the original school must pay for it for the rest of your time in high school.”

No student should ever face antisemitism alone, Lerman said.

“Since Oct. 7, we’ve seen a dramatic rise in legal complaints, not only on campuses, but across everyday community spaces,” she continued.

“Recently, one man went to pick up a clothing order at a store where he had been a loyal customer for several years. The clerk looked at his kippa and muttered, ‘You Jews think you can get everything you want.’

“Later that day, he received an email telling him he was banned from the store and the entire chain. So, he reported the incident to StandWithUs. Our lawyer filed a complaint with the appropriate government agency and negotiated a settlement. The store had to lift the ban and compensate him. That is what accountability looks like,” said Lerman.

The conference heard diverse emotional testimonies.

Shem Tov shared the harrowing story of dancing at the Nova festival and, minutes later, being thrown in the back of a pickup truck and transported across the border into Gaza, beginning a nightmarish ordeal of 505 days of being shuttled between locations and then confined in underground labyrinths. For 50 consecutive days, at one point, he was held in complete darkness in a cell where he could not stand up.

“They used to abuse me physically and mentally,” he said of his captors. “There wasn’t any human interaction, I would say.”

Shem Tov was held in near-starvation even as he saw piled boxes of United Nations-supplied rations.

His captors once took him to a house above a tunnel that had been rigged with explosives and told him he would be forced to trigger an explosive blast when Israeli soldiers entered the boobytrapped structure. When they threatened to kill him if he refused, Shem Tov told them they could shoot him, but he would not do it.

After Shem Tov’s presentation, hundreds of students rushed to the front of the hall, surrounding the former hostage and dancing ecstatically as music blared and massive screens declared: “We are dancing again.”

The executive director of StandWithUs Australia, Michael Gencher, led a memorial for the 15 victims murdered during a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach last Dec. 14.

Sami Steigmann, a child survivor of the Holocaust, spoke of the series of flukes and strokes of luck that saved his life.

In addition to Canada and all regions of the United States, student delegations came from Europe, Latin America and Australia. Due to war-related airspace closures, only two delegates were able to travel from Israel for the event.

BC delegates spoke to the Independent about their experiences.

Adar Latak, a University of Victoria psychology student in his final year, said he gained confidence at the conference and made important connections.

“You’re meeting Jews from around the world, and that’s beautiful,” he said. “It’s easy to get brought down by everything, and coming here really lifts your spirits. You’re with other Jews, you’re all facing the same thing, and you’re all talking about it, and you’re giving each other advice and tips, and it is really just a beautiful thing.”

Alexis Moscovitz, a second-year physical and health education student, also at the University of Victoria, echoed Latak’s sense of community.

“Obviously, everybody has different experiences, but it’s all basically the same,” she said. “We’re all fighting antisemitism on our campuses and so, having a support system, amazing staff here, it’s just amazing to be able to be with people that you know are experiencing the same things.”

Vancouverite Ethan Doctor, a Langara College student, has faced threats on campus, including being followed and intimidated by a group of masked and keffiyeh-clad activists. His experience as an Emerson Fellow helped him navigate the college bureaucracy, seeking appropriate security and prevention steps.

“If it wasn’t for organizations like StandWithUs, I wouldn’t know how to properly deal with it and wouldn’t know the proper steps to take,” said Doctor. “I am just eternally grateful to organizations like this.”

photo - Michael Dickson, executive director of StandWithUs Israel, left, speaks with Omer Shem Tov, who was held hostage in Gaza for 505 days — Michael Dickson, executive director of StandWithUs Israel, left, speaks with Omer Shem Tov, who was held hostage in Gaza for 505 days. (photo by Pat Johnson)

Jesse Primerano, executive director of StandWithUs Canada, told the Independent his group’s role is to help young pro-Israel activists, but also people of all ages, find their voices.

“In many cases, they don’t feel comfortable with the facts, to engage with people who are coming at them very aggressively,” he said. “So, our job is to help them understand the facts and how to communicate them to people who disagree.”

