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HERZLIYAN 2022

D R E A M

C O M E

T R U E

CONTENTS

Israel’s first private university

Prof. Rafi Melnick appointed President

13 Prof. Varda Liberman appointed Provost

Reichman’s next challenge – Israel’s first private medical school

Reichman University confers Honorary Doctorates

Managing Editors: Anna Menzies Hecht / anna.menzies@idc.ac.il Tamara Mizroch / tamara.mizroch@idc.ac.il Copy Editor: Miriam Bulwar David-Hay / miriambdh@gmail.com Contributing Writer: Ariel Rodal-Spieler / arielrodal@gmail.com Graphic Designer: Guy Tamir / guy@2plustudio.com Production Assistant: Natalie Gluck Photographers: Cover pic: Yehoshua Yosef Inside pages: Adi Cohen Tzedek, Eyal Gaziel, Rami Sinai, Ofer Amram, Alon Gilboa, Oren Shalev, Eli Dassa, Omer Mizrachi, Ronen Topelberg, Kfir Bolotin, Herschel Gutman, Gilad Kavalerchik, Amir Geron, Gadi Dagon, Sigal Blayer-Gat, Aviv Gottlieb, Yehoshua Yosef, Peter Halmagyi

Twice the joy at double graduation ceremonies

Israel Friends of Reichman University

102

Reichman University major building projects

Raphael Recanati International School

Sammy Ofer School of Communications

School of Sustainability

50 Dr. Miriam and Sheldon G. Adelson School of Entrepreneurship

Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology

107

Efi Arazi School of Computer Science

Ashager Araro: Fighting Anti-Semitism and Advocating for Israel Online

108

Tiomkin School of Economics

Global Engagement at Reichman University

Reichman University welcomes new Deans

Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy

112

American Friends of Reichman University

Arison School of Business

Harry Radzyner Law School

Reichman University supports scholarship students

REICHMAN UNIVERSITY

ISRAEL’S FIRST PRIVATE UNIVERSITY Rarely, perhaps once in a lifetime, do you hear an inner voice saying: ‘Go forth. Go and fulfill a mission.’ A mission that carries risks, but that stems from your inner being, from your past, from what you are. Establishing IDC Herzliya was such a moment for me.” – Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President of Reichman University and Chairman of the Board of Directors 4 | Herzliyan 2022

THE VISION From its inception, IDC Herzliya functioned as a university, Israel’s first private university. However, it took 27 years of struggle, driven by an uncompromising vision, unbending faith, and tireless determination, to receive official recognition. Now the words “Reichman University” hang proudly on the campus gates. Here, Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President and Chairman of the Board of Directors, outlines the long journey he and the institution he founded have taken.

THE SETTING In the early 1990s, I found myself at a crossroads. I had led the Movement for a Constitution in Israel and was completing a successful term as Dean of the law school at Tel Aviv University. At that time, there were only seven universities in Israel, and they were not responsive to the need to expand and open the gates of higher education. Many Israeli students who could afford to do so, were leaving to study abroad. Those who could not afford to study abroad were deprived of the ability to obtain an academic education and were being denied social mobility.

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I had long held a dream to establish a new type of academic institution in Israel, a private university that would train the leaders of tomorrow based on the values of freedom and responsibility. The idea was to create a unique institution whose world view was to make a contribution, and to train the future leadership of Israeli society according to the fundamental values of the State of Israel. This institution would not be subsidized by the government. This would give it freedom to offer a unique learning environment and unique degrees, without having to abide by government restrictions and regulations aimed at limiting its potential to nurture leadership in applicants, whose qualities were demonstrated by their military and community service and ability to rise out of poverty. Being a private university enabled us to develop our own unique criteria for admission, based on the potential of our applicants. The doors of academia had been closed for too long and controlled by too few. I wanted to challenge that. I believed that the time was ripe to establish this private university. Rarely, perhaps once in a lifetime, do you hear an inner voice saying: ‘Go forth. Go and fulfill a mission.’ A mission that carries risks, but that stems from your inner being, from your past, from what you are. Establishing IDC Herzliya was such a moment.

THE WORK BEGINS This new institution was established in Herzliya on the site of a former Israeli Air Force base, dotted with dilapidated old barracks and littered with garbage and overgrown vegetation. I saw beyond the weeds and the neglect when I first visited the site. I told the early visitors that one day the future buildings would be filled with students from all over the world, and that on this former military base, a revolutionary institution like no other would be established.

Prof. Uriel Reichman supervises construction on campus in 1994

During the 1990s, the government was starting to institute reforms that allowed more colleges to award academic degrees. I believed that in the near future we would be allowed to do so too. In May 1994, the Declaration of Inauguration of IDC Herzliya took place, and in October 1994, the school year began. I held all the positions: I was the President, the Rector, the Dean of the law school, and, to a very large extent, also the janitor. The construction of the campus around the barracks gave the place its unique character. In 1998, Israel’s Council for Higher Education finally announced that IDC Herzliya would be able to award academic degrees. Our first law students, several hundred in number, now knew that upon completion of their studies they would be awarded a degree. It was a very emotional moment. They had put their trust in me and supported our efforts to move the Israel Council of Higher Education to finally approve our authority to grant academic degrees. I was happy and proud that I could have fought the right for them to earn the degrees that they deserved.

The dilapidated former barracks at the old Israeli Air Force base

TOWARDS A NEW ISRAELI ACADEMY The first school to be established, in 1994, was the Harry Radzyner School of Law, named after Dr. Harry L. Radzyner z”l, IDC Herzliya’s first benefactor. Today there are nine academic faculties, as well as the Raphael Recanati International School, which enables 2,000 of our 8,000 students to study in English. IDC Herzliya was a novelty in Israel. A private institution that did not and does not receive government funding and that was funded exclusively by tuition fees and donations from friends who shared our vision. Our institution is a not for profit, public benefit corporation, able to enjoy academic and administrative freedom alongside academic excellence and innovation. This has included introducing new academic disciplines altogether. In 2014, the Adelson School of Entrepreneurship was established, the first of its kind in Israel and one of the first in the world to develop a degree program in entrepreneurship, providing young businesspeople with the knowledge and tools to realize their ideas. The school has already made a significant contribution to entrenching Israel’s status as the “StartUp Nation,” with alumni having established more than 400 social and business ventures in various fields, and having created more than 6,000 jobs. Thirteen companies founded by our graduates have made it into the exclusive club of “unicorns” – private start-up companies valued at over $1 billion. Similarly, our groundbreaking Zell Entrepreneurship Program has inspired similar programs at leading institutions around the world.

Another unique expression of Reichman University’s academic success is the Argov Fellows Program in Leadership and Diplomacy, which continues the legacy of former Ambassador Shlomo Argov z”l. The program provides talented students with knowledge and tools for the world of diplomacy, and is designed to prepare them to represent the interests of Israel and the Jewish people internationally. At Reichman University, each academic school has redefined its field. The Sammy Ofer School of Communications includes technology and human computer interaction in its studies. The School of Sustainability addresses not only water, energy, pollution and food challenges, but also the issue of urbanization. The Harry Radzyner Law School analyzes the impact of the latest technological developments and designs regulatory solutions to deal with future realities. The Arison School of Business and the Tiomkin School of Economics embrace the use of big data, and the Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology engages with advanced brain research labs. The Efi Arazi School of Computer Science deals with bioinformatics, computer vision, cyber, and artificial intelligence. The Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy prepares its students for leadership positions in government and society to tackle the challenges of an ever more complex world and its unique M.A. in Counter-Terrorism and Homeland Security combines academic study, simulations and workshops which offer special tools for critical thinking in this field. The Raphael Recanati International School, with over 2,000 international students, is the largest school in Israel offering degrees taught entirely in English.

The doors of academia had been closed for too long and controlled by too few. I wanted to challenge that. I believed that the time was ripe to establish this private university.” 8 | Herzliyan 2022

Prof. Uriel Reichman chats with students on campus

GAINING ACCREDITATION AS A UNIVERSITY From the beginning, IDC Herzliya functioned as a university. However, it had to fight. First to be permitted to award bachelor’s degrees, then master’s degrees, and, finally, a grueling, decade-long battle to obtain approval to confer doctorates and receive official recognition as Israel’s first private university. It is a struggle that in total took 27 years because of the opposition of public universities and the bureaucracy of the Council for Higher Education. Many people did not take the idea of a private university seriously and did not necessarily want it to succeed. Finally, in March 2018, the Council for Higher Education allowed IDC Herzliya to award doctorates in law. More recently, we have also been accredited to offer doctorates in computer sciences and in psychology. Then, in June 2021, my ultimate goal was reached, when a committee of experts appointed by the Council for Higher Education issued their report announcing their decision to recognize IDC Herzliya as a university.

CULTIVATING LEADERSHIP AND EXCELLENCE At Reichman University, the commitment to cultivating future leaders is not just a slogan. It is manifested in practical terms in the university’s special admission policy, which is based on personal excellence and leadership in military or in civilian life. The university values those who have made outstanding achievements in business, the arts or sports, as well as in volunteerism and contribution to the community. Reichman University was the first to recognize active military reserve service as equivalent to social volunteer work granting academic credits, and the first to establish a leadership program for members of the Ethiopian community – the Israel at Heart program. It has welcomed meritorious students from disadvantaged economic backgrounds, raised money for scholarships for African asylum seekers, and supported students with potential through its dedicated system of donations and scholarships. The Keren Or (“Ray of Light”) program provides opportunities for highly motivated candidates with the potential for academic success who were denied admission to the public universities since they refused to consider their achievements measured against their disadvantaged backgrounds. In recent years, Reichman University has raised over $8 million per year in financial aid for its students from Reichman University Friends Associations around the world. Despite not receiving any kind of state funding, the university provides more student scholarships than any other Israeli academic institution relative to its size and budget.

Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau, then Israel’s Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi, hangs a mezuzah on the doorpost of the campus library in 1994, watched by (from left) Prof. Uriel Reichman, then Israeli President Ezer Weizman z”l, and then Herzliya Mayor Eli Landau z”l

THE NEW INTERDISCIPLINARITY In recent years, the institution has been promoting the “new interdisciplinarity” – research and learning that integrate the fields of technology, computer science, neuroscience and biology into the social sciences. Based on this concept, the unique Reichman University Innovation Center has been established on campus, the first of its kind in Israel. The center brings leading researchers and experts from diverse fields together under one roof, in a shared space for research and learning, creating fertile ground for unique creativity. Its purpose is to initiate integrated research in response to social and economic challenges, and to work in collaboration with industry and partners in applied ventures, the government and the public sector. Laboratories from the various schools at the university will collaborate under the auspices of the Innovation Center, and together advance cutting-edge, multidisciplinary research. The center will be housed in the Drahi Innovation Building, thanks to the support of the Patrick and Lina Drahi Foundation and businessman Joey Low.

