Your Daily Phil: Journey to Japan aims to empower teen survivors of Oct. 7
Good Friday morning.
For less-distracted reading over the weekend, browse this week’s edition of The Weekly Print, a curated print-friendly PDF featuring a selection of recent Jewish Insider, eJewishPhilanthropy and The Circuit stories, including: JFNA partners with Israeli Health Ministry on $14M community mental health plan; Jewish Democrats cautiously cheer a potential Josh Shapiro ticket; How one Jewish-Arab Israeli gap-year program navigated a fraught post-Oct. 7 landscape. Print the latest edition here.
In today’s edition of Your Daily Phil, we report on a set of guidelines for combating antisemitism published this week by the State Department. We feature an opinion piece by Brian Amkraut about resisting an “us vs. them” mentality in addressing the challenges of today’s Jewish campus experience. Also in this newsletter: Rabbi Miriam Terlinchamp, Ben Sasse and Joe “Jellybean” Bryant. We’ll start with the story of a group of Israeli teens from the Gaza Envelope heading on a meaningful journey to Japan. Shabbat Shalom!
One teenager is longing for her grandfather, a hostage being held in Gaza. Another lost her best friend in the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre in Kibbutz Be’eri. Yet another had to carry a gun for protection as he patrolled his moshav a few days after Hamas’ brutal attack.
All three are part of a group of Israeli students from Nofey Habsor High School, located in the Eshkol Region in the Gaza Envelope, that will travel to Japan at the end of this month, reports Jewish Insider’s Ruth Marks Eglash for eJewishPhilanthropy. The program they are participating in aims to support their recovery following Hamas’ brutal Oct. 7 attacks on their communities, and to instill a sense of empowerment that young people can be effective agents of change — even in a world full of unknowns and tragedies.
While the group — which will also include three teachers and a student counselor — will travel to several locations in Japan, the highlight of the trip will be a visit to Fukushima, the site of the 2011 nuclear power plant accident caused by an unprecedented earthquake and tsunami in the region.
“The similarity between Fukushima and what happened in southern Israel on Oct. 7 are the personal stories of loss and destruction,” said Mayo Hotta, the executive director of enForward, a community platform that promotes diversity and multicultural collaborations to achieve a better future and overcome challenges and crises. A Japanese national, Hotta moved to Israel in 2017 and is married to Yotam Polizer, CEO of Israeli emergency aid agency IsraAid.
The idea for the trip, she told eJP, was based on her own experiences working with young survivors from Fukushima.
In 2011, Hotta was working for the Japanese investment company Softbank. Like many in Japan, she was shocked into action after learning that between the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear power plant accident, some 20,000 people were killed. She helped found the Tomodachi SoftBank Leadership Program, under the auspices of the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, aimed at giving hope to young survivors of the disaster.
It was the success of the Fukushima program that propelled Hotta into action following Oct. 7. Connecting with Hadar Horesh, the 11th grade head teacher at the Nofey Habsor school, she worked on creating a program that would allow young survivors of the terror attacks in Israel a glimpse into the heartbreaking travails of people in another place, halfway across the world.
Both populations have experiences in common, Hotta told eJP, including devastating loss of life, mass evacuation from a danger zone and the struggles of a destroyed community. The Israeli group’s two-week stay in Japan will focus not only on learning about her country, the Fukushima disaster and developing leadership skills, but also on emotional reflection, she added.
Run in partnership with the American Jewish Committee, the Israeli Embassy in Tokyo, the Sojitz Foundation and an anonymous donor, the program has been warmly received in Japan, Hotta said. Despite the fact that public attention and sympathy in the country is often focused on the Palestinian people in Gaza, “No one in Japan questioned me about the importance of bringing Israeli kids to visit. They all understood that these kids were hurt, and that they all need support.”
UNITING AGAINST HATE
State Dept. unveils ‘Global Guidelines for Countering Antisemitism,’ endorsed by 32 countries, 4 international entities
The State Department published a major new document on Wednesday intended to provide governments around the world with a blueprint for effectively responding to antisemitism, reports Gabby Deutch for eJewishPhilanthropy’s sister publication Jewish Insider. The document was signed by representatives of 31 additional countries as well as the Council of Europe, the European Commission, the Organization of American States and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
A sense of urgency: Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt, the U.S. special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, formally announced the “Global Guidelines for Countering Antisemitism” at a Wednesday event at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Buenos Aires. “I want to underscore the special sense of urgency we all feel given the ongoing global surge in antisemitism,” Lipstadt said. “I believe we have channeled that sense of urgency in a productive, creative and collaborative fashion, and by introducing these Global Guidelines we are making a major stride forward in international policy to counter antisemitism.” Antisemitism envoys from several European and Latin American countries were also present, having converged on the Argentinian capital along with politicians and Jewish community leaders to mark the 30th anniversary of the deadly terror attack on the city’s Jewish community center.