Earlier, Primerano briefed the convention on the state of affairs in Canada.

“We look back on times [of] the Holocaust, and I think what we said for many generations was that, as long as our government didn’t turn on us, we would be safe in the countries that we live,” he said. “And, you know, since Oct. 7, antisemitism has become emboldened in a way in Canada that it feels like our politicians know the only way to stay in office is to take an anti-Israel position.

“So, we’ve seen our mayor of Toronto be unwilling to come to an Oct. 7 vigil, unwilling to come to an Israeli flag-raising,” Primerano continued. “Our prime minister in Canada said that he would arrest Bibi [Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu] should he come to Canada. He put an arms embargo on Israel and, most importantly, as I’m sure many of you are aware, he rewarded Hamas with support for the establishment of a Palestinian state.

“That type of rhetoric and action from our government has spilled into the streets because it has emboldened those who are willing to take shots at the Jewish community. And I mean that both literally and figuratively. Just [days earlier] in Toronto, we had three synagogues that were shot overnight in four days,” he said.

StandWithUs partners with many different groups, Primerano said, but because they work extensively with university students, some people might wonder how they fit with agencies like Hillel.

“Hillel is, in many ways, the voice on campus,” he said. “They are the coordinators of Jewish life. Their goal and their work and their ultimate obligation is to bring Jewish students and their allies together. Our job is, once those students are together, to help supplement the work that Hillel is doing with Israel education, with helping awareness towards antisemitism. Hillel has a wide array of responsibilities that go far beyond just advocacy. Our job is to supplement their work, to work with them as a partner and bring our resources into their space while they bring the students here to meet our resources.”

At the Vegas conference, StandWithUs unveiled SWUBOT, a free, downloadable artificial intelligence tool providing at-the-fingertips information on Israel, antisemitism and activism.

StandWithUs was marking 25 years since Rothstein founded the group with her husband, Jerry Rothstein, who is the organization’s chief operating officer, and Esther Renzer, who is the president.

Mobilizing against Jew-hatred

Ysabella Hazan said phrases such as “the West is next” imply “exactly what the enemies of Israel accuse us of – being a Western outpost in the Middle East, a settled body, which is not true.” (photo by Dave Gordon)

Rage Against the Hate in New York on Oct. 31 had the goal to “gather Jewish organizations, and to find ways to start fighting back, to retake the streets, to retake the campuses, to retake social media, to combat antisemitism in a way that we haven’t,” said Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, president of the Israeli nonprofit Shurat HaDin Law Centre, organizers of the full-day conference.

photo - Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, president of Israeli nonprofit Shurat HaDin Law Centre, which organized the Rage Against the Hate conference in New York Oct. 31 — Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, president of Israeli nonprofit Shurat HaDin Law Centre, which organized the Rage Against the Hate conference in New York Oct. 31. *(photo by Dave Gordon)*

More than 30 organizations were conference partners and keynote speakers included radio host/author Dennis Prager, attorney Alan Dershowitz, actor Michael Rapaport, activist Shabbos Kestenbaum and NGO Monitor’s Gerald Steinberg.

Dershowitz, 86, said that after speaking to Jewish high school students, he was “stunned by their lack of knowledge” about Israel. To fill the void, he will be giving away a million copies of his latest book, The 10 Big Anti-Israel Lies and How to Refute Them with Truth, to 1,000 universities and high schools across the United States. He lambasted what he called the “educational malpractice” pervasive on college campuses, where professors “give disguise” to Jew-hatred through diversity, equity and inclusion policies, and oppressor-versus- oppressed beliefs.

“I offered $1,000 to anybody who could find me a single protester in any of these protests on university campuses that has ever called for a two-state solution. Nobody has taken me up on it. No protester wants to see an Israeli state,” he said to the audience of 300.

He added that “we are in a fight for our lives. We are in a fight for the future,” because these students will become politicians, corporate executives, media influencers and other types of leaders, and they will have all “been brought up with this kind of knee-jerk anti-Zionism.”