COMING FULL CIRCLE After the Council for Higher Education announced its decision to officially recognize IDC Herzliya as a university, I announced that I would be stepping down from the presidency, although I will continue to remain closely involved with the university I founded and will remain pro bono Chairman of the Board of Directors. With the end of my tenure as President, things have come full circle. The name recognizes my life’s work to establish the institution and bring it to the forefront of Israeli academia. The realization of my vision was met with extremely difficult challenges throughout the entire journey. There were moments when I felt that all of Israel’s bureaucrats and legal advisers had it in for us. The road was tough, yet we were able to stand up and meet the challenges, thanks to the support of our first students, who took part in the fight and placed their trust in us, and to the first group of professors and lecturers, who believed in the vision, gave up tenure at other universities, and joined the pioneering effort that changed the face of higher education in Israel. Together with them stood our friends, who backed and supported us, even in the most difficult moments. May the ability to dream and to realize those dreams, while remaining loyal to our values, chart Reichman University’s path into the future.

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Prof. Uriel Reichman addresses the class of 2019 graduation ceremony

It is a project that will require approvals from the Council for Higher Education and the Ministry of Health.

PROF. URIEL REICHMAN’S NEXT CHALLENGE – ISRAEL’S FIRST PRIVATE MEDICAL SCHOOL Similar to the way Prof. Uriel Reichman transformed the study of law in Israel in the 1990s, his new dream is to do so with the study of medicine. Israelis for many years have been moving abroad to study medicine due to a lack of places in Israel’s six medical schools (all in public universities). Furthermore, it is predicted Israel will soon face a severe shortage of licensed doctors. Reichman is planning to establish Israel’s first private medical school at Reichman University together with the Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer and has been holding meetings to promote the initiative and recruit donors. “We are working hard to raise money from civil society, from the private sector and from donors,” he explains.

“Until the 1990s, there was a tremendous shortage of spots for law school and the gates of higher education were nearly closed to hundreds of thousands of people who wanted to study but weren’t able to,” Reichman explains. “We breached these gates and the problem was solved. Today there is a similar situation with medical schools, which is hard for me to accept. I find it absurd that a country like Israel, which has such a high level of medicine, is unable to produce enough doctors.” There is an extremely high rate of Israeli doctors who move abroad for their medical studies (around 60 percent) and with many of these students remaining there or moving elsewhere, it can be a real long term loss for Israel. Furthermore, it is not always guaranteed that students who study at these foreign universities can then take the Israeli medical licensing exams. A dramatic drop in the number of newly licensed doctors is expected in the coming years, a situation that requires a rapid increase in the number of new medical students in Israel and in new medical schools being approved. The anticipated doctor shortage will directly impact the challenges of the health system and its ability to care for the population. Reichman says his intention is to do for this future medical school what he once did for the Radzyner School of Law and is ready for the challenge.

Prof. Rafi Melnick

PROF. RAFI MELNICK APPOINTED PRESIDENT Prof. Rafi Melnick has been appointed President of Reichman University, replacing Founding President Prof. Uriel Reichman, who announced in September that he was stepping down from the position after the Israeli Council for Higher Education officially recognized the institution he founded as a university – the first private university in Israel – and the Board of Directors decided to change its name to Reichman University. The appointment of Melnick, previously the university’s Provost, as President was approved by the Board of Directors and by the General Assembly of Reichman University. Reichman welcomed the appointment, saying, “Prof. Melnick has been a partner in leading this university for many years. His agreement to serve as President gives me confidence that our university will continue to fulfill its values and make significant academic and human achievements. Prof. Melnick is an integral part of this university, and as Provost has led it through considerable changes over the past few years.”

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In response, Melnick said, “Reichman University has been my academic home for many years. I have the honor and gratification of being a veteran faculty member here, and over the years I have witnessed closely and taken part in the growth of the institution and its many achievements, both academically and in its contribution to Israeli academia. It is a great privilege to step into the tremendous shoes of Prof. Uriel Reichman, my teacher and friend, a remarkable entrepreneur and a man of unparalleled vision.” Melnick is an expert in Israeli economics, with a large body of research and publications to his name. He holds a B.A. in Economics and Statistics and an M.A. in Economics from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley. He joined Reichman University as a permanent faculty member in 1998, and as well as serving two separate terms as Provost, founded the Tiomkin School of Economics and has served as the Dean of the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy. He has also been a senior researcher and lecturer in the fields of economics and government, and regularly publishes the Melnick Index, which analyzes levels of activity and economic shifts in Israel in real time.

PROF. VARDA LIBERMAN APPOINTED PROVOST Prof. Varda Liberman has been named Provost of Reichman University, replacing Prof. Rafi Melnick, who has become the university’s President following the decision of Founding President Prof. Uriel Reichman to step down. Liberman was unanimously elected as Provost by the university’s Higher Academic Committee and her appointment was approved by the university’s Board of Directors.

Liberman has held a variety of managerial and leadership positions. Among others, she established and headed the mathematics and statistics curricula and teaching in all schools at Reichman University. She also initiated, built, and leads the prestigious and unique MBA in Healthcare Innovation program conducted in collaboration with Israel’s largest hospital, the Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer.

Liberman, one of the founders of Reichman University, holds a Ph.D. in mathematics from Tel Aviv University. Her research deals with probabilistic judgment and decisionmaking under uncertainty, in which she collaborates with the leading researchers in the field. She is the author of several textbooks, and a co-author of the book “Critical Thinking.” She has also won several teaching and research awards. As a renowned researcher in the field, she provides expert consultations, and delivers lectures and workshops to management at leading Israeli businesses and organizations in a wide range of areas, including the legal system, the health system, the IDF, high-tech companies, banks, investment houses, and startups.

Melnick welcomed Liberman’s appointment, saying, “I am excited to congratulate Prof. Varda Liberman, on behalf of myself and on behalf of the faculty and the students, on her appointment as Provost of Reichman University, and wish her much success in her new role. I am convinced that thanks to her extensive experience in academia, and her own special way, she will contribute greatly to Reichman University and to its entrenchment as a top academic institution in Israel and around the world.”

Prof. Varda Liberman

Prof. Uriel Reichman with former Israeli President Reuven Rivlin

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REICHMAN UNIVERSITY CONFERS HONORARY DOCTORATES Reichman University has awarded Honorary Doctorates to seven distinguished individuals whose life’s work reflects Zionist values, entrepreneurship, and social responsibility, and who have made important contributions to Israel, the Jewish people, and the university. The degrees were presented at a festive ceremony to: former Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, philanthropist Dr. Miriam Adelson, Sheba Medical Center Director Prof. Brig. Gen. (res.) Yitshak Kreiss, business pioneer Dita Bronicki, Brig. Gen. (res.) Hasson Hasson, marketing expert and one of the founders of the university Prof. Jerry (Yoram) Wind, and investor and philanthropist Joey Low. The degrees were conferred by Prof. Uriel Reichman, the university’s Founding President and Chairman of the Board of Directors, together with Reichman University Chancellor Oudi Recanati. Delivering the opening remarks at the ceremony, Reichman said, “On this occasion, which marks achievement and fulfillment, I would like to say that each and every one of you, the recipients of this honorary degree, has made a unique contribution to this institution at important and meaningful moments in its development. On a personal note, I will be finishing my tenure as president with a feeling of satisfaction. We are proud of the leadership that has grown here and which will continue to grow.”

The Honorary Doctorate recipients and Reichman University faculty after the presentation ceremony. Back row, from left: Dr. Amit Lavie-Dinur, Prof. Zvi Eckstein, Prof. Arik Shamir, Dr. Adi Koll, Prof. Rafi Melnick, Prof. Yoav Yair, Prof. Dov Pekelman, Prof. Daniel Levy, Prof. Amnon Lehavi, Prof. Assaf Moghadam, Prof. Yair Tauman, Jonathan Davis Front row, from left: Joey Low, Prof. Jerry (Yoram) Wind, Dr. Miriam Adelson, Prof. Uriel Reichman, Reuven Rivlin, Oudi Recanati, Dita Bronicki, Prof. Brig. Gen. (res.) Yitshak Kreiss, Brig. Gen. (res.) Hasson Hasson

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Each and every one of you, the recipients of this honorary degree, has made a unique contribution to this institution at important and meaningful moments in its development.” – Prof. Uriel Reichman 17

At the presentation ceremony. Back row, from left: Prof. Rafi Melnick, Prof. Amnon Lehavi, Prof. Dov Pekelman, Prof. Arik Shamir, Prof. Assaf Moghadam, Dr. Amit Lavie-Dinur, Prof. Daniel Levy, Prof. Zvi Eckstein, Prof. Yoav Yair, Prof. Yair Tauman, Dr. Adi Koll. Front row, from left: Jonathan Davis, Oudi Recanati, Reuven Rivlin, Dr. Miriam Adelson, Dita Bronicki, Brig. Gen. (res.) Yitshak Kreiss, Joey Low, Brig. Gen. (res.) Hasson Hasson, Prof. Jerry (Yoram) Wind

Addressing Rivlin, who had just completed his term as President, Reichman said, “You have repeatedly demonstrated your absolute commitment to the state and the people of Israel, without any personal considerations, and have served as a unifying beacon, a symbol of Israeli togetherness, in times that have been especially difficult and challenging for Israeli society. In your modest and compassionate manner, more than any public figure in Israel, you have represented the Zionist mission and the continued commitment to walking in the path of Israel’s founding fathers in the fight for unity.” Reichman also addressed Low, who founded Reichman University’s Israel at Heart Fellows Program, which provides full scholarships to young Israelis of Ethiopian descent, as well as a scholarship program for refugees and asylum seekers. “Joey is a true personal friend. He is always suggesting ways he can contribute to advancing the university. The graduates of his scholarship programs have had incredible successes – they are diplomats, Rhodes scholars … and their successes are Joey’s successes too,” he said.

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Rivlin gave a speech in which he discussed the rifts between Arab and Jewish citizens in Israel and the importance of cooperation between the different sectors of Israeli society. “This cooperation is the backbone of our social, economic and moral resilience. We have to work together to build our national and sovereign life, as a Jewish and democratic state,” he said. Adelson, whose husband Sheldon Adelson z”l had recently passed away, also spoke at the ceremony. “I am thankful for the honor to stand here today. This is very meaningful for me, just as it was for Sheldon when he received an honorary degree here two years ago,” she said. “We have been at IDC Herzliya’s side since the early days, when there were only a few dozen faculty members, and today to see the vibrant and diverse campus fills me with pride. The fact that today IDC Herzliya is today giving out academic degrees is not something to take for granted. I wish you many more years of wonderful endeavors here, and I intend to stay as involved as ever.”

