Boca Raton & Delray Beach | Volume 1

BIRTHRIGHT ISRAEL

FOUNDATION

Birthright Israel Foundation Boca Raton & Delray Beach

Volume 1 Fall 2021

BIRTHRIGHT ISRAEL

FOUNDATION

To Our Community, This past year we are proud of our community’s support for the Birthright Israel program. Most of all, we are thrilled Birthright Israel is back, thanks to you. Not only during the pandemic, but when antisemitism and the anti-Israel sentiment are at an all-time high, we have ensured young Jews know the strength of Israel and the Jewish people when they need it most.

Together, our community has made this experience a top priority for young Jews here and around the world. We are both proud to call South Palm Beach County home, and to be a part of this incredible organization.

In the pages to come, we invite you to meet the Birthright Israel alumni whose lives you have transformed and your fellow philanthropists, who, like you, are leaving their mark on the Jewish world. May we continue to celebrate Birthright Israel’s return and the decades of success that are still to come!

Sincerely, Mike Leven National Board Member, Co-Chair of South Palm Beach Leadership Cabinet Birthright Israel Foundation Barry Swidler National Board Member, Co-Chair of South Palm Beach Leadership Cabinet Birthright Israel Foundation

To Our Boca Raton and Delray Beach Supporters, Birthright Israel’s decades of success would not have been possible without the unwavering support of our Boca Raton and Delray Beach philanthropists. The dedication you, as donors, have shown to Birthright Israel Foundation is outstanding. This community has and will always play a significant role in Birthright Israel and the tens of thousands of young Jewish lives the program impacts each year. Your generosity has made the dream of visiting Israel a reality for thousands of young Jews in South Palm Beach County and in turn has strengthened not only this community but the Diaspora and the future of the Jewish people.

We are thrilled that Birthright Israel trips are back on the ground, and the next chapter in the program’s story has only just begun. With your generosity, we can continue to fight antisemitism and anti-Israel hatred and ensure Israel remains a focal point in the lives of the next generation.

More so, that our children, grandchildren and generations to come are proud to be Jewish.

We thank you for your generosity and look forward to what the future holds.

Regards,

Israel “Izzy” Tapoohi President & CEO Birthright Israel Foundation

Carole-Ann Levine VP President, Southeast Region Birthright Israel Foundation

Sherryl Steinberg AVP, Southeast Region Birthright Israel Foundation

BIRTHRIGHT ISRAEL

FOUNDATION

Baruchim Habaim!

Birthright Israel Foundation is thrilled to announce the opening of its inaugural office in Boca Raton and welcomes Sherryl Steinberg as the Associate Vice President, Southeast Region.

The office will be serving all of Birthright Israel Foundation’s needs in South Palm Beach County.

Sherryl Steinberg is an experienced and deeply committed development professional and has worked in the Jewish world for over 22 years. Before Birthright Israel Foundation, Sherryl spent nine years at The Jewish Federation of Palm Beach County as their Annual Campaign Director and several years in Chicago as the Midwest Regional Director of the American Friends of Technion Society and as the Associate VP of Campaigns for the Jewish United Fund of Chicago. Most recently, she was the Director of Development at Donna Klein Jewish Academy here in Boca Raton, FL where both of her daughters attended.

Sherryl Steinberg Associate VP, Southeast Region sherryl.steinberg@birthrightisrael.org (561) 504-0600

Dear Supporters, Like so many of you, my parents and grandparents made Jewish continuity and Israel a central part of our lives. Israel was always a focal point of conversation at each family gathering and, of course, around the table. I grew up in Winnipeg, Canada, where I would spend my evenings with Jewish youth groups and my summers with Young Judea at camp, where I learned to love and be proud of my Jewish roots.

At 15-years-old my parents took us on our first trip to Israel, and like so many of our Birthright Israel participants, I will never forget taking my first steps in Israel. It solidified the importance of Zionism and the Jewish community for me. Years later, I began my career as an attorney but soon realized I needed to do something more fulfilling, which led me to work in Jewish philanthropy. I know that my desire to work on behalf of Israel and the Jewish people stemmed from my Israel experiences and Jewish upbringing. These are traits I have also instilled in my two daughters.

I am humbled to be part of the Birthright Israel Foundation family in Boca Raton, FL, and work with one of the most generous Jewish communities in the world. My life was immensely impacted by my time in Israel, and I know together, we can help transform the Jewish future one Birthright Israel participant at a time.

