from an editorial in the New York Jewish Week (June 18, 2006):

It is common these days to bemoan the state of Jewish activism in America. Our organizations are out of touch with the Jewish rank and file, some complain; young people are drifting away from affiliation and involvement; the Jewish community has lost its focus on social justice, long seen as a pillar of Jewish security in America.

This week, in a special supplement entitled “The New Activism,” the Jewish Week looks at trends that belie these dire assumptions.

There is an outpouring of Jewish creativity around the country that is giving rise to new organizations, reinvigorating old ones and forging modern modes of activism that both benefit our own community and strengthen the Jewish commitment to the welfare of the society in which we live.

You can read more in this week’s Jewish Week.

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LIFE: an innovative tikun olam program for Jewish and Israeli young adults from all walks of life. It combines rich exposure to civil-society and leadership experiences in Israel with an intensive 3-month long experience doing international development work in an African country.

LIFE: an eight-month long program being tailored by top Israeli and international experts in the fields of international development, Jewish-Zionist education and justice-oriented leadership development. To be launched this year, the program begins with a lengthy period in Israel combining community service, learning about civil society and international development issues and approaches, leadership development and group-building.

LIFE: the first initiative of its kind that works simultaneously on two-tiers: bringing Jewish and Israeli young adults together in Israel in a rich process of Jewish-Zionist, civil society leadership learning and growth, while channeling their energy and commitment to tikun olam into a deep personal engagement with the issues and practice of international development work and global social justice as a critical dimension of Jewish life.

LIFE: a joint venture of Brit Olam and B’Tzedek, with support from MASA.

LIFE: currently recruiting

about Brit Olam: This International-Israeli Jewish Volunteer Movement is a leading Israeli NGO in international relief and humanitarian development projects.

about B’Tzedek: B’Tzedek aims to provide Israel and the Jewish people with a leadership of thoughtful and pro-active citizens from all sectors of society.

about MASA: MASA enables thousands of Jewish youth to spend a semester or a year in Israel, helping them build a life-long relationship with Israel and a firm commitment to Jewish life.

for more information, contact yonatan [at] btzedek.org.il

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The following results are abstracted from a recent survey conducted by the Hartog School of Government and Policy at Tel Aviv University and released Monday morning at the Workshop on Faith and International Development.

During the early years of the State, Israel’s policy of development cooperation (which began in the mid 1950’s), was said to be one of the most extensive technical assistance programs in the world. This slowed in the late 1960’s and came to a major about face in the early 1970’s.

There are various explanations for this change of attitude amongst the Israeli leadership, however the most commonly accepted account is that it stemmed from the actions of African countries during the Yom Kippur War. Since then, the political will in Israel for development cooperation has waned, and seemingly never recovered.

During these golden year’s of Israel’s policy of international development cooperation, policies were broadly supported by both the Israeli leadership and society at large. Then with the War came a general feeling to (as expressed in Haaretz) “…not forget who abandoned us in this, our hour of need…”.

Given the historical context, the question regarding Israeli society is whether it remains negative towards international development. Is the general public still of the view that under no circumstances tax dollars should be spent in Africa? Is the continued impassiveness of Israeli governments in line with current views of her citizens?

A public opinion survey was commissioned in January, 2008 to examine the attitudes of Israeli society towards the Governments’ international development assistance programs. The key findings follow:

• A majority of the general public (56%) agree Israel must provide assistance to developing countries and a substantial majority (73%) agree Israel should do so at least some of the time. This is much higher among the secular public (78%) than among the Orthodox community (55%).
• An absolute majority of the public (75%) feels proud when learning Israel has helped needy people in the world; among the secular public (82%), the Orthodox community (54%).
• Only a minority of the general public (28%) agree Israel’s security needs or economic / social needs (29%) exempt it from behaving like an ordinary country in providing assistance to developing countries.
• Only a small minority of the general public (19%) agree with the sentiment Israel should not assist developing countries because the world will always side against it.
• A large majority of the general public (60%) believe there are advantages to Israel in providing development assistance and this strengthens Israel’s international position (65%).
• A large majority of the general public (61%) believe Israel should work with the Jewish world in providing international assistance to the developing world.
• A large majority of the general public (64%) believe that at least in some cases, Israel should serve as a “light unto the nations” with regards to assisting the world’s needs. Only a minority (27%) outrightly object to this claim.
• A large majority of the general public (63%) agree Israel should adopt a policy of preference for its own needy over other countries. This is much higher among the Orthodox community (84%) than the secular population (63%).