Straightforward guidance: The Global Guidelines do not have the force of law, but they offer a clear statement of where the U.S. government and its partners stand in their fight against antisemitism. Featuring 12 straightforward directives, the guidelines are meant to offer a blueprint for how governments and civil society can take action against antisemitism. The document also reflects strong U.S. support for the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA)’s working definition of antisemitism, despite a global campaign against it by activists who take issue with its assertion that some forms of anti-Zionism are antisemitic.
STICK AROUND
Eliminating the binary in responding to campus antisemitism
“Suggesting that students must be all-in or all-out regarding their campuses’ responses to the challenges we have seen this past academic year oversimplifies the complex reality of Jewish life and identity on campus,” writes Brian Amkraut, a vice president at Mercy University in New York, in an opinion piece for eJewishPhilanthropy.
Inadvertent concessions: “The ‘our camp or their camp’ attitude aligns with the politics (if not necessarily the academics) of intersectionality, which has resulted in seemingly well-meaning social justice movements strangely finding themselves advocating support for Hamas. So too are well-intentioned movements to promote Jewish safety on campus and reject antisemitism risking falling into the mirror image of the intersectional movement by calling for an alliance of conservative religious individuals and organizations regardless of the broad spectrum of values and attitudes they represent… I fear that an exodus strategy [also] concedes to the demand for ideological purity and resultant tribalism, further eroding the small-D democratic ideals that have been conducive to Jewish acceptance and success in America in the post-WWII era.”
Values-based approaches: “[S]ome Jewish students and faculty members choose to engage directly with their universities, advocating for policy changes, increased security and more robust educational programs about antisemitism and Jewish history… Other Jewish groups focus on building strong, supportive communities on campus, creating spaces where Jewish students can feel safe and celebrated… No single solution can accurately represent the multiple voices within the Jewish community that share the overarching goal of challenging hostility to Jews and Israel in our colleges and universities. By embracing a range of strategies and fostering collaboration among Jewish communities and their allies, a more effective and inclusive response to campus antisemitism can be achieved.”
Worthy Reads
May I Dwell in the House of the Lord: A rabbi’s words of welcome to Jewish converts have unanticipated consequences in this feature story by Andrew Lapin for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “When Rabbi Miriam Terlinchamp appeared on an episode of the ‘Judaism Unbound’ podcast last year to talk about her new online Jewish conversion class, she didn’t know that two listeners would soon change the trajectory of her life. Those listeners, Ari Kingsman and Joshua Phillips, were cellmates inside the Monroe Correctional Complex in Washington State with a shared interest in Judaism. After listening to her podcast, they wrote to the rabbi asking if she would help them convert… In the year-long journey that followed, Terlinchamp would take up the challenge, traveling across the country to supervise two decidedly non-traditional conversions to Judaism from inside a prison — a setting where, to her knowledge, no other rabbi has agreed to stage a conversion before.” [JTA]
A Different Way to Lead: In The Chronicle of Philanthropy, Drew Lindsay interviews Tim Dixon about More in Common, the nonprofit he co-founded following the political assassination of British MP and close friend Jo Cox in 2016. “Today, More in Common, which Dixon leads, helps political leaders and social-change movements find the language and strategies to strengthen their coalitions by including unlikely allies. It has teams in Brazil, Britain, France, Germany, Poland, and the United States. ‘We need leaders across society who actually can see there is a hopeful way through,’ Dixon says. ‘You can transcend the divisions. You don’t have to pick a side. You need to define a different common-ground approach. You need to have courage in doing that.’ More in Common is one of scores of nonprofits devoted to Cox’s premise that we are more united than we think. Extreme or ‘toxic’ polarization, they contend, supercharges differences and fuels perceptions that people on the other side are evil mortal enemies. It turns toxic the disagreement that’s essential for a healthy democracy, spurring those already inclined to anger and violence to act… Polling suggests the majority of Americans are worried by the country’s divisions. And they see a role for nonprofits to close divides and make partners of enemies, according to a survey commissioned by the Walton Family Foundation last fall.” [ChronicleofPhilanthropy]
Around the Web