Regards,

Sherryl Steinberg AVP, Southeast Region Birthright Israel Foundation

‘ Energized and inspired ’ : After a year away, Birthright returns to Israel at a critical time

by Deborah Fineblum If you’re in Israel this month, you can’t miss the clusters of them downing falafel on Jerusalem’s Ben-Yehuda Street, cooling off in the Dead Sea, climbing Masada at sunrise or slipping prayers between the stones of the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

After more than a year of pandemic silence, the Birthrighters have returned with all the gusto of young adults who’d waited out the year of coronavirus restrictions with visions of Israel dancing in their heads. Take Conor Mullaney, who applied for a Birthright Israel trip months ago with little hope of going then.

“I’d been looking forward to being in Israel for a very long time,” says Mullaney, a third-year finance student at the University of Maryland’s Global Campus, who arrived on May 24 with the very first Birthright Israel group to set foot on Israeli soil since the pandemic shut the program down more than a year ago.

“Even though I’ve read a lot on Israeli politics and history, never having been here until now, I didn’t fully understand how it all fits together,” he says. “Being here has changed my life and the way I see the world.” It also included holding the bar mitzvah he’d never had at the Western Wall with his new friends cheering him on.

Or take his fellow Birthright traveler Sami Marshak, an aspiring attorney who after the Birthright experience is starting a summer internship with a Tel Aviv international law firm. While the Rutgers University junior had been to Israel years ago with family, she notes that “it’s extremely cool being here with friends.”

And then there’s Jack Berkey, who was busy exploring the country with pals from his school, the University of Michigan. It worked out perfectly to have this opportunity to see Israel for the first time between college graduation and beginning his new job, Berkey reports. “I came with zero expectations of what I will experience,” he said. “I’ve always wanted to come but with COVID,

it wasn‘t happening last year. So when I heard I could come on Birthright this spring, I thought, ‘This is my chance; I’m not going to miss out on it.’”

These three young adults were indeed fortunate to secure a spot; some 6,000 applicants are now qualified and looking forward to going, reports Birthright’s vice president of Global Marketing Noa Bauer. Most of these are expected to be able to enjoy Birthright this summer, with another 20,000 waiting in the wings for winter, spring and beyond.

When they go, they’ll join the whopping 750,000 young adults ages 18 to 32 from 68 countries who in the last 21 years have experienced the unforgettable sights, sounds, smells and tastes of Israel through a free Birthright trip.

In fact, the newly released Pew Research Center study of American Jews found that while just under half of Jewish adults (45 percent) have been to Israel, among those ages 25 to 34, more than a quarter report having traveled on a Birthright trip.

Bauer’s stats say more than a third of the young Jewish adults have been on a Birthright trip, “which makes it a potent force for influencing how an entire generation feels about both Israel and their Jewish identity. And now, after more than a year of isolation, they’re so happy to be free to come and explore at a time when Israel is back to life and more exciting than ever.”

Indeed, professor and American social psychologist Len Saxe, who directs the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis University and has been following how college students have dealt with pandemic isolation this past year, says the time is ripe for them to go. “For this generation coming off the loneliness and emotional challenges of COVID, the hunger to engage with peers makes this a propitious moment to go to Israel and an important moment in our history for young Jews to establish personal relationships with their peers, including the young Israelis they get to know on the trip.”

That’s because only face-to-face contact works for establishing bonds, he maintains. “Online works only if you’ve already formed the relationship in person, and grow and deepen it on the phone and online.”

For Scott and Amy Jaffee of Brookville, N.Y., involvement in Birthright began five years ago when their oldest son returned from his trip. “We saw how energized and inspired he was when he got back, including the rapport he had with his Israeli peers and the beginning of understanding what a young Israeli’s life is like.”

And, adds Amy, who now serves as co-chair of Birthright Israel Foundation’s Long Island Leadership Cabinet, “we began thinking about all the Jewish kids who need to go to Israel but can’t afford it, and we wanted to pay it forward.”

‘An important time to strengthen Jewish identity’ The rise in anti-Semitic acts and presence in the last few months, including but not limited to anti-Israel pressures from college campuses to social media to online hate to the images from the January riot on Capitol Hill, has not escaped the notice of Birthright-goers. “We’ve had our fair share of pro-Palestinian rhetoric on campus,” says Marshak, noting one professor who said that Israel is an apartheid state and that the Jews have no historical right to the land. “The media also

influences what people think, including all of us who came here questioning our beliefs and not knowing how to feel about Israel.” Her own view: “Despite Israel’s problems, here I see Jews of different politics and religious views all feeling the same way about the rise in anti-Semitism, the importance of Israel and the fear that history could repeat itself.”

Berkey, too, had heard the anti-Israel voices being raised at his school. “I’ve heard a lot about Israel, and it wasn’t necessarily positive,” he says. “But I refused to believe any of it until I could come with an open mind and see it for myself.”