The honorary doctorate was awarded to Kreiss in recognition of his contribution to the Israeli public health system. In 2016, Kreiss was appointed as director of Sheba Medical Center. Under his leadership, Sheba was named one of the best hospitals in the world for three years in a row. When the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, Sheba spearheaded Israel’s battle against the virus.

Wind, a world-renowned expert on management and marketing, established the Executive MBA program at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He played a major role in shaping Reichman University’s vision, goals and educational philosophy, and served as chairman of its International Advisory Board and Higher Academic Committee.

Bronicki received the award for being a pioneer and role model for women executives in Israeli industry. She and her partner, Yehuda, are behind the success story of the Ormat Group, a world leader in the field of renewable energy.

Upon receiving his scroll, Wind summed up his feelings, saying: “What an accomplishment. For IDC to award honorary doctorates only 27 years after its establishment is an amazing achievement. It took Harvard 127 years to do that. I feel privileged to be associated with this amazing university from its inception. IDC symbolizes the best in leadership. It succeeded in promoting its values of freedom and responsibility, coupled with the value of Zionism. And it has proven that a relentless focus on the learner is a successful and viable strategy. This place is a role model for innovation and agility.”

Hasson was awarded the honorary degree in recognition of his immeasurable contribution to Israel’s security, most of which remains top secret. Hasson was military secretary to President Shimon Peres, and later to President Rivlin. Reichman said that Hasson “embodies the strong alliance between the Druze community and the State of Israel.”

Reuven Rivlin (center) receives his Honorary Doctorate from Prof. Uriel Reichman and Oudi Recanati

Dr. Miriam Adelson

TWICE THE JOY

AT DOUBLE GRADUATION CEREMONIES

We now belong to the group of universities of Israel. We will compete with them and collaborate with them to promote research, novel approaches, and new horizons for the future leadership of the country.” – Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President of Reichman University and Chairman of the Board of Directors

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Jonathan Davis, Head of the Raphael Recanati International School and Vice President of External Relations, Prof. Uriel Reichman, Dr. Ayelet Ben-Ezer, and Prof. Rafi Melnick gather for the graduation ceremony

The pandemic has caused many disruptions over the past two years, not least to major events usually attended by thousands. As a result, for the first time in Reichman University’s history, the graduation ceremonies for two cohorts of students were held in the same month, making for twice the festivity. First, about 2,100 graduates from the class of 2019 received their degrees at a long-delayed ceremony, followed the next week by the graduation ceremony for about 2,600 students from the class of 2020. At each ceremony, the graduates marched together in a festive procession, dressed in the customary caps and gowns in the colors of their fields of study. The procession was led by the Deans and faculty members, headed by Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President of Reichman University and Chairman of the Board of Directors; Prof. Rafi Melnick, President of the university, and Dr. Ayelet Ben-Ezer, CEO and Vice President. Herzliya Mayor Moshe Fadlon was also present. Student Kelly Odes was the valedictorian at the 2019 ceremony and Ricci Cohen, the former chairperson of the Student Union, spoke at the 2020 ceremony. Addressing the graduates, Reichman said: “Twentyseven years ago, I set out to establish a university with a different mission than that of Israeli academia at the time. I saw the education and training of Israel’s future leadership as my principal commitment. In a world that was changing at a tremendously rapid rate, I thought it was essential to provide students with the most up-tothe-minute tools so that they could not only integrate into the workforce but be leaders. Today it is clear that academically speaking, quality is what matters, and freedom is now also given to institutions that were not established by the government and are not funded by it. We now belong to the group of universities of Israel. We will compete with them and collaborate with them to promote research, novel approaches, and new horizons for the future leadership of the country.”

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Jonathan Davis addresses students and parents at the RRIS class of 2020 graduation event

Mayor Moshe Fadlon, Prof. Uriel Reichman and Prof. Rafi Melnick lead the traditional march to the graduation grandstands

Kelly Odes with Prof. Uriel Reichman after her speech at the 2019 graduation ceremony

Kelly Odes, RRIS student and valedictorian of the class of 2019, grew up in Johannesburg, South Africa. After making aliyah, she studied at Reichman University’s Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy. She participated in the Argov Fellowship in Leadership and Diplomacy and represented Israel at the United Nations in the Young Ambassadors Program. She has since become the Spokesperson for International Media in the IDF and has been awarded with an outstanding achievement award by the Operations Division Commander for her work.

Jonathan Davis (third from left), Israel at Heart program coordinator Ester David (fourth from left) and Prof. Uriel Reichman (fifth from left) with Israel at Heart students (from left) Shiran Gedamo, Asaf Tesemta, Tsion Derbao, Meron Asafao, Michal Ben Gama, and Galit Tzvi, Deputy Dean of Students, at the class of 2019 graduation event 23

REICHMAN UNIVERSITY MAJOR BUILDING PROJECTS THE DANIEL JUSIDMAN INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE HALL Thanks to the generous support of the Jusidman Foundation, the new Daniel Jusidman International Conference Hall at Reichman University will be a major focal point on campus and is due for completion in 2023. This significant and stately venue will become the permanent home to Reichman University’s two major annual conferences – the Herzliya Conference, Israel’s foremost global policy gathering, run by the Institute for Policy and Strategy, and the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism’s World Summit, the largest and most influential meeting on terrorism and counter-terrorism in Israel.

Daniel Jusidman 24 | Herzliyan 2022

Shari Arison

SHARI’S PLACE STUDENT DORMITORIES Generously supported by the Ted Arison Family Foundation, the Shari’s Place student dormitories have been completed and are already home to hundreds of students. The dormitories are named after businesswoman and philanthropist Shari Arison, a strong supporter of the vision of Reichman University since its inception.

Patrick Drahi

DRAHI INNOVATION BUILDING

Angelina Drahi, Chairwoman of the Patrick and Lina Drahi Foundation

Thanks to the generous support of the Patrick and Lina Drahi Foundation the Drahi Innovation Building will be home to Reichman University’s Innovation Center. Construction is well underway with the official opening slated for December 2022. This building was also made possible by businessman Joey Low.

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Joey Low

RONSON DORMITORY BUILDING Thanks to the generous support of The Gerald and Gail Ronson Family Foundation the new Ronson Dormitory Building caters for shared living arrangements (as opposed to single occupancy like our other dorms) and is due for completion in 2023.

Gerald and Gail Ronson

The West Campus Dormitory (Building A) will be built here

REICHMAN UNIVERSITY WELCOMES NEW DEANS The 2021-2022 academic year started with six new Deans at Reichman University. As for the outgoing Deans, most remain with the university, taking on new roles or continuing as lecturers and supervisors to students.

Prof. Anat Brunstein Klomek Dean, Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology Prof. Anat Brunstein Klomek is a clinical psychologist and supervisor in cognitive-behavioral therapy and interpersonal psychotherapy. She joined Reichman University in 2009, and has served as the head of the clinical psychology program since 2018. Prof. Brunstein Klomek completed her postdoctoral fellowship in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at Columbia University in New York and completed her clinical specialization in the Department of Psychological Medicine at the Schneider Children’s Medical Center. She serves as a scientific consultant to the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Health in the framework of the National Suicide Prevention Program. Prof. Brunstein Klomek’s main areas of research include depression, suicide, bullying and cyberbullying, interpersonal psychotherapy, learning disabilities including ADHD, and eating disorders. Prof. Daniel Levy served as Dean from 2019-2021. His research and expertise includes understanding the core processes and brain systems that comprise human memory, and developing applications in the field of learning and memory based on insights and innovations in neuroscientific research. He continues to lecture and supervise Ph.D. students at the school.

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Dr. Yossi Maaravi Dean, Adelson School of Entrepreneurship Dr. Yossi Maaravi joined Reichman University in 2009, and until recently served as Vice Dean of the Adelson School of Entrepreneurship. He obtained his B.A. in Psychology with distinctions from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, where he was part of the Amirim Honors Program for outstanding students. He completed his Ph.D. in Business Administration in the direct program for excellent Ph.D. students at Tel Aviv University. His research focuses on behavioral decision-making, negotiation, creativity, and innovation. He is the author of two children’s books and a book on negotiation, “You Deserve Better: Success in real life negotiations”. Dr. Maaravi has extensive experience in entrepreneurship and management, both as an entrepreneur and as a consultant to leading Israeli companies. Prof. Yair Tauman is the Founding Dean of the Adelson School of Entrepreneurship and served as Dean from 2016-2021. His areas of research include game theory, imperfect competition, auctions, patents, the value of information in strategic conflict, and bargaining. Since 2009, he has served as the academic director of the Zell Entrepreneurship Program and will now serve as Vice Dean of the Adelson School of Entrepreneurship.

Prof. Yacov Hel-Or

Prof. Lior Zemer

Dean, Efi Arazi School of Computer Science

Dean, Harry Radzyner Law School

Prof. Yacov Hel-Or joined Reichman University in 1998. Prof. Hel-Or completed a bachelor’s degree in physics and computer science and a Ph.D. in computer science from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He completed his postdoctoral work at the Weizmann Institute and NASA in the United States, where he concurrently worked in the computer vision group at Stanford University. He has served as a scientific consultant and visiting scientist at HP, a consultant and visiting scientist at Google, and a senior scientist at Amazon, where he worked on the AmazonGo project. His research interests are deep learning in the contexts of computer vision and image processing. Prof. Ariel Shamir served as Dean from 2017-2021 and joined Reichman University in 2000. His areas of research include computer graphics, image and video processing, geometric sampling, and automated learning. He continues to lecture and supervise Ph.D. students at the school.

Prof. Niron Hashai Dean, Arison School of Business Prof. Niron Hashai joined Reichman University in 2017 and holds a B.Sc. in computer science from the Technion and an MBA and Ph.D. from Tel Aviv University. Prior to joining Reichman University, Prof. Hashai served as a faculty member at the school of Business Administration at the Hebrew University, including as Deputy Dean and head of the Asper Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, and held the Albertson-Waltuch Chair in Business Administration. Prof. Hashai was one of the founders of the Hebrew University’s Entrepreneurship Center in 2015. His areas of research include theory of the multinational corporation, technological innovation, diversification, and growth patterns of high-tech companies. He also serves as head of the MBA programs. Prof. Dov Pekelman served as Dean from 2016-2021. His areas of expertise include business administration, control theory, marketing and management.