In a related issue, there is strong support for international assistance being conducted in conjunction with world Jewry. It is the belief of those conducting the research that one of the keys to bolstering Israel’s soft power lies in the creation of joint projects on a global scale, in partnership with world Jewry.

You can read more about the Workshop on Faith and International Development here.

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A new international agenda, Tikkun Olam, is uniting Israeli aid amutot and Jewish humanitarian groups from around the world in a common mission: partaking in the global effort to overcome the most serious afflictions of poverty, hunger and disease worldwide.

Under the auspices of Tel Aviv University’s Harold Hartog School of Government and Policy, this bold agenda brought together, a few days ago, the largest gathering of Jewish and Israeli humanitarian aid groups ever assembled in Israel. Over 100 representatives of Diaspora and Israeli groups participated in a Workshop on Faith and International Development, and heard from development experts, philanthropists, academics and spiritual leaders on the role of the Jewish people among the nations in the 21st century.

A major focus of the workshop was to discuss ways to encourage the current generation of Jews to fulfill their personal responsibility to humanity, in the spirit of our Jewish tradition. According to project director Eli Fried, “By contributing to the struggle against disease, hunger and poverty, we can help those who urgently need our assistance…We believe that this agenda can also give rise to a new age in the relations between Israel and the Jewish world.”

One of the program highlights was a major ‘Jewish learning session’, which aimed to formulate a new Jewish-humanitarian vocabulary, and introduce the values of Tikkun Olam into the central discourse of the Jewish establishment worldwide. There was also discussion among the heads of major Jewish foundations on how to enhance the support of Jewish philanthropists for large-scale, coordinated Jewish and Israeli endeavors in the developing world.

We heard the results of a survey recently conducted by the Hartog School at Tel Aviv University and released at the Conference about Israeli society’s attitudes towards Israel’s foreign aid policy. You can read about the study here.

Key speakers included Anne Heyman, Esq, President of the Heyman-Merrin Family Foundation, who in a joint project with the JDC, is spearheading the creation of the Agahozo-Shalom Youth Village for genocide orphans in Rwanda. The concept is based on Israeli Youth Aliya Villages established in the 1950’s, and more recently the home of many Ethiopian immigrants, some of whom will now return to their home continent to serve on the Agahozo-Shalom team.

Read what the Clinton Global Initiative has to say about this project here.

We also heard from Ruth W. Messinger, President of American Jewish World Service, one of the largest Jewish inspired international development organizations. Ruth joked about being known as ‘Miss Darfur’ as AJWS has been instrumental in efforts to raise the profile of the Darfur genocide in the U.S.

By the way, AJWS has a great new website; definitely worth a look if you haven’t visited recently!

The sessions were enlightening and educational and we will have a few related posts both today and next week on this meaningful premier event.

You can also find a great article by Anshel Pfeffer summarizing the Conference here; just one small part…

The “hot” idea mentioned at almost every session at the conference was establishing a world Jewish volunteer service that would function similarly to the American Peace Corps, and would send thousands of Jewish young people and professionals for a year of volunteer work all over the world.

“For the concept of a Jewish volunteer force to succeed,” says Akiva Tor, who is the Foreign Ministry official responsible for ties with Diaspora communities, “a senior political figure has to enlist in the cause or one of the big Jewish donors has to fall in love with the idea. Just to reach the first group of 100 volunteers will require at least $10 million.”