The Jaffees recall meeting one young woman who’d bad-mouthed Israel on the flight over—an attitude that lasted until she got off the plane. ‘She said as soon as she arrived, she began questioning her own assumptions, and wound up falling in love with Israel and the idea of being Jewish,” says Scott Jaffee. “This kind of transformation was something we wanted to be a part of.”

Rabbi Shlomo Gestetner who directs the Mayanot Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, one of Birthright’s providers, says “the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe and now in the United States makes this such an important time to strengthen Jewish identity. And the only lasting way to do that is to come to the land filled with Jewish history, where you can hear our ancient language spoken on the street and walk on the same 2,000-year-old stones our ancestors walked on.”

‘The sense of unity that I never expected’ Many a Birthrighter reports those few days in Israel truly strengthen their connection to the Jewish people and to Israel, says Barry Shrage, former president of Boston’s federation, Combined Jewish Philanthropies, who now teaches at the Brandeis Hornstein Program in Jewish Professional Leadership. “It’s a transformational experience, and though we know you can’t get back what you lost so the kids who should have gone this past year might go later or we may have missed them altogether, but now is a particularly important moment to go.”

In a time of “woke anti-Israel and anti-Semitic propaganda, fighting it with information and advocacy can go only so deep, and facts can and will be distorted by our enemies,” continues Shrage. “The only thing that really works is getting to know their brothers and sisters in Israel, and truly understanding the heart of the Israelis. You can’t educate someone to love and identify with the Jewish people and Israel. Falling in love has to be experiential, and Birthright is the best way we have of giving them that experience.”

Bauer adds that “just getting them here and showing them the real Israel is the single most powerful way to fight BDS attacks. And, though they’re not necessarily going to wave the Israeli flag on campus when they get back, they have a much better chance of questioning the hate they could face from a place of deep connection after having seen firsthand what the Israelis are made of and what they’re dealing with.”

Bauer says when they do hear accusations, returned Birthrighters tend to “pick up the phone and call their Israeli friends and ask them what’s really going on over here.”

Berkey put it this way: While zipping up his backpack as the plane touched down at Ben-Gurion International Airport: “I’ve always identified Jewishly, but this is my chance to find out what that really means.”

Marshak discovered one thing it really means when her group arrived at Israel’s national cemetery on Jerusalem’s Mount. Herzl. “I wasn’t really expecting much,” she says. “But we saw a bunch of soldiers mourning over one grave, and everyone in my group just stopped and mourned with them, staying for the prayer. It really felt like one of us had died.

“I know I’ll always remember that moment—the sense of unity that I never expected and never felt before,” she adds. “You never know how things will affect or change you. But I guess after this, I’m feeling more open to new experiences shaping me and my understanding of things.”

Originally Published by JNS on June 8, 2021

Summer 2021 Birthright Israel Participants

Life-Changing Testimonials from Accessibility Participants “Some of the best moments on the trip were the unplanned moments, like hilarious dance parties on the bus or impromptu conversations about having a relationship when disabled.

There was never a dull moment on this trip. I feel like I gained a new community of people who truly understand me, and I hope these friendships will last a lifetime.”

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Naomi Hess, 2019 Alumna

“On No Limits, I met people on my intellectual level, which allowed me to build deep bonds with all 12 group members on the trip as well as the staff. Our Tour Educator, Omar Tzur, was a core part of our community. His father is a wheelchair user as he was wounded in the Yom Kippur War. Omar brought us to his family home to meet his father and learn about what it is FOUNDATION like to be disabled in Israel. It was also very special to have the opportunity to interact with Israeli military personnel who have BIRTHRIGHT ISRAEL GAVE US AN OPPORTUNITY disabilities.”

BIRTHRIGHT ISRAEL

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WE NORMALLY WOULD NOT HAVE

Aaron Kaufman, 2015 Alumnus THE PEERLESS FAMILY

The Peerless family lives in Beachwood, Ohio in a Modern Orthodox Jewish community. Each year, teens and young adults from the Beachwood community embark on trips to Israel with their peers.

When Sharon Peerless learned about the Birthright Israel Yachad trip – where young Jewish adults with disabilities travel to Israel with their peers in a supportive environment to meet individual needs – she felt confident this would be a good program for her children. Ronit and Ben, two of the family’s three children, have been active with Yachad for years.

Ronit participated in the Birthright Israel Yachad trip in May 2019 and Ben was so inspired by Ronit’s positive experience, that he joined the Birthright Israel Yachad trip in December 2019. As they discovered Israel and grew their Jewish identities with their peers, Ronit and Ben each reached a modern Jewish rite of passage as they claimed their birthright just like their friends and classmates from home.