Until recently, Prof. Lior Zemer served as the school’s Deputy Dean and as head of the M.A. in Law, Technology and Business Innovation (a position he still holds). Prof. Zemer holds a Ph.D. from York University in Toronto, Canada, and completed a Master of Studies (MSt) at Oxford University and a Master of Laws (LL.M.) from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Prof. Zemer’s areas of expertise include intellectual property law, law and technology, jurisprudence, EU law, and comparative law. His book The Idea of Authorship in Copyright was published in 2007. Prior to joining legal academia, he served as the assistant lawyer to Judge J.D. Cooke at the European Court of First Instance and Judge S. von Bahr at the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg. Prof. Amnon Lehavi served as Dean from 2016-2021. Prof. Lehavi is the academic director of the Gazit-Globe Real Estate Institute, which has been operating at Reichman University since 2011. Prof. Lehavi’s areas of expertise include theories of private law, property law, planning and construction law, international economic law, and local government law. He continues to lecture and supervise Ph.D. students at the school.

Dr. Amit Lavie-Dinur Dean, Sammy Ofer School of Communications Dr. Amit Lavie-Dinur received her master’s from NYU and Ph.D. from the Hebrew University. She has published a book, “Privacy and Fame: How we Expose Ourselves Across Media Platforms” and has been a judge for the New Israeli Foundation for Cinema and TV; a board member of the Second Authority for Television and Radio; and co-author of the Ethical Code on Internet Safety for Junior High Students, along with the Ministry of Education. Prof. Noam Lemelstrich Latar is the outgoing and Founding Dean of the Sammy Ofer School of Communications, established in 2006. He is one of the pioneers of the study of new media and interactive media and is now head of the new Innovation Center at Reichman University. 29

Prof. Uriel Reichman (center back, with blue tie) with alumni at a gala in New York City in 2019

It has been an honor to work with Prof. Reichman and watch him build a first-class institution that I am proud to be a part of.” – Leslie Skyba, Executive Director, American Friends

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AMERICAN FRIENDS HONOR PROF. URIEL REICHMAN SUPPORTING THE VISION AND FULFILLING “It has been an honor to work with Prof. Reichman and THE DREAM The American Friends of Reichman University (previously known as the American Friends of IDC Herzliya) has only ever known one President – Prof. Uriel Reichman. Established in 1997 to support the institution in the United States, the organization has had the honor and privilege of working closely with Prof. Reichman from the very beginning to shape and help develop Israel’s first private university. The American Friends recognize his enormous contribution to education and Israeli society and wish him the very best of luck in his role as Chairman of the Board of Directors. Over the years, the American Friends have been honored to build the institution’s name in the United States, helping to bring thousands of students to study at the Raphael Recanati International School and raise millions of dollars for student scholarships, institutes and programs on campus, including Jewish learning initiatives. The Friends have built and maintained an American alumni network numbering in the thousands, which continues to grow and flourish.

watch him build a first-class institution that I am proud to be a part of. I know that this is not the end of our journey together, but a new beginning in the next phase of Reichman University,” American Friends Executive Director Leslie Skyba said in tribute. Prof. Reichman’s visits to the United States over the years have solidified the strong relationship between American donors, supporters, students, alumni and parents, as well as the American Friends Board of Directors. His presence has been a highlight at regular and special events across the United States, including cocktail evenings for donors, alumni and parents, Board meetings, Zell Entrepreneurship Program pitch nights, Argov Fellows study tours, and RRIS information sessions.

American Friends Board Chairman Gil Tenzer said, “On behalf of the entire American Friends Board and donor community, I would like to express our tremendous gratitude to Prof. Reichman for all that he has done to launch and grow the university. As he steps down from his role as the first and only President since the university’s founding, he leaves a solid institution which is continuing to expand with new schools and facilities and with a critical mass of over 7,000 students. We look forward to working with the incoming university President Prof. Rafi Melnick to continue the activities of the American Friends.” 31

Ronald S. Lauder, founder of the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy, Board member of the American Friends, with Prof. Uriel Reichman at the inaugural luncheon in Lauder’s New York City home to launch IDC Herzliya’s U.S. Academic Innovation Tour in 2012

Amb. Dani Dayan, then the Israeli Consul General in New York and now Chairman of the Yad Vashem Holocaust Remembrance Center, presents Prof. Uriel Reichman with an award in honor of IDC Herzliya’s 25th birthday in 2019 Jonathan Davis, Prof. Uriel Reichman, and longtime supporter and American Friends Board member Andrew Taitz at an Act.IL event in Chicago in 2016

American Friends Board member Alberto Vitale and his wife Gioietta Vitale

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Prof. Uriel Reichman, supporter Corinne Arazi, Jonathan Davis, Zell Executive Director Liat Aaronson, American Friends Board member and founder of the Argov Fellows program Gideon Argov, former American Friends Executive Director Felicia Zarai, and American Friends supporter Bill Recker at an American Friends event in New York City in 2011

Throughout the years... Jonathan and Iris Davis with Carol, Julia and Joey Low, American Friends Board member

Prof. Uriel Reichman and Jonathan Davis at the American Friends Board meeting and celebratory event in 2018 Prof. Uriel Reichman with longtime supporter and American Friends Board member Daniel Jusidman at the inaugural luncheon to launch IDC Herzliya's U.S. Academic Innovation Tour in 2012

American Friends Board member Prof. Jerry Wind, Prof. Uriel Reichman, and American Friends Board Chairman Gil Tenzer at Reichman University’s 25th anniversary gala

American Friends Board member Lauren Cramer, Prof. Uriel Reichman, and American Friends supporter Kimberly Cramer at the American Friends Board Meeting and event in 2018 33

Back row, from left: Maayan Schreiber, Itai Nir, Afik Wall, Eshchar Erez Front row standing: Tal Avriel, Tamir Ringel, Omer Levi, Charlotte Hetzler, Paula Giese, Noa Namdar, Danielle Pitkowski, Yali Aviram, Rinat Zilberstain, Neta Ly Niculescu, Doron Horwitz, Dafna Guy, Meitav Marom, Noam Atzmon Seated: Mirel Vansovski, Michal Olmert Naishtein

GLOBAL MBA STUDENTS VISIT NEW YORK CITY American Friends of Reichman University hosted a cocktail hour for MBA and GMBA students visiting New York City on their study tour. Reichman University alumnus and American Friends Board member Eli Elefant provided a beautiful outdoor space overlooking Bryant Park for the event. Although such study tours normally take place annually, this was the first one to take place since the pandemic began. The students were joined by longtime Reichman University supporters for an evening of cocktails and appetizers. The students shared their experiences and the ways in which studying at Reichman University has impacted their lives.

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AMERICAN FRIENDS HOST BRUNCH FOR PARENTS American Friends of Reichman University hosted a brunch for parents in New York City to meet Jonathan Davis, Vice President of External Relations at Reichman University and Head of the Raphael Recanati International School. Over 50 parents attended the gathering, which took place at a Manhattan restaurant that offered stunning views of the One World Trade Center. Worldrenowned chef Patrick Allouache catered the event with his modern French kosher cuisine. With many of the parents unable to visit the campus because of the pandemic, Davis shared an update on the RRIS’s activities and detailed the care being provided to the students in Israel. He also issued a call to action, to assist with much needed scholarship funds for students in need. The campaign among parents is an important part of Reichman University’s fundraising operations in the United States.

DOUBLE THE SUCCESS FOR ALUMNI TWINS ADAM AND CORY ZINKER We are twin brothers from Phoenix, Arizona. We came to Israel and went to Reichman University (then IDC Herzliya) after we finished high school, and loved every bit of it. Studying abroad allowed us to grow as people and, most importantly, to become responsible and independent adults. We both knew that we had to work hard to succeed, and when we graduated, we did not want our connection to Israel to end. Luckily, it did not. A big part of our family is in Israel, as well as the new “family” we gained from Reichman University. While at Reichman University, we discovered that for both of us our passion was entrepreneurship. We saw that our fellow students inadvertently broke their mobile phones quite often, and we decided to learn how to fix them, and we created a thriving business out of this. Our endeavor very quickly became extremely busy. After completing our course and graduating in 2013, all the while fixing phones, it was time to go back to the United States. We left with our remaining inventory of cell phone repair components. Once we were back home, we decided to list the various products for sale on eBay. To our astonishment, we sold out in minutes, and we realized that we were on to something. Over the next 10 years, we expanded from working out of our home to an office to a warehouse, which has since become three warehouses.

We were fortunate to join the growing world of e-commerce early, and over time, we learned what to do and, more importantly, what not to do. Our company, The Perfect Part, now sells a range of items, from electronic devices to mobile phone parts to cosmetics. We send out about 5,000 packages each day to all over the world, including to Reichman University students and alumni, and we have grown to become one of the largest sellers on eBay, even becoming a corporate partner with eBay due to the amount of business we do through it. We have a staff of 22 team members, two managers, and four customer service representatives, and we plan to continue expanding in the future. Each of us has taken on different roles in the company, with Adam running the computer platform while Cory runs the warehouse and oversees the staff. We understood from the start that having different roles would allow us to work together while not stepping on each other’s toes. Being twins has always allowed us to be “in two places at once.” And now it is enabling us to prove that together we can be more than twice as good as the sum of our parts. – Adam and Cory Zinker

Cory and Adam Zinker

Prof. Uriel Reichman at the gala event in 2021

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ISRAEL FRIENDS OF REICHMAN UNIVERSITY TEARS AND MEMORIES AT GALA EVENT AS PROF. URIEL REICHMAN STEPS DOWN FROM PRESIDENCY There was hardly a dry eye in the audience when dignitaries, faculty members, donors, friends, and alumni gathered on campus for a gala event to honor Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President of Reichman University, who was stepping down from the position after leading the institution for almost three decades. Reichman, who will continue his involvement with the university and remain Chairman of the Board of Directors, announced last September that he would leave the post of President after the Israeli Council for Higher Education officially recognized the institution he founded as a university and permitted its name to be changed from the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya to Reichman University. “I have fulfilled the mission I undertook in establishing IDC Herzliya,” Reichman told the many guests who had gathered to thank and farewell him at the event as well as celebrate the institution becoming the first and only private university in Israel.

I have fulfilled the mission I undertook in establishing IDC Herzliya.” – Prof. Uriel Reichman “It is time to say thank you for the opportunity to realize this vision. It is also the moment to announce that I have decided to end my term as President. IDC Herzliya was established as a public benefit corporation. Contrary to what was commonly done, we did not ask for or receive any financial support from the state or its institutions. I worked alongside my friends, as an entrepreneur for the public good, without any expectation of stock options or the right to bequeath. Today, with tears of gratitude in my eyes, I am receiving the noblest and greatest reward and recognition for what has been the achievement of my lifetime. I could not hope for more than this institution being named after me. “IDC Herzliya was established as a Zionist university, hence our educational outlook, which is expressed in the words ‘freedom and responsibility.’ We teach our students to go out into the world with faith in themselves and their friends. To be entrepreneurs and not accept the status quo if they don’t like it. To live a life of meaning and personal fulfillment of their aspirations, while at the same time caring first and foremost for those who cannot help themselves. And to be willing to protect, physically and morally, the state and its values. This is the foundation of principles on which we built our university, and the 35,000 graduates of IDC Herzliya carry these values with them.” Among the dignitaries wishing Reichman well was the President of Israel, Isaac Herzog, who said: “Twentyseven years ago you founded what has become your greatest achievement. You created an institution that has become a role model in its field. Today, IDC Herzliya is an integral part of the academic landscape and of Israeli society as a whole. Israel is deeply ingrained in your soul.