In the early hours of this morning in Israel, a drone attack struck a building near the U.S. Consulate in Tel Aviv, leaving one person dead and at least 10 injured. According to Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the IDF Spokesperson, no air-raid sirens sounded to warn civilians of the attack because while Israel’s defense systems picked up the drone it failed to register as a threat. Yemen’s Houthis claimed responsibility for the attack…
Faced with backlash from organizations like the American Jewish Committee, Adidas apologized for using Palestinian-American model Bella Hadid, a vocal critic of Israel amid the war in Gaza, as the face of its retro marketing ad campaign for the relaunch of its 1972 Munich Olympics sneakers and said it will revise the remainder of the campaign. Palestinian terrorists murdered 11 members of Israel’s Olympic team at the 1972 Munich Olympics…
The Board of Deputies of British Jews welcomed the inclusion of the “Holocaust Memorial Bill” in the government’s legislative agenda, moving forward plans for construction of the National Holocaust Memorial and Learning Center…
The Wall Street Journal looks at how Israeli hospitals and municipalities in the country’s north are preparing for a potential escalation with Hezbollah…
University of Florida President Ben Sasse announced on Thursday that he is resigning from his position to “focus more on the needs of [his] family” following his wife Melissa’s recent epilepsy diagnosis and other health challenges. Sasse drew widespread praise this year from the Jewish and pro-Israel communities for his forceful condemnation of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and his leadership against antisemitism…
The Free Press reports that some members of the American Federation of Teachers, the second biggest teachers union in America, have raised concerns over a series of proposed resolutions that they say target Jews and “libel the Jewish state”…
Birthright Israel announced two new programs this summer to help young Diaspora Jews’ bolster their knowledge of geopolitics, public diplomacy and Israel’s counterterrorism efforts…
Kansas City’s PJ Library and the Jewish Federation of Greater Kansas City received $3,500 in grant funding to launch the PJ Grandparent Project: a monthly gathering to provide resources, activities and space to explore ideas about Jewish grandparenting…
The New Jersey Council for the Humanities awarded a $15,000 grant to the project “Generations: An Oral History of Jewish Farming in Southern New Jersey” at Stockton University in Galloway, N.J. …
Additionally, Stockton University’s Alliance Heritage Center — a digital museum and archive centering on the experiences of the first successful Jewish farming village in the United States — was recognized by the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference with its Innovative Archives Award…
In its obituary for Joe “Jellybean” Bryant, father of the late NBA star Kobe Bryant, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency highlights the elder Bryant’s lesser-known claim to fame: He coached the 1992-1993 girls basketball team at Akiba Hebrew Academy (known today as the Jack M. Barrack Hebrew Academy) in Philadelphia…
Pic of the Day
People hold pictures of victims of the July 18, 1994 terror attack on the Jewish community center in Buenos Aires during a commemoration ceremony on Thursday marking the 30th anniversary of the attack.
Birthdays
Professor of astronomy at MIT and 2013 MacArthur genius grant winner, Sara Seager’s birthday is on Sunday…
FRIDAY: Retired Israeli airline pilot, he successfully thwarted an in-flight hijacking by Leila Khaled in 1970, Uri Bar-Lev… Johannesburg resident, Monty Lasovsky… Interactive designer, author and artist, in 1986 he married Caroline Kennedy, daughter of the late JFK, Edwin Arthur “Ed” Schlossberg… Retired professor at Erasmus University Rotterdam and Leiden University, he served in the Dutch Senate and then as the minister of foreign affairs of the Netherlands, Uriel “Uri” Rosenthal… Hotelier and real estate developer, Ian Schrager… Co-founder of Limmud FSU, she co-founded UJA-Federation of New York’s Women’s Executive Circle, Sandra F. Cahn… Former co-chairman of the Federation for Jewish Philanthropy of Upper Fairfield County, Conn., Linda Meyer Russ… Sportswriter for The Athletic and author of three books on baseball, Jayson Stark… Former CEO of Starbucks Coffee Company, Howard Schultz… Retired judicial assistant at the Montgomery County (PA) Court of Common Pleas, Deenie Silow… Rabbi of Congregation Beth Abraham in Bergenfield, N.J., and rosh yeshiva at Yeshiva University, Rabbi Yaakov Neuburger… Head of the Kollel at Baltimore’s Ner Israel Rabbinical College, Rabbi Ezra D. Neuberger… Former chairman and CEO of Sears Holdings, Edward Scott “Eddie” Lampert… Israel’s ambassador to Canada until last August, Ronen Pinchas Hoffman… Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter and author of The Nazis Next Door: How America Became a Safe Haven for Hitler’s Men, Eric Lichtblau… Israeli actress, model and film producer, Yael Abecassis… Spokesperson to the Arab media in the Israel Prime Minister’s Office, Ofir Gendelman… Co-chairman and CEO of CheckAlt, Shai Stern… Senior writer and NBA Insider for ESPN, Ramona Leor Shelburne… Former soccer star at the University