“I had my Bar Mitzvah in Israel, but I was much younger then and I didn’t appreciate Judaism as much as I do now. I saw my friends going on trips to Israel and I always wanted to go back.

Even though we looked into other trips to Israel, Birthright Israel was the first one that was the right fit for me.”

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Ben Peerless, 2019 Alumnus

“I was nervous about being the only person with Autism going to the Holy Land with a bunch of others. But as soon as we were off the plane, each person opened up and we got to know each other’s history. When we met our Israeli peers, we quickly found that we had a lot in common. We shared the same Jewish holidays and culture, but at the same time the Israeli way of life is different than ours as Americans. We gained a deep respect for their culture as we learned more and they gave their personal perspectives as we toured Jerusalem.”

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Billy Steinberg, 2018 Alumnus

“I went on the airplane with 15 complete strangers, and when I left Israel, I had 15 new family members. This unique Birthright Israel trip afforded the seven of us an opportunity rarely presented to people with physical disabilities. When we first met, I distinctly remember one among us, who looked completely uninterested in going on the trip, with eyes shut, head down, and no smile or look of any anticipation when we left New York. At the end of the trip, this person’s entire face was shining and had a smile from ear to ear. Words could not describe the experience any better. The same could be said for all of us.”

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Avery Schaefer, 2019 Alumnus “As a special needs mom, it is hard to convey to others how special it is that Jonah has been able to do so many of the things that his peers are doing. When I met him at the airport after he landed at JFK and I saw the expression on his face as he embraced the Birthright Israel participants one by one, it was clear just how happy (and proud of himself) he was.”

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Stacey Geer, Birthright Israel Accessibility Parent

Life-Changing Testimonials from Boca Raton and Delray Alumni “Birthright Israel helped me understand myself and showed me I could accomplish anything that I can set my mind to. It allowed me to explore my identity and understand myself more since I’ve been home especially since the pandemic began...

It has also made me more involved in my community, allowing me to connect more with my temple and those in need in my community after visiting Sderot and seeing what life was like there.”

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Matthew Labkovski, 2019 Alumnus

“I grew up learning Hebrew and studying ancient Israel, but I was never overtly exposed to the country’s progressive, exciting, and cool aspects until Birthright Israel. This was tremendously impactful for me in making the country and the people relevant to my life. Similarly, this experiential approach is what made Israel, and subsequently Judaism, relatable to everyone on our bus regardless of where they were on their personal and Jewish journeys.”

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Marisa Obuchowski, 2011 Alumna

“Birthright was the first meaningful opportunity that I got to actually see the country, at an age where I could truly appreciate the experience. I had never gotten to see Tzfat, or visit the Golan Heights, or hike Masada— at least not that I could remember anyway — until this trip. Birthright Israel gave me these unforgettable adventures, along with the context to appreciate the significance of the places we visited, that I would not have gotten on a family trip.”

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Netalia Shapse Little, 2009 Alumna

What Boca Raton and Delray Supporters Say About Birthright Israel “The mission of Birthright Israel is that it is a birthright. It doesn’t say, “Not if you have special needs.” It was important to us, not to just be a supporter of Birthright Israel but to be a supporter in a more meaningful way; that meant a lot for us and what we knew it would mean to the special needs community.”

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Lynne Halpern

“I have sat in on many live and now virtual stories from the young Jewish adults that participated in Birthright Israel. They each came back passionate about their visits – both culturally and socially. Some of them came from areas with very few Jewish families and created new bonds with fellow Jews. Others were enlightened by the history of the country and the lives of the citizens of Israel.”

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Harriet Levine “At Ben-Gurion Airport, we watched Birthrighters leaving Israel for “home”; gathered together exchanging contact information, hugging each other, not wanting to leave, tears of excitement. Their energy was contagious! Birthright Israel makes it possible for our children to have an exceptional educational, cultural, and motivational experience that they will never forget.”

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Meryl Gallatin

“Birthright Israel provides a unique opportunity for young Jews to understand their heritage through a firsthand experience in Israel. Plus, there is no better way to travel to Israel than on Birthright! More so, it is the responsibility of those of us who can support Birthright Israel in any way possible to pay it forward both emotionally and financially.”

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Rosalyn August “We consider it an honor to support Birthright Israel Foundation. The program is the best pluralistic Israel experience a young adult can immerse themselves in! We believe strongly in the support and continued success of this imperative peer-related experience. We hope others will join us and support the program – it’s a minimal investment with a maximum impact.”

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Etta & Raymond Zimmerman

Thank you to our South Palm Beach community!

BIRTHRIGHT ISRAEL

FOUNDATION