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Prof. Uriel Reichman and Dr. Miriam Adelson

Shari Arison and Liora Ofer, Chairperson of the Friends of Reichman University

“You have devoted all of your energy to thinking about how to make it a better place, how to establish an exemplary society of classical liberal Zionism, that of individual and human rights – no small challenge in our changing world. You have always been a man of vision and action. Your role as president of IDC Herzliya will always be remembered as that of a founding leader, a man to be looked up to, a role model.”

Gili Dinstein and Prof. Uriel Reichman

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett sent his best wishes too, saying: “You took an abandoned military camp and turned it into an empire of education and Zionism. It was a great privilege for me to be the Education Minister and Chairman of the Council for Higher Education who approved IDC Herzliya becoming a university. Today, we have the honor of saying that Reichman University has been established. A university that embodies excellence and values such as giving back to society and supporting the people who contribute to the country. The road has only just begun. I expect the university to thrive, and for you to look happily upon its flourishing and continued growth.” Foreign Minister Yair Lapid also conveyed his congratulations, saying: “Prof. Uriel Reichman created something in this world. There are very few people who create something in this world that leads to real and substantial change. Prof. Reichman did this in higher education, in the way in which we see colleges and soon universities, in the way in which we see the young people of this country and what they want going forward. Prof. Reichman has changed something, and I am sure this is not the last change he is going to create in this world.”

Staci Light Recanati and Reichman University Chancellor Oudi Recanati

Housing Minister Ze’ev Elkin, a former Higher Education Minister and former Chairman of the Council for Higher Education, said: “Prof. Reichman, you made history because you did not give up, because of your determination and excellence. You have done something very honorable for the country. From my acquaintance with the new project you are currently working on, I am sure that not only will you continue to help Reichman University, but that you will also take Israeli academia and innovation to new places in the Middle East. Thank you for everything you have done and for what you will still do.” 39

Dr. Miriam Adelson, who together with her late husband Sheldon Adelson z”l has been a longtime friend and donor to Reichman University, said: “To be here on this beautiful campus with my friends and to celebrate Uriel’s many impressive achievements is to experience the fulfillment of a dream. From Jacob and Joseph in the Bible, to the visionary Zionist Benjamin Zeev Herzl, we Jews have always understood the power of dreaming. To dream is vital in a university like this, where young people shape their minds and character and strive forward. My late husband, Sheldon, was the ultimate dreamer. All the glorious buildings he erected around the world, all the great philanthropic projects, and the diplomatic activity he would engage in, began as dreams he had envisioned. This was the secret of his success as an entrepreneur. ‘Follow your dream’ was Sheldon’s mantra, which he passed on to our children, our family and anyone who asked for his opinion. And that’s why he loved and respected you so much, Uriel. You followed your dreams, and in the same way, you became a leader in Israel, an educator, an inventor and an entrepreneur like no other.”

Dr. Ayelet Ben-Ezer, CEO of Reichman University, said: “Today, we are a private, Zionist, worldwide university, with 10 schools, with groundbreaking studies and thousands of students and graduates integrated into all the key roles in Israeli society. A revolutionary academic institution that is an example and a role model for all institutions of higher education.” Gili Dinstein, CEO of Friends of Reichman University and External Relations Israel, who organized the entire gala, thanked all those who donated to the event and announced that a number of friends and alumni of the university had established a scholarship fund named the Reichman Fund: “Through the fund, the university will be able to award scholarships to needy students in the amount of NIS 4.2 million. I thank each of them from the bottom of my heart for the willingness, mobilization, the kind words they said, and of course for the contribution itself, thanks to which we can enable talented young people who cannot fulfill their dream and study here. A number of graduates from the Zell Entrepreneurship Program also joined this fund, and contributed a total of NIS 100,000.” Alumni from the first cohort to graduates from the university presented speeches and songs, as did Reichman’s grandchildren, in a very moving show.

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To be here on this beautiful campus with my friends and to celebrate Uriel’s many impressive achievements is to experience the fulfillment of a dream.” – Dr. Miriam Adelson

From left: Ronit Reichman Lahat, Arielle Lahat, Yonatan Lahat, and Dan Lahat

Dr. Ayelet Ben-Ezer Housing Minister Ze’ev Elkin

and Prof. Uriel Reichman 41

From left: Gili Dinstein, Ilan Stolman, Prof. Uriel Reichman, and Dr. Ayelet Ben-Ezer during their visit to the UAE

ISRAEL FRIENDS VISIT THE UAE Following the signing of the peace agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, as well as the lifting of pandemic restrictions, a delegation of Israel Friends of Reichman University visited Dubai, led by Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President of the university and Chairman of its Board of Directors. The tour included many exciting and some unique experiences for the 50 participants, who met local personalities, climbed the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building, toured a spice market, and enjoyed a sunset safari into the desert. One of the highlights of the tour was meeting the Israeli Consul General in Dubai, Ilan Stolman, who discussed the UAE’s relations, interests, and hospitality. The group visited the Israeli pavilion at the World Expo in Dubai, together with Josh Bendit, the Israeli pavilion director. Titled “Connecting Minds, Creating the Future,” the fair was being held after being canceled the previous year, and brought together 192 countries, making it the largest World Expo in history. It was the first time the expo was held in the Middle East, as well as the first time that Israel participated in such a large international event in an Arab country. Israel spent some NIS 70 million on its pavilion, in a project led by the Foreign Ministry.

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The delegation was also hosted by the UAE logistics giant DP World, which manages more than 150 ports around the world and was one of the developers of Dubai’s famous Palm Islands project, as well as the Jebel Ali port and commercial hub. Senior UAE education officials, including Dr. Nitesh Sughnani, Director of Higher Education Classification at Dubai’s Knowledge and Human Development Authority, were happy to meet the group and expressed a strong desire for cooperation and student exchanges with Reichman University. Gili Dinstein, CEO of Friends of Reichman University and External Relations Israel, said: “This was truly an extraordinary trip. We had such a good time and have been truly blessed to have such friends, who have stood by our university from day one. They could all travel to Dubai without us, but they chose to travel with us, in addition to making a significant contribution to scholarships for needy students.”

The Israel Friends take in the desert before sunset

ISRAEL FRIENDS HOLD ENCHANTING EVENING WITH PROF. AMIR AMEDI AND LIOR SUCHARD The Israel Friends of Reichman University had the opportunity to meet with famed Israeli mentalist Lior Suchard and renowned brain research scientist Prof. Amir Amedi, founder and Head of Reichman University’s Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition and Technology. Amedi’s pioneering research has led to the creation of a new field of intersensory integration, in which the brain is enabled to use existing abilities to overcome deficiencies. He has published hundreds of articles and won numerous local and international awards, and has been named one of the visionaries in the global Genius 100 Einstein Legacy Project.

After dinner and mingling, Suchard entertained the crowd, correctly guessing the name of the kindergarten teacher of the child of one of the participants. He also stunned the crowd by guessing the time that Reichman had randomly set on his watch, pulling a wall clock out of a large bag showing the same time. Following the entertainment, Amedi spoke to the Israel Friends about his groundbreaking research into the human senses. “We have conducted research into a tool for the blind that we call ‘eye music,’ which provides visual information through an auditory musical experience,” he said. “People make use of the ‘eye music’ to identify the shapes of objects, their locations, and colors, allowing them to interact with them. Through this device a sightless person can ‘hear’ an image of 1,500 pixels in one second of music.” After the talk, the group was invited to tour Amedi’s laboratory and the Ruth and Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, both located in the Adelson School of Entrepreneurship on campus.

Lior Suchard, Liora Ofer, Chairperson of the Friends of Reichman University and Yafit Cohen, Deputy Director Israel External Relations

From left: Gili Dinstein, Reichman University Chancellor Oudi Recanati, Rafi Melman, and Staci Light Recanati

THE RAPHAEL RECANATI INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL

Every student has a unique story

Jonathan Davis, Head of the Raphael Recanati International School and Vice President of External Relations

Raphael Recanati z”l

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/// SOME WORDS FROM JONATHAN DAVIS ALWAYS WORKING TO SUPPORT OUR STUDENTS Jonathan Davis, Head of the Raphael Recanati International School and Vice President of External Relations, speaks out about the special nature of the RRIS and how it never ceases to put its students first and foremost. “The Raphael Recanati International School continued to strive to offer the best opportunities for our 2,000 international students this year. Giving them the very best of the special spirit that makes Reichman University what it is. Even though we were back on campus, we had to deal with the challenges of several coronavirus waves. We have continued to turn these challenges into opportunities and alongside this have continued to see an increase in registrations. It has been wonderful to have students back on our beautiful campus filling the classrooms, corridors and cafeterias. Extracurricular and social activities are back in full force and students have benefited so much from these opportunities.”

Jonathan Davis with the statue of Zionist visionary Binyamin Zeev Herzl at the Herzl Museum in Jerusalem

CARING FOR UKRAINIAN STUDENTS “There are currently 14 students from Ukraine studying at Reichman University. Now in Israel, their thoughts and prayers are naturally with their families and friends back home. This includes two students who are currently in shelters in Ukraine. With the outbreak of the conflict, we established a remote psychological support system, including daily contact and attempts to transfer the two female students to a safe place. We have spoken to the two students, as well as to those who are in Israel, and have pledged that we will continue to do everything possible to help the students and their families during this period of physical and emotional hardship. We have also launched an emergency campaign to provide scholarships for Ukrainian students.”

Some of the Ukrainian students and friends on campus

/// RRIS CAMPUS LIFE ROARS BACK INTO ACTION Campus Life at the Raphael Recanati International School roared back into action at the start of the academic year, with over 500 international students joining the Ethel and Leonard Tigay Orientation Week. The students took part in team-building activities in the Ben Shemen forest, feasted in a traditional Bedouin tent in the Negev Desert, and visited the grave of Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, at Kibbutz Sde Boker, where Jonathan Davis, Head of the RRIS and Vice President of External Relations for Reichman University, addressed the first-year students.

/// AMBASSADORS’ CLUB MAKES THE CASE FOR ISRAEL Campus Life and the StandWithUs Israel advocacy organization have been collaborating for over a decade and a half, holding seminars and leading tours for students. Their latest session was opened by Charlotte Korchak, StandWithUs’s Director of International Student Programs, who led a talk titled “Geopolitical Update on the Middle East.” The students then went on a strategic tour of Jerusalem to learn about the complexities of the region, and gained insights about minorities in Israel.