Most conference participants agreed that such a program should be open to any serious Jewish candidate who is willing to donate a year of work, and that the training should take place in Israel, which would then itself become a world center of international aid. Now the only thing needed is a mover and shaker who will accept the challenge.

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This is a busy ten days: from Oxford University to Tel Aviv; from San Diego to Jerusalem we’ve got you covered. Over this week, eJewish Philanthropy will bring you a combination of on the spot coverage, conversations, complete presentations and links. Check back often as we highlight goings on in the world of philanthropy.

For those of you with an interest in Social Entrepreneurship or Social Philanthropy, the gathering these past few days of the 5th Annual Skoll World Forum at Oxford University will be of interest.

Some background: The Skoll Foundation, was established in 1999 by eBay founder Jeff Skoll in order to promote social entrepreneurship. In 2003, the Foundation established Skoll The Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship at Oxford. As part of its aim to advance the field of social entrepreneurship, The Centre convenes the Skoll World Forum on Social Entrepreneurship, an annual conference that brings together the world’s foremost practitioners and thought leaders in the emerging field of social entrepreneurship. The Conference is pretty much like a Davos for social entrepreneurs, attended by more than 700 people from around the world.

The sessions this year were centered around the theme of Social Entrepreneurship: culture, context and social change. Some of the questions addressed by the participants:

• If social entrepreneurship is truly about “changing the world”, then what are the cultural and contextual barriers that social entrepreneurs need to overcome to create sustainable change in the areas where they work?
• To what extent does culture accelerate or inhibit change, innovation, and scale?
• How can social entrepreneurs best evaluate the contexts in which they operate?
• What are the opportunities and models of success?
• And, at the most practical level, what mindsets and tools are needed for social entrepreneurs to work successfully across different cultures and contexts?

There is a lot out there on the blog-o-sphere about the Conference. If you’re interested, I’d check out the teams from both Berkeley and the Skoll Scholars; Social Edge is the place to start.

There are also good day-by day detailed posts on Buzz, onPhilanthropy’s news and commentary blog. I also found interesting a post on social branding here.

Other news coming from the Forum included a Rockefeller Foundation announcement of a $500,000 investment in support of studying the feasibility of a social stock exchange.

Most participants are now back home and there may be more to say in the days ahead. If so, I’ll add additional links to this post.

Back in Israel, I’m attending a Tel Aviv University conference / symposium,
A new agenda for 21st century world Jewry: Tikkun Olam – mending the world;
the largest gathering of Jewish and Israeli humanitarian aid groups ever assembled in Israel. I will have several posts about this conference coming up.

In the meantime, direct from the AFP Conference in San Diego, we have exclusively for our audience the power-point of the first ever AFP session devoted to Jewish Fundraising,

What-Makes-Jewish-Fundraising-Unique; isn’t a dollar a dollar?

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From Ghana to Venezuela to Israel, 10 Brandeis University undergraduates have been selected to participate in social justice internships around the world this summer.

Through The Louis D. Brandeis Legacy Fund for Social Justice, established by the generosity of an anonymous donor on the occasion of Justice Brandeis’s 150th birthday, the students are provided a $3,500 stipend to alleviate costs associated with an unpaid internship in a social-service agency that addresses issues of social justice.

“There is in most…some spark of idealism, which can be fanned into a flame. It takes sometimes a divining rod to find what it is; but when found, and that means often, when disclosed to the owners, the results are often most extraordinary.” (Justice Louis D. Brandeis)

Meet the inaugural class and their projects here.

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We invite you to join Jewish communities, organizations and individuals from around the world in celebrating a month of social action and Jewish unity.

Since its establishment in 2005 by KolDor, a global network of young Jewish activists, www.socialaction.com and Member of Knesset, Rabbi Michael Melchior and the Office of the Prime Minister of Israel, Jewish Social Action Month (JSAM) has evoked a remarkable response.