Darshan-Leitner characterized Students for Justice in Palestine as a “propaganda arm of Hamas.” She believes their activity is “actually providing material support to a terror organization” and, in doing so, contravenes the Anti-terrorism Act in the United States.

Kestenbaum – who, last January, became the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit against Harvard University, alleging systemic antisemitism, and has testified before Congress about antisemitism on college campuses – told the Jewish Independent: “Jewish students are fighting a really remarkable fight with limited resources, with limited help and limited funding. It’s the Jewish nonprofits, who raise billions of dollars each year, who could be in a position to do a lot more. And so, I would encourage the Jewish nonprofits not to say, ‘What can the students be doing?’ but to ask themselves, ‘What can I be doing?’ to help students.”

“It is imperative that larger organizations actively support grassroots initiatives that can manoeuvre and mobilize quickly and efficiently, whereby large organizations cannot,” said Amir Epstein, director of Tafsik, a Jewish civil rights group that fights Jew-hatred in Canada and more broadly.

“Hundreds of millions of dollars are donated to large organizations, so it isn’t unreasonable for them to contribute considerable monetary aid to empower these grassroots efforts, so we can create a united front to combat the degradation of our Jewish community’s safety, and address the unprecedented antisemitism we face in universities, K-12 schools, media, politics and the arts,” said Epstein.

Montrealer Ysabella Hazan, who started the movement called Decolonized Judean, said phrases such as “the West is next” and “Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East” do not resonate with the younger generation. “They do not speak about us, convey our story or address the accusations that we are facing on the world stage,” she said. “And they indirectly prove exactly what the enemies of Israel accuse us of – being a Western outpost in the Middle East, a settled body, which is not true.”

Columbia business professor Shai Davidai, who has earned renown for calling out Jew-hatred on campuses, told the audience that antisemites have “created the new normal” by making students feel uncomfortable being visibly Jewish.” He said, “If we don’t fight back in the court of public opinion and in the court of law, we’re not going to win this war.”

photo - At the Rage Against the Hate conference Oct. 31, Dennis Prager offered an idea of how to counter the delegitimization of Israel — At the Rage Against the Hate conference Oct. 31, Dennis Prager offered an idea of how to counter the delegitimization of Israel. *(photo by Dave Gordon)*

Prager, who did graduate work at the Middle East and Russian institutes of Columbia’s School of International Affairs, said, “I was basically taught by moral idiots, but they were giants compared to who’s teaching in Columbia today, or at Harvard or at Princeton.”

An argument he proposed to use against the delegitimization of Israel is to draw a parallel to the creation of Pakistan, born the same year as the modern Jewish state. “There were two Israels in history,” said Prager, “but there was no Pakistan in history. When it was created, it was wrenched out of India. Nobody ever challenges the right of Pakistan to exist.”

Rapaport, known for his social media posts about Israel, advised: “Fight with your heart, fight with your prayers, fight with your genius, brilliant, Jewish, Zionist minds. Fight ferociously and do not take a step back,” he implored, while also encouraging Jewish education: “The more that I learn about our fantastic, magical history, the prouder I become.”

Journalist Douglas Murray, who is not Jewish, and Darshan-Leitner, shared a question-and-answer session.

Murray lamented how “very senior politicians” and “a generation of Americans” have bought into the “delusion that, if you were to solve the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, peace would break out, not just in the region, but around the world.” But a state of Palestine with Hamas leadership “will be another Iranian proxy state nearer to Israel,” he said, and it’s “an obscenity that more people don’t realize that.”

He also said this is “a great opportunity for alliance-building,” and reminded the audience “not to forget the Christian communities” and others “who have been so supportive of Israel.”

Winnipeg attorney Lawrence Pinsky told the Independent that the conference was “inspiring and helpful,” and he plans to create a community “situation room,” he said, “just so that we can have a multi-directional approach to any problem. These will be individuals who may or may not be parts of organizations, who actually want to do, and can do.”