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Jonathan Davis (standing) joins students for a kosher Bedouin meal

/// RRIS HONORS LONE SOLDIERS As a proudly Zionist institution, Reichman University embraces its many students who have served or plan to serve in the Israel Defense Forces, especially those who are “lone soldiers,” living in Israel without their families. More than 300 lone soldiers are studying at Reichman University, and many joined Jonathan Davis, a former lone soldier himself, for an afternoon of pizza on the lawn. “As a former lone soldier and lone student in Israel myself, nothing can give me better pleasure that watching dozens of former lone soldiers devouring some great pizza on a lovely sunny day at our Radzyner Quad,” Davis said.

Lone soldiers gather on campus for pizza with Jonathan Davis (standing, fifth from right)

/// SOUTH AFRICAN “BRAAI” BRINGS STUDENTS AND STAFF TOGETHER As a result of the pandemic and the red-listing of South Africa for travel, many of Reichman University’s South African students were unable to return to their home country for many months. To help alleviate their homesickness, a “braai,” a traditional South African barbecue, was held for the South African students on campus. Many faculty members also turned up to enjoy the event, including Jonathan Davis, Head of the Raphael Recanati International School and Vice President of External Relations, together with his wife Iris, Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President and Chairman of the Board of Directors, School of Sustainability Dean Prof. Yoav Yair, International Program in Business Management Head Dr. Danna Tevet, Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology former Dean Prof. Daniel Levy, and Academic Admissions Head Stephanie Miller, as well as the former Chairman of Telfed, the South African Zionist Federation, David Kaplan.

The student delegation at the gates of Auschwitz

South African students, together with Dr. Yael Hadass, Dr. Danna Tevet, Jonathan Davis, Iris Davis, Prof. Daniel Levy, David Kaplan and Stephanie Miller, gather for the “braai” on campus

/// STUDENT UNION DELEGATION VISITS POLAND After a two-year break due to the pandemic, a delegation of 29 Reichman University students and staff visited Poland on an educational trip organized by the Student Union. The emotional journey included visits to Warsaw Ghetto sites, the Okopowa Jewish cemetery and Nozyk synagogue in Warsaw, and the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum. RRIS student Lena summed up her impressions: “I was very nervous in the lead-up to the trip, that it would be too overwhelming for me. It was a rollercoaster of emotions, from extreme highs to extreme lows, but everyone was always there for each other.” The trip was made possible by sponsors Joey Folkman and Cindy and Sheldon Stone.

A student stands with the Israeli flag

/// WELCOMING SHABBAT AND SHABBATON WEEKEND After a long break because of the pandemic, RRIS students were finally able to gather for their first in-person Shabbat dinner, held as part of the late Seymour Fox Friday Night Shabbat Dinner Series and sponsored by Jewish Life on Campus supporters Mark and Erica Gerson. Students participated in the traditional prayers and socialized over a tasty dinner before holding a discussion on the weekly Torah portion and then leading the traditional joyful Shabbat celebration and singing. Thanks must also go to Erma Blumenfeld for her support for the Friday night dinners. More than 100 RRIS students, staff and Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus educators bonded during the annual Shabbaton weekend, held near Kibbutz Nachsholim in northern Israel. The weekend included traditional prayers and Shabbat dinner on Friday night, followed the next day by interactive sessions led by student leaders, biking, lunch, and a tour to an archeological site led by Jonathan Davis, Head of the Raphael Recanati International School and Vice President of External Relations. The Friday night dinner was sponsored by Ezra and Lauren Kest in memory of Sol and Clara Kest and the Refuah for Mordechai Tzvi ben Soro Rochel. The Shabbat lunch was sponsored by the Folkman family.

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Shabbat dinner volunteers

Meir Yapheth Killekar lights a Chanukah candle watched by Jonathan Davis and fellow students

/// SHINING A LIGHT AROUND THE WORLD The RRIS held a festive Chanukah candle-lighting ceremony on campus, with students from around the world each saying the traditional prayers and lighting a candle. As well as students from the United States, South Africa, Turkey, and The Netherlands lighting candles, one candle was lit by MBA student Meir Yapheth Killekar, a Bene Israel Jew from Mumbai. Students also were able to join a tour of Jerusalem to see the Chanukah candelabras on display throughout the city and learn about different traditions.

Students go kayaking at Acadia Beach in Herzliya

Eden Yitbarek

Purim on campus 2022

/// RHODES SCHOLAR EDEN YITBAREK MAKES FORBES 30 UNDER 30 LIST

/// CELEBRATING PURIM ON CAMPUS

RRIS alumna Eden Yitbarek has made the Forbes Israel 30 under 30 list. Yitbarek was the first ever Reichman University student to be awarded a Rhodes Scholarship and is currently M.Sc. in Evidence-based social intervention and policy at Oxford University.

For the first time in two years, RRIS Purim celebrations, including a Megilla reading, took place on campus and indoors. It was an enjoyable and meaningful event for the dozens of RRIS students who attended, along with RRIS staff.

Yitbarek graduated from the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy in 2020. while at Reichman University, she was twice named to the Dean’s List of outstanding students. She also received an Israel at Heart Scholarship. The Israel at Heart program, supported by Joey Low, the Broward Jewish Federation, Dorit and Benjamin Genet and other generous and kind donors around the world, awards scholarships to outstanding young Israelis of Ethiopian origin.

/// ORIENTATION TRIP FOR RRIS SECOND-YEAR STUDENTS

/// STUDENT UNION MAKES WAVES

Due to the pandemic, RRIS 2nd year students were not able to go on the traditional orientation trip as part of the Ethel and Leonard Tigay Orientation Week in 2020. Together with RRIS staff and Jonathan Davis, a large group of these students recently made up for lost time by enjoying a full day in the Negev. The group hiked, ate lunch in a Bedouin tent, enjoyed a local wine tasting and finished the trip in Kibbutz Sde Boker at the grave of Israel’s first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion.

The Reichman University Student Union continued to run extracurricular and social activities for students, including student clubs, workshops, personal mentoring and social and community involvement. Under the leadership of Prof. Tal Azran the Kayak Club held several sessions at Acadia Beach in Herzliya, where students were able to make new friends while learning a new skill and doing an enjoyable activity. Jonathan Davis and RRIS staff with 2nd year students in the Negev

ADELSON SCHOOL OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Building a new generation of entrepreneurs

Dr. Yossi Maaravi, Dean

Sheldon G. Adelson z”l and Dr. Miriam Adelson

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/// ADELSON SCHOOL OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP CONTINUES TO FLOURISH Despite the ongoing pandemic, the Adelson School of Entrepreneurship continued to grow and flourish as the leading academic entrepreneurship hub in Israel. Students’ projects broke new records, with one third-year student managing to raise $2 million, more mentors joining weekly, faculty members publishing significant research, and new collaborations with companies and institutions. Alumni and students are fulfilling the school’s vision by becoming entrepreneurs and innovation leaders. Recently, the school opened an Honors program, which has received excellent feedback from participating students. Dr. Yossi Maaravi, Dean of the Adelson School, said that one of the best indicators of the school’s reputation in the business world is the significant number of parents of students who themselves are senior managers, entrepreneurs, or venture capitalists.

Zell Entrepreneurship Program Statistics: · 425 alumni · 161 startups founded · 98 companies active · 25 companies sold or merged · $3 billion raised · 4,770 jobs created Dubai experience

/// ZELL ENTREPRENEURSHIP PROGRAM REACHES NEW HEIGHTS Since its founding by businessman and philanthropist Sam Zell over two decades ago, the Zell Entrepreneurship Program has evolved into an acclaimed venture creation program. Designed for students from all faculties, the program is aimed at outstanding final-year undergraduates who aspire to work in entrepreneurial organizations or launch their own startups. In the spirit of Reichman University, the program combines multidisciplinary approaches and embodies a “learning by doing” ethos, enabling students to learn and develop skills as they work on creating their own startups.

As a result of the signing of the peace agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates in 2020, students in the Zell Entrepreneurship Program had the chance to visit Dubai in June 2021, where they were exposed to the growing opportunities for collaboration and investment in the city’s entrepreneurial scene. During the trip, the Zell teams visited startups and leading high-tech companies, and also had the chance to meet with entrepreneurs and investors. Using a space generously provided by the program’s hosts at the Dubai Future Foundation, the teams were able to showcase their ventures via Zoom to founder and supporter Sam Zell. Attending the Zoom presentations were members of Sam Zell’s company, Equity Group Investments, as well as of ZGEN, the Zell Global Entrepreneurship Network, which brings together Zell programs at Reichman University, Northwestern University in Illinois, and the University of Michigan.

The current Zell 21 class is equally divided between women and men, from a wide range of faculties. They are working on startups in a diverse variety of fields, including e-commerce, gaming, metaverse, pet care, and developer and data analysis tools.

Sam Zell

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Zell students in Dubai

ZEP Fund During the 2020-2021 academic year, four alumni ventures were funded by the ZEP Fund: Mobai, which combines artificial intelligence and computer vision to help parents keep tabs on their baby’s safety; Ole, a hassle-free fashion marketplace; Wisor, which works to optimize pricing and quotes in the freight industry, and Monto, which aims to eliminate tedious and error-prone manual billing by integrating over 200 different portals into one. In total, the ZEP Fund has funded 38 ventures in industries ranging from tourism to finance.

The ZEP Fund also notched up its first “exit” in 2021. V-Labs, a startup offering digital backgrounds for video meetings, was founded by Zell 19 graduates Ido Lavi, Yonatan Eldan and Bar Wolf and received funding from the ZEP Fund. It was acquired by the U.S.-based online advertising wholesaler Mobile Vision Marketing.

Winners of the contest

Head of the double major in Computer Science and Entrepreneurship program, and Prof. Dafna Kariv, Head of the double major in Business Administration and Entrepreneurship program. The winning team was hosted at a lunch together with a group of CEOs, entrepreneurs and investors. They included Olmert; Daniella Gilboa, co-founder and CEO of AIVF, which uses artificial intelligence to improve the in-vitro fertilization process; Yael Wiesel, founder and CEO of Zikit, an app that offers an interactive shopping experience; Yar Oren, Vice President of Facebook Israel, and Dov Moran, a veteran entrepreneur, investor and investment fund manager.