of Virginia, he is now a director of administrative operations at Hopscotch Health, Chad Prince… Former deputy mayor of the city of Haifa, now a real estate developer, Shai Abuhatsira… Ultra-marathon runner, he performs as a mentalist and magician, Oz Pearlman… Associate partner at McKinsey & Company, Alexis Blair Wolfer… President of Brightside Academy Ohio, Ezra David Beren… Director of operations at Tide Realty Capital, Yanky Schorr… National political reporter for the Washington Post, Isaac Arnsdorf… Project coordinator for Israeli nonprofits operating in East Africa, Caroline Mendelsohn… First-ever Orthodox Jewish player selected in the MLB Draft, picked number 77 overall by the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2021, Jacob Steinmetz… Former executive vice president and CEO of the Ronald S. Lauder Foundation, George Ban… Zach Houghton… Jewish Insider editor Tamara Zieve…
SATURDAY: Retired U.S. Sen. (D-MD), Barbara Mikulski… Retired president of the National Endowment for Democracy, Carl Gershman… Longtime Israeli diplomat, he served as Israel’s ambassador to Germany, Yoram Ben-Zeev… Former commissioner on the Civil Rights Commission, assistant secretary of HUD in the Clinton administration, presently vice chair of the Bank of San Francisco, Roberta Achtenberg… U.S. District Court judge in Massachusetts, Judge Patti B. Saris… New York Times weekly columnist and three-time Pulitzer Prize winner, Thomas Loren Friedman… Molecular geneticist at NYC-based Rockefeller University and an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Jeffrey M. Friedman… Broadcast and digital media executive, Farrell Meisel… Professor of sociology at the University of Illinois at Chicago, Barbara Risman… Past president of the Women’s Department at the Jewish Federation of Detroit, Marcie Hermelin Orley… Los Angeles-based wardrobe consultant, Linleigh Ayn Richker… Public policy expert and author, Jane S. Hoffman… Former member of the Knesset for the Yesh Atid party, she is a brigadier general in the IDF (res.), Nira Shpak… Member of the Knesset for the United Torah Judaism party, Yitzhak Ze’ev Pindros… Attorney, Jack Achiezer Guggenheim… Vice president and political director of CNN, David Marc Chalian… Co-author of Jewish Jocks: An Unorthodox Hall of Fame, he is a staff writer at The Atlantic, Franklin Foer… Southern states director at AIPAC, David Fox… Singer who burst on the scene as a finalist on the fifth season of “American Idol,” Efraym Elliott Yamin… Commissioner of the community affairs unit for NYC Mayor Eric Adams, Fred Kreizman… Co-founder and managing partner of Main & Rose, Beth Doane… Co-founder and co-executive director of the Indivisible movement, Ezra Levin… Former MLB player, he was a third baseman for Team Israel in 2023, Ty Kelly… Comedian and regular player on “Saturday Night Live,” Chloe Fineman… Software engineer at Home Chef, Ashley Abramowicz Gibbs… Anesthesiologist, Dr. Sheila Ganjian Navi… Recent MBA graduate at Harvard Business School, Etan Raskas… Senior vice president and head of investor relations at Vintage Investment Partners, Jonathan Tamir Alden… Actor and comedian, Joey Bragg… Associate at Ballard Spahr, Goldie Fields…
SUNDAY: President at Admar Group, Henry Dean Ostberg… Retired CEO of Sony/ATV, a large music publishing firm, Martin Bandier… Professor emeritus in the Department of Physics at Bar-Ilan University, he won the Israel Prize in 2018, Shlomo Havlin… Director of the Center for the Political Future at USC, Robert Shrum… Criminal defense attorney, Benjamin Brafman… Former member of the U.K.’s House of Commons, now in the House of Lords, Baroness Susan Veronica Kramer… U.S. Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY)… Chairman and CEO at Quantitative Financial Strategies, Sanford “Sandy” Jay Grossman… Endocrinologist and professor at Columbia University’s medical school, she is the honorary president of NYC’s Central Synagogue, Shonni Joy Silverberg, MD… Professor at Columbia Law School and daughter of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Jane Carol Ginsburg… Irene Ostrovsky… Comedian and actor, best known for his five seasons on “Saturday Night Live” ending in 1990, Jon Lovitz… Former chief rabbi of Moscow, Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt… Literary agent at the William Morris Endeavor book department, Eric Matthew Simonoff… Actress and producer, Alysia Reiner… Brazilian fashion designer, Alexandre Herchcovitch… CEO of Fanatics, Michael G. Rubin… Founder, president and CEO of Securing America’s Future Energy (SAFE) and the Electrification Coalition, Raphael “Robbie” Diamond… Rabbi of Congregation Bais Naftali in Los Angeles, his YouTube channel has over 4.3 million views, Rabbi Yoel Gold… Online media personality and director of product management at Electronic Arts (EA) in Vancouver, Veronica Belmont… Clinical social worker, Aniko Gomory-Pink… Entrepreneur and political activist, Chloé Simone Valdary… Policy analyst at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, Zachary A. Marshall… Recruiter at Tines, Rachel Elizabeth Nieves… Attorney in Madrid and secretary general of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain until 2021, Elias Cohen…