He said the conference helped him realize that activism should involve “no ego,” and that people should jump into action, not feeling they “have to reinvent the wheel.”

Dave Gordon is a Toronto-based freelance writer whose work has appeared in more than 100 publications around the world. His website is davegordonwrites.com.

Improv conference held here

Viola Spolin is widely thought to be the mother of modern improvisation. (photo from amazon.ca)

If you thought that improv was only for entertainment, think again. This summer’s applied improvisation conference at Granville Island will showcase some of the world’s best applied improvisation coaches, trainers and facilitators.

The conference will be hosted by the Applied Improvisation Network in partnership with the Improv Centre, formerly Vancouver Theatresports.

Avril Orloff is one of four Jewish community members on the Vancouver conference planning committee. She told the Independent that there will be more than 30 workshops offered, from improv in education and health care to using it to navigate difficult conversations, increase confidence, build community and address humanitarian issues.

“The hard part will be choosing among all the great offers,” she said.

Conference dates are July 27-30, with July 25-26 called “Learning Journeys” before the conference proper, where people can sign up to do a deep dive into particular topics for a half or full day.

“Another highlight is the Open Space sessions on the final day, which is a marketplace of ideas where anyone can offer a workshop on any topic they’re particularly interested in,” said Orloff. “Open Space is a great lab for people who want to test out new ideas, processes and games, or put out an ask to anyone who’s willing to answer.”

Orloff dived into applied improv in 2022 and fell in love with it.

“The weekly classes and open space sessions were a bright spot in my life during the pandemic,” she said. “They expanded my outlook beyond the confines of the immediate moment and made me feel connected during a time of isolation.”

Since then, she has used applied improv techniques more and more in her work as a facilitator, starting with the online “connection cafés” she hosted during the pandemic, and now in person.

Avi Dolgin is another community member on the planning committee. He said they are expecting 200 delegates with a dozen or so who are local but the majority from elsewhere in Canada, as well as from the United States, Europe and Asia.

Dolgin sees improv as a profound way of unlocking human potential. Now retired, he uses improvisation to teach Bibliodrama at Or Shalom.

“In my life, an improvisation mindset encourages me to greater spontaneity, unexpected creativity and a greater willingness to help others in their ideas,” he said.

Carol Ann Fried, an inspirational speaker and consultant who lives in Vancouver, is also on the conference committee. She is presenting an applied improv workshop alongside Sarah Fisk and Matt Weinstein.

“Now that many people – but not all – are meeting again in person, the need to conduct ‘hybrid meetings,’ where some are in person and others are online, has arisen,” she said. “This split format is difficult, in part because it is hard for people to interact with each other. Our session attempts to address this issue with specific structures and activities to engage people in a hybrid setting, that are based in the values of improv, and that can be used in any work context.”

Well-known improviser Colin Mochrie will be one of the keynote speakers at the conference. Mochrie is most famous for appearing in the television show Whose Line Is It Anyway for the last 30 years.

Jewish community member David Diamond is the other keynote speaker. He will be giving a demonstration of Theatre for Living, with three audience members. Based on Augusto Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed and Diamond’s lifelong interest in physics, Theatre for Living uses improvisation to create scenes that stimulate community dialogue and calls for change, in particular cross-sectoral understanding.

Applied Improvisation Network (AIN) was created in 2002 to bring together professionals with a keen interest in the study, practice and teaching of applied improvisation. Initially, a group of 30 or so improvisers gathered for the first conference in San Diego. Today, AIN is a global community of more than 8,000 participants online and across numerous regional and local groups.

Ed Reggi is AIN’s president and another member of the Jewish community. Reggi, who lives in St. Louis, Mo., told the Independent that there has always been a Jewish presence in the organization, from its founding to the present day.

Reggi said he takes his inspiration from Viola Spolin (1906-1994), who is widely thought to be the mother of modern improvisation. Spolin was the daughter of Jewish immigrants from Ukraine. Spolin’s father, Make Mills, had escaped pogroms in Ukraine to come to the United States. Her grandfather stayed in Ukraine and died at the hands of Stalin’s troops after the Soviets took his farm.