/// STUDENTS RISE TO ENTREPRENEURIAL CHALLENGE Students at the Adelson School of Entrepreneurship were presented with the challenge of producing a one-pager for a young startup within a short time, using the editing app Piggy. In the challenge, designed by the school’s Dean Dr. Yossi Maaravi, the students were divided into 72 groups of four, with each team working on a different startup, consisting of the Pumba parking app, the Monto billing app, the Fibo tax return app, the Tuto customer education app, and the Wisor quote generating solution app, all founded in recent years by Reichman University graduates. Co-founded by serial entrepreneur Shaul Olmert, Piggy enables users to create, design and edit content innovatively and quickly, including short messages, videos and photos. Students were given four hours to complete the task, with the final product judged by Olmert, Piggy Marketing and Product Manager Ofir Ginsberg, and Reichman University’s Dr. Gail Gilboa Freedman, Head of the double major in Economics and Entrepreneurship program, Dr. Revital Hollander,

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“This was an amazing challenge, which expressed the spirit of the Adelson School in the best way possible – learning by doing,” said first-year Economics and Entrepreneurship student Alon Eliav, who was on the winning team. “My team had the privilege of having a brunch with CEOs and investors from the Israeli startup ecosystem. Overall this was an amazing experience that taught me how to make the most of storytelling to convey a message.”

/// HONORS STUDENTS MAKE AN IMPACT THROUGH FIVERR Honors students at the Adelson School were challenged to help a nonprofit organization of their choice, using the online freelance marketplace platform Fiverr. In this challenge, designed by the Dean Dr. Yossi Maaravi, the students were divided into six teams of three, with each team responsible for choosing an organization, discovering its main unfulfilled need, and assisting it through one of Fiverr’s freelancers, while staying within a small $100 budget. The students were responsible for managing the project, communicating with the freelancer, and completing the project in just five weeks.

A variety of organizations were selected, among them a sports association for the visually impaired and organizations offering educational support for visually impaired children, Zoom tutoring for underprivileged children, animal protection, and support for Holocaust survivors. Through the challenge, students learned about teamwork, understanding customer needs, delegating and outsourcing projects, and working to benefit others. At the final event, each team had five minutes to present its project to two judges from Fiverr, both of them alumni from the Adelson School: Business Development Manager Eli Bogdan, and Business Strategy and Partnerships Manager Tamar Yehudar. The winning team comprised Ziv Shacham, Mor Levi and Bar Cohen, who focused on an organization that helps children who suffer from social anxiety. “Working together with a nonprofit organization made the whole difference,” Cohen said. “We were given free rein to choose which organization we would collaborate with and what kind of service provider we would match it with. That way, we could make a real impact and assist people who really needed it. We have stayed in touch with the organization’s staff, and seeing them using the skill set we managed to deliver them gives us huge satisfaction.”

/// STUDENTS HELP SOLVE MUNICIPAL ISSUES Adelson School of Entrepreneurship students came together with senior officials from the Herzliya Municipality to discuss a variety of issues in the city in a workshop held as part of the school’s Schestowitz innovation Program. The Innovation program was founded and is managed by the school’s Dean Dr. Yossi Maaravi. In this program, students explore innovative methodologies that can be applied in various organizations. Ehud Lazar, Director General at the Herzliya Municipality and an alumnus of Reichman University with a B.A. in Law and Government and an M.A. in Law, gave the students a presentation on issues in the city. Following the meeting, students took part in a second workshop in which they took on the role of advisers in the areas of manpower, technology, environment, housing, and services for residents. “Our contribution to problem solving was presenting the way our generation thinks about the problem and the solution. The encounter challenged many stigmas held against the municipality,” said Aaron Shmidman, a second-year Business and Entrepreneurship student, “We all expected veteran employees who had worked for the municipality for decades, and we were surprised to discover the opposite – a group of inspiring executives, a 30-year-old CEO, as well as executives who have a passion for innovation, technology, entrepreneurship, and excellence. All of us noted how the meeting strengthened our desire for public action and completely changed the way we view such organizations.” Another participant, Ofek Cohen, a second-year Economics and Entrepreneurship student, said, “The real value of the workshop was understanding that the tools we learn in our degree are relevant in all fields. It is easy to see them in the high-tech startup world, but they can be applied to all areas, both in the public and private sectors.”

A Student workshop

LAUDER SCHOOL OF GOVERNMENT, DIPLOMACY AND STRATEGY

Preparing students for leadership positions in a complex world

/// LAUDER SCHOOL FORGES AHEAD TO NEW HEIGHTS Prof. Assaf Moghadam, Dean

Amb. Ronald S. Lauder

The Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy resumed most of its regular on-campus activities in the 2021-2022 academic year, and was delighted to welcome students back for in-class instruction and extracurricular activities. Among the highlights of the first semester were the inauguration of the new Institute for Liberty and Responsibility, the opening of a new, unique B.A. in Government Cluster in Data and Democracy, and a number of distinguished appointments for faculty members. The school and its affiliated institutes also organized a number of high-profile academic and policy conferences.

Unique new cluster for students The Lauder School inaugurated a new B.A. in Government Cluster in Data and Democracy, the first such cluster in Israel. Headed by Prof. Karine Nahon, the cluster aims to prepare graduates for key positions in the public sector, civil society and knowledge-intensive industries, providing students with data analysis skills to apply to complex problems in government, and training them to analyze the impact of information technologies on governments.

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Academics visit campus

Lauder School events

With the easing of some Covid restrictions, the Lauder School hosted several leading academics as visiting professors and scholars. Longtime Lauder School friends Prof. Tanja Börzel and Prof. Thomas Risse of Freie Universität Berlin spent two weeks at the Lauder School and gave several talks, including at a Lauder Forum event titled “The Liberal International Order: Quo Vadis?”, which was moderated by Dr. Amichai Magen, Head of the Specialization in Diplomacy and Conflict Studies. At the end of their visit, Lauder School Dean Prof. Assaf Moghadam announced the appointments of Borzel and Risse as visiting professors.

Institute for Liberty and Responsibility Head Dr. Amnon Cavari hosted the annual poster session on American politics, at which second-year Government students showcased their final research projects. Students had been asked to pick topics from the U.S. policy agenda and to offer their analyses based on survey data. Research topics chosen by the students included the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, gun control, and the climate change debate.

The school also hosted Prof. Shmulik Nili, an Associate Professor at Northwestern University’s Political Science Department, as a visiting scholarin-residence. One of the world’s leading political theorists, Nili shared his insights with faculty and students at the Lauder School Seminar and the Lauder Hour student engagement series.

Student achievements Lauder School students continue to notch up outstanding accomplishments, with Eden Amare Yitbarek and Eden Raviv, both from the Lauder School’s Argov Fellows Program in Leadership and Diplomacy, becoming the first two Reichman University students to be awarded prestigious Rhodes Scholarships to study at Oxford University in the U.K. Meanwhile, Lauder School M.A. students Diana Salatskaya and Antonio Noboa were chosen to participate in the Future Diplomats Peace Game hosted by the Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy in Abu Dhabi and Foreign Policy Group (FP).

“Talking Lauder” podcast series “Talking Lauder”, the official Lauder School podcast series, continued to provide fresh perspectives on hot topics related to politics, government, and security issues. Hosted by Lauder School students Hila Roded and Sharon Bressler, the episodes featured academic and policy experts.

The school also organized Lauder Forum events with visiting lecturers and practitioners. One highlight was a talk given by Amb. Eitan Na’eh, the Israeli Ambassador to Bahrain, who was hosted by Dr. Daphné Richemond-Barak, Head of the International B.A. in Government. The Honors Track in Strategy and Decision Making, directed by Prof. Dima Adamsky, hosted its annual alumni meeting, at which current and former honors students farewelled departing Honors Track coordinator Leehe Freedman, who was leaving the program after several years.

Ongoing programs The Program on Democratic Resilience and Development, led by Dr. Amichai Magen, opened its second year of activities. The Program, a partnership between the Konrad Adenauer-Stiftung and the Lauder School, bridges research, education and policy, aims to understand and nurture conditions for free and responsible societie. Faculty and students were invited to engage in innovative activities such as the Arena for Social Change, led by Dr. Adi Koll, which educates students on Israeli civil society and encourages them to take part in it. The Lauder School also continued with its Hans Morgenthau Scholarship Program, which gives a select group of students the chance to study for a full semester at the University of Bonn in Germany.

Senior appointments and faculty news Prof. Rafi Melnick, Reichman University Provost and former Dean of the Lauder School, has been elected President of Reichman University. Amb. Ron Prosor, Professor of Practice and Head of the Lauder School’s Abba Eban Institute for International Diplomacy, has been appointed the Israeli Ambassador to Germany. Lauder School instructor Dr. Ronen Hoffman has been appointed the Israeli Ambassador to Canada. Dr. Maoz Rosenthal, a senior lecturer at the Lauder School, has been appointed Coordinator of the Israeli Association of Political Science.

Prof. Sivan Hirsch-Hoefler, Associate Professor at the Lauder School, has been awarded an Israeli Science Foundation grant on the subject of “Women’s Visibility in Politics and the Legitimization of AntiDemocratic Policies: the Gender Mainstreaming Model.” Prof. Liza Ireni-Saban, Associate Professor and former Deputy Dean of the Lauder School, and Lauder School student Maya Sherman have released a book, “Ethical Governance of Artificial Intelligence in the Public Sector,” published by Routledge. Prof. Dima Adamsky has released his latest book, “Russian Nuclear Orthodoxy: Religion, Politics, and Strategy,” to critical acclaim. Published by Stanford University Press, the book has since been translated into Hebrew. Prof. Gabriel Weimann, Communications Professor at Reichman University, has marked the acceptance of his 200th publication. Co-authored with Natalie Masri, a research assistant at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism, the article is headed “TikTok’s Spiral of Anti-Semitism.”

Dr. Amnon Cavari (far right), Head of the Institute for Liberty and Responsibility, speaks with second-year Government students as part of a course on American politics

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The current Argov class at the annual alumni dinner

/// ARGOV FELLOWS SHOW THE WAY FOR LEADERSHIP For a decade and a half, the Argov Fellows Program in the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy has been cultivating qualified and skilled individuals who aspire to leadership positions in Israel and the Jewish world. Almost 350 alumni, half of them female, have graduated from the program and have taken on leading roles in the public and private sectors, in Israel and around the world. The annual Argov alumni dinner, held on campus, brought together numerous alumni and introduced them to the current Argov class. A panel was held on the topic “Leadership During Crisis,” and featured alumni Era Duek (2008), Deputy Director of Planning and Marketing at the Israeli Center on Addiction, and Ehud Lazar (2016), Director General of the Herzliya Municipality.

