What happens when Jewish communal professionals step outside their usual, familiar spheres and immerse themselves in a reality that challenges and expands their understanding of Jewish global responsibility? That was the question we set out to answer during OLAM’s recent InterACT Global Study Trip to Rwanda.

OLAM is a network of Jewish and Israeli organizations working in international development, humanitarian aid and global service. As part of our strategy to equip Jewish leaders with the tools to mobilize their communities on behalf of the world’s most vulnerable people, we bring Jewish communal professionals on immersive study trips to developing countries to expose them to powerful examples of ethical global service in action.

Study trip participants at MindLeaps, an organization that fosters youth development through the creative arts, in Rwanda. Dunya Rodrigues

On our fourth such trip earlier this year, we brought a diverse cohort of North American Jewish professionals to the East African country, including members of the Jewish Service Alliance, powered by Repair the World, and alumni of the Wexner Field Fellowship. Through site visits, encounters with Jewish and Israeli development and aid organizations, meetings with short- and long-term volunteers serving in the field through partners such as JDC Entwine, we explored the deep growing ties between Rwandan civil society, Israel and the global Jewish community.

We met local changemakers rebuilding their country in the aftermath of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, through efforts focused on female empowerment, food security initiatives, vocational training, and education. And we witnessed how Jewish values are being translated into action through our partners’ work on the ground.

At Fair Planet, an Israeli NGO, for example, we learned how access to high-quality seeds is empowering farmers to reclaim their livelihoods. At the Streets Ahead Children’s Centre Association (SACCA), funded by the U.K.-based World Jewish Relief and Pears Foundation — a Jewish family foundation — we met children who had once lived on the streets and are now gaining vocational skills and hope for a better future. At Agahozo-Shalom Youth Village, inspired by Israel’s youth villages for child Holocaust survivors, we met young Rwandans being provided with education, mentorship and a path to success.

These visits raised critical questions for our participants: Where do Jewish values intersect with global service in non-Jewish contexts? Should Jewish institutions and communities respond to the challenges these communities face? And if so, what should that response look like?

I watched participants evolve from passive observers to deeply engaged learners. They started connecting the dots between their day-to-day work at home and the global realities they saw unfolding before them. They began to talk about a connected world, where local Jewish engagement and global justice are not competing priorities, but reflections of the same moral imperative.

And as I witnessed their transformation, I found myself undergoing one as well. As OLAM’s communications manager, I’ve spent years writing about Jewish responsibility to the broader world and our partners’ impact. But this was the first time I’d stood in the fields where farmers are rebuilding their livelihoods or sat face-to-face with those young people whose lives are being reshaped by the very initiatives I so often describe from a distance.

This experience helped me grasp, in a tangible way, how a funder in London, an NGO in Tel Aviv and a grassroots organization in Rwanda are all part of one interconnected story. How real change doesn’t happen through philanthropy alone, but through partnerships rooted in dignity, mutual respect and long-term commitment.

Pirkei Avot (Ethics of Our Fathers) asks, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? But if I am only for myself, what am I?” These words echoed in my mind, especially as this trip unfolded during a time of profound grief in my home country of Israel, which was mourning the return of the bodies of the beloved Bibas children — the youngest remaining hostages.

In that moment of collective grief, against the backdrop of our trip, I was reminded of a clear, if complicated, answer to these ancient questions: Compassion is not a limited resource. Jewish responsibility starts with our own, but the Torah’s repeated commands to care for the stranger remind us that our circles of responsibility do not end within our communities.

The parallels between Jewish history and Rwanda’s story of survival and rebuilding are striking. But this trip was never just about Rwanda. It was about a larger call to reimagine what Jewish global responsibility looks like in a complex, fractured world.

To Jewish communal professionals, funders and leaders: I invite you to engage in this work. Ask bold questions. Forge partnerships across borders. Expand the boundaries of your communal vision. In doing so, we will shape not only the world our children will inherit, but the Jewish community they will one day lead as well.

Naomi Lipstein is the communications manager for OLAM.