Much of Spolin’s work and success comes from her body of experience around recreational play. She studied under Neva Boyd, who was a sociologist, and documented recreational games, dance and activities that came over from Europe, Reggi said.

“Of course, Viola’s son, Paul Sills, watched his mother developing her Theatre Games and he took them over to the University of Chicago, where he worked with Mike Nichols, Elaine May, Ed Asner, Alan Alda and Avery Schreiber and so many more.”

Sills went on to create the Second City in Chicago, now North America’s oldest improvisation theatre institution, where Saturday Night Live stars Gilda Radner, John Belushi, John Candy, John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara made their debuts.

Reggi is excited about attending the conference here in July.

“I think, because this conference is happening in Vancouver, I expect more Jewish presence. Last year, we were in Ávila, Spain, after two years of being halted by the pandemic. I am thrilled to be coming back together in person again.”

For more information about the conference, go to appliedimprovisationnetwork.org/vancouver-conference-2023.

Cassandra Freeman is a freelance writer living in Vancouver.

Na’amat to gather in Calgary

This fall, Susan Inhaber, left, will take over the presidency of Na’amat Canada from Dr. Sandi Seigel. (photos from Na’amat Canada)

Na’amat Canada’s 20th Triennial Convention takes place Oct. 13-15 at the Hilton Garden Inn in Calgary. The event will include a thank you to outgoing president Dr. Sandi Seigel of Hamilton, Ont., and it will welcome new president Susan Inhaber from Calgary, Alta. Inhaber will be the first national president from Western Canada since 1975.

Inhaber became a member of Na’amat Canada Calgary in 2000. “In short order,” she said, “I was president of a new chapter and, a few years later, I became the president of an amalgamated chapter. I served in that role for many years, immersing myself in all of the projects and programs that our group was involved with, including being the bingo chair, casino chair and grocery store gift card chair. My involvement in all activities continues to this day. As city president, I was a member of the national board, later becoming a member at large and, lastly, the vice-president of Na’amat Canada.”

Inhaber has been to Israel several times with Na’amat. “Everyone who goes always comes back with a renewed sense of energy for the organization,” she said. “We can see the impact that we are making in the lives of others and that is what drives my passion for Na’amat. My next trip will be as the leader of our newest leadership cohort.”

Delegates from across Canada and guests from Israel and the United States will attend the fall convention, and special guests will include Hagit Pe’er, president of Na’amat Israel, and Shirli Shavit, director of the overseas division of Na’amat Israel. There will be speakers on the topics of antisemitism, human rights, breaking the glass ceiling, and more.

“It has been a privilege serving as Na’amat Canada national president since 2020,” said Seigel. “I am most proud that we have supported our organization throughout the pandemic and not only have we survived but thrived. We have built on our relationships with our chaverot internationally and in Israel and have had four successful fundraisers with Na’amat USA.”

Contributing to the success has been the quality of programming, both on Zoom and, more recently, back in-person, she said. “Despite many challenges, we have been able to transmit significant funds to support our work in Israel and continued to maintain important local projects such as our school supplies for kids program.”

Stepping down as president doesn’t mean leaving the organization. “I feel that I have lifelong friends at Na’amat, and it is wonderful to be united in the work that we do on behalf of Na’amat,” said Seigel. “As we near our convention in Calgary, I am excited for the future of our organization as we approach our 100th anniversary in 2025.”

For her upcoming three-year term, Inhaber said she is looking forward to continuing the relationship building that Seigel and, before her, Doris Wexler-Charow brought to the organization. “My main goal is to further grow our membership and donor base,” said Inhaber. “I hope to increase awareness of what Na’amat Canada does in Israel and Canada, especially among Western Canadians.”

For more information, contact Vivian Reisler at [email protected]. To register for the convention, visit naamat.com.

– Courtesy Na’amat Canada