For the last three years, Jewish Social Action Month has brought the world together in common cause – around our traditions of tzedek (righteousness) and tikun olam (repairing the world) – during the month of Cheshvan. This year, Cheshvan will be from 30 October to 27 November 2008.

By encouraging a sense of Jewish Peoplehood and a positive Jewish identity JSAM transforms a month without holidays, often associated in the Jewish tradition with bitterness, into a global celebration of positive action and unity. It has successfully involved thousands of people around the globe in common cause and has garnered the political support of the Presidents of both Israel and the United States along with legislators in the UK, the US and Israel. A wide spectrum of Jewish religious leaders, major institutions, youth groups, communal organizations and others worldwide endorsed the initiative and created exciting and widespread programs.

This year’s Jewish Social Action Month, occurring during Israel’s 60th anniversary, promises to be once again an amazing time of increased unity and positive action involving Jews from many countries and perspectives.

Every group or individual is welcome to mark Jewish Social Action Month in the way most meaningful to them and their community. Cheshvan can be a month to launch new social action projects or increase existing efforts. The actions can be large scale projects or simple acts of individual kindness. They can be focused on the Jewish community, on the wider world or the environment. Jewish Social Action Month presents endless possibilities to make a difference. Each act is important in itself and will also link to this global Jewish effort to make the world a better place. For a fuller indication of partners and projects, see www.cheshvan.org.

Mark the first of Cheshvan, October 30, on your organizational calendars as the beginning of Jewish Social Action Month. Start planning the social actions in your community that will make this Cheshvan a global celebration — a month of meaning and justice.

Jewish Social Action Month belongs to everyone who wishes to take part. Contact KolDor (jsam@koldor.org) for more information.

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Community organizing means developing leaders and bringing people together to form powerful organizations that allow people to act on their own behalf to make systemic changes in their lives.

Community organizers are people who want to stir things up to motivate people to act for change, who embrace challenge, and who think strategically about power.

The Boston based, Jewish Organizing Initiative (JOI) builds a vibrant, pluralistic community of Jewish young adults who learn grassroots community organizing, explore their Jewish identity together, and become leaders in the pursuit of social justice. The JOI year-long paid fellowship program is a source of Jewish community, intellectual stimulation, mentorship, and professional networking. Over the last decade, JOI has built a network of over 100 alum and countless mentors and trainers from the Jewish community and beyond.

Now JOI is looking for fellows who have the aptitude and the appetite to become excellent organizers, who are committed to pursuing social justice professionally, and who are looking to build progressive community in a Jewish context. In addition to work experience, JOI is about building a unique and genuine community of peers, committed to intertwining their Jewish identity with their work for social justice.

For more information, contact Program Director Catherine Bell at cbell@jewishorganizing.org.

updated February 14th: for more on JOI read today’s Jewish Advocate article, JOI marks 10 years of working for change in Greater Boston

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The Jewish, Muslim and Arab communities at the University of Pennsylvania made history Tuesday night. With the launch of a new collaborative initiative called Bridging the Gap, these communities took a step toward building long-lasting working relationships within the Penn community. Through dialogue and cultural events, this program hopes to foster a sense of mutual understanding that “is often lacking in the world today,” said Mariam Ezz, Wharton senior and president of Penn Arab Student Society.

“While there will always be a place for partisan events on campus, an initiative like Bridging the Gap will expose Jewish, Arab and Muslim students to a way of thinking that will foster compassion and mutual understanding,” added Ezz.

“I found it ironic that we hope people in places like Israel will make peace when there is no effort to even engage with each other in our own backyards,” said College sophomore Sam Adelsberg, co-chairman of Hillel’s Israel Dialogue sector.

to read the complete article, click here

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We first met her at a special performance in Nashville during the GA. Now, Grammy Award-winning musician Miri Ben-Ari, the Israeli “hip hop violinist” who is best known for her collaborations with artists Kanye West and Jay Z, was awarded the first annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Israel Award for her work in bringing together African American and Jewish communities closer together through music.

from the official press release…<