Ambassador Shlomo Argov z”l, for whom the program is named

Argov alumni have also won important awards and attained positions in academia. Eden Amare Yitbarek (2020) and Eden Raviv (2021) were awarded Rhodes Scholarships to study at Oxford University in the U.K. Keren Guttman (2019) was awarded a Schwarzman Scholarship to study at Tsinghua University in Beijing. Dr. Asaf Tzachor (2009), whose doctorate and post-doctoral work were done at Oxford University and Cambridge University in the U.K., has returned to Reichman University to join the faculty in the School of Sustainability. In the first semester, the Argov class was able to return to campus, attending in-person classes and going on day tours in Israel focusing on challenges such as the integration of the ultra-Orthodox sector and religious pluralism. It is hoped that the annual study tour to the United States will resume as soon as conditions allow.

Argov students meet with famed former Soviet refusenik and current Knesset member Natan Sharansky (center front, with cap) in Jerusalem 59

/// ICT ANNUAL CONFERENCE MARKS 20TH ANNIVERSARY OF 9/11 ATTACKS The International Institute for Counter-Terrorism’s annual World Summit at Reichman University brought together dozens of senior government and military officials and experts from Israel and around the world, who joined the conference in person and via online platforms to discuss salient issues in the field of counter-terrorism policy, including the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the rise of the Taliban, the Iranian nuclear program, and terrorism’s threat to democracy. At the conference’s opening event, a memorial service was held to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in the United States and in memory of the victims of terrorism in Israel and around the globe. Opening the conference, Prof. Boaz Ganor, the ICT’s Founder and Executive Director, said he had been in the U.S. when the multiple attacks happened on September 11, 2001. “That day, I was in the United States, on a delegation to explain to the Americans how difficult it is to deal with this phenomenon called suicide bombings. The title of my lecture that day was ‘Stopping Terrorism – the Israeli Challenge.’ That day, that title became irrelevant. From that day forward, terrorism became the problem of the entire world.” Michael Ratney, Chargé d’Affaires at the U.S. Embassy in Israel, spoke at the opening event, saying, “On behalf of the U.S. government, I want to thank ICT for its work to help make the world a safer place. Your work helps ensure that none of us ever sees another September 11. The United States remains steadfast in our support for Israel’s right to defend itself against terrorist threats. No act of terrorism, not on September 11th, not ever, has succeeded in undermining our values or weakening our societies.” Ratney stressed that Iran continues to be a key issue for the United States. “President Joe Biden has made clear that we are committed to ensuring that Iran

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never obtains a nuclear weapon. Make no mistake we will continue to work together to strengthen regional security, including curbing Iran’s destabilizing behaviors in the region and beyond,” he said. Alejandro Mayorkas, Secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, added to Ratney’s remarks, saying, “Few better understand what 9/11 meant and what dangers lay ahead than the people of the State of Israel, where acts of terror have for too long been a primary, bloody tactic of enemies sworn to the state’s destruction.” Several senior Israeli ministers also spoke at the conference, including Foreign Minister Yair Lapid and Defense Minister Benny Gantz. Lapid presented a multi-year plan to attempt to create stability in the Gaza Strip, based on a two-stage approach comprising first the humanitarian rehabilitation of Gaza and then “a plan for economic growth in exchange for security.” Gantz’s speech focused on Iran, which has sponsored the establishment of organized terrorist armies that are assisting Iran in achieving its economic, political and military goals. “One of the most significant tools Iran has developed to help its proxies is a system of unmanned aerial vehicles with ranges of thousands of kilometers,” he said. “Hundreds of these are spread across Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. Iran is also attempting to transfer the know-how needed for UAV production to Gaza.” In a moving address via Zoom, Dr. Ali Rashid Al Nuaimi, chairman of the Defense Affairs, Interior and Foreign Affairs Committee at the United Arab Emirates’ Federal National Council, which was participating for the first time at the summit, said, “My Israeli friends, the war against terror is not your war – it is all of our war. Let’s be partners and fight it together as a common war.” Other prominent speakers included former Spanish Prime Minister José María Aznar, Europol Executive Director Catherine de Bolle, and UAE Cyber Security head Dr. Mohamed Hamad al Kuwaiti. A special address was also given by Israeli President Isaac Herzog.

Prof. Boaz Ganor, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, and Prof. Uriel Reichman

/// ICT REACHES AROUND THE GLOBE As well as the World Summit on Counter-Terrorism, the ICT organized and participated in several other international conferences. Together with the International Institute for Strategic Leadership Dialogue, a private diplomatic channel fostering closer ties between Australia, the U.K. and Israel, the ICT organized the Leadership Dialogue conference, a four-day event that brought world leaders and experts together to discuss pressing global issues, including the challenges and lessons of the pandemic, the continued presence of anti-Semitism globally, regional conflicts as a result of great-power competition, and the threat of climate change.

In addition to helping coordinate the event, Prof. Boaz Ganor, Founder and Executive Director of the ICT, joined a panel on how Israel should respond to Iran’s continued attempts to develop nuclear weapons. The ICT also partnered with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute to host the Beersheba Dialogue conference, which brought together leading scholars, analysts, and experts to discuss common areas of interest in national security. Speakers included Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz and Australian Defense Minister Peter Dutton. The experts discussed the rising threat of farright terrorism, the continued danger posed by Iran, and the increasingly aggressive actions of China. In addition, recognizing the rising risk of other kinds of warfare such as cyber attacks, trade interference, and online disinformation campaigns, the talks also focused on how the two countries could cooperate more closely to limit such actions and contain damage from them.

RESEARCH OFFERS INSIGHTS INTO WORLD THREATS The ICT has continued to conduct cutting-edge research into current international threats. One such danger, repeatedly noted by the ICT, has been that of far-right extremists, and this threat has only continued to grow since the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, with various far-right groups working to radicalize and recruit potential new members. The dangers of far-right extremism were canvassed in an article in Newsweek magazine written by Bradley Martin, an ICT Research Assistant with Dr. Liram Koblentz-Stenzler, Head of the ICT’s Global Far-Right Extremism Desk, and Alexander Pack, a Reichman University M.A. student and ICT researcher. ICT scholars have also issued multiple warnings about the growing threat from Iran. Dr. Michael Barak, a senior ICT researcher, discussed in The Jerusalem Post how Iran and the pro-Iranian Hezbollah serve as mentors to terrorist organizations by helping them perfect their social media propaganda campaigns. And in an interview, Prof. Boaz Ganor, the ICT’s Founder and Executive Director, suggested that a “new NATO alliance” is necessary to combat the Iranian threat, both to reduce its support for terrorism and to “prevent Iran from reaching the [nuclear] bomb.”

ICT LAUNCHES NEW PODCAST The ICT also launched a new Hebrew podcast, The Terrorist, in which experts and prominent figures discuss terrorism through the lenses of psychology, law, economics, and intelligence. The podcast is hosted by Dan Ganor, a student in the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy, and has featured government ministers and Knesset members, former ambassadors, and Igal Unna, the Head of Israel’s National Cyber Directorate.

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/// INSTITUTE FOR POLICY AND STRATEGY (IPS) SECURITY AND POLICY CONFERENCE DISCUSSES NEEDED STRATEGIES The Institute for Policy and Strategy’s Security and Policy Conference, entitled “What Strategy Does Israel Need”, held on campus, was hailed as a major success. The conference brought together leading political figures, diplomats, military officers, officials and academics from Israel and abroad, who discussed the political and security challenges facing Israel in the short and the long term, as well as strategies to deal with those challenges. The gathering opened with a special address by Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, who said, “Israel’s response must change, and the asymmetry by which Israel contends with the proxy from Lebanon, Syria or Gaza in an ongoing attrition campaign that is weakening it must also change.” Among the prominent figures from abroad was Brett McGurk, the U.S. National Security Council’s Coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, who discussed the question “What is the American Strategy in the Middle East?” with the Institute for Policy and Strategy (IPS) Executive Director Maj. Gen. Amos Gilead. McGurk said the Biden administration is pursuing a policy that is re-focusing on “realistic” and “achievable” objectives, based on diplomacy, regional de-escalation, and support for U.S. partners, although he said those partners should take the lead to defend themselves as the United States had other priorities further east.

Prof. Uriel Reichman, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, and Maj. Gen. Amos Gilead

In parallel, Gen. (ret.) Joseph Votel, former Commander of the U.S. Central Command, held a discussion with Prof. Boaz Ganor, Founder and Executive Director of Reichman University’s International Institute for Counter-Terrorism, in which he praised the Israeli decision to upgrade collaboration between the two countries and to be absorbed into the U.S. Central Command’s area of responsibility, rather than remaining under the U.S. European Command’s as before. The greater collaboration will include joint training and tighter operational cooperation in the region. Gilead held a discussion with businessman and philanthropist Haim Saban, who stressed the importance of closer U.S.-Israel collaboration. Israeli Defense Minister Lt. Gen. (res.) Benjamin Gantz gave an address in which he underscored the need to develop an alternative plan to the diplomatic effort, consisting of political, economic and military tools, as well as enhanced strategic collaboration with the United States.

A panel discussion on “The Iranian Threat: Is the Strategy Effective?” brought together former heads of Israel’s security and intelligence agencies: Maj. Gen. (ret.) Amos Yadlin, former chief of IDF Military Intelligence; Tamir Pardo, former head of the Mossad; Gideon Frank, former head of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, and Maj. Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror, former head of the National Security Council. Moderated by Gili Cohen, the Kan Israeli Public Broadcaster’s Corporation’s senior diplomatic and political correspondent, they discussed their views on the level of threat from Iran, including its timetable for achieving a nuclear bomb. While they sometimes disagreed about the wisdom of past policies, there was consensus among them about the need for a credible and effective military alternative and for bolstering the U.S.-Israel alliance. Maj. Gen. Amikam Norkin, Commander of the Israeli Air Force, was interviewed by Channel 13’s senior defense correspondent, Alon Ben-David, and said: “The IDF is building its plan in collaboration with the political echelon. I won’t go into the operational plans, but if there’s one thing everyone would agree on, it’s that a military option must be on the table.” 63

He also said that the leap in the strategic and security relations between Israel and the Arab world in recent years illustrates the potential for promoting regional collaboration in the campaign to curb Iran. Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman, interviewed by Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper’s political-diplomatic commentator Shimon Shiffer, presented a far more pessimistic view of the ability to rein in Iran. He said that even if the U.S. and Iran formulate a new protocol on nuclear development, “Iran will still become a nuclear state within five years.” MK Nir Barkat, former Mayor of Jerusalem, and senior IPS researcher Dr. Michael Milstein also discussed the Iranian threat. Barkat said the next campaign, which he called “the First Iran War,” would center on an acute struggle against Hezbollah, requiring Israel to strike Iran directly, and the Israeli public should be prepared for the dimensions and repercussions of such a conflict. As well as Iran, the conference also held discussions on other issues. A plenum on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, titled “What the Future Holds, One, Two or Three States?,” brought together a panel of leading specialists: Dr. Micah Goodman, a Research Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute and author of the book “Catch ‘67”; Dr. Dana Wolf, Head of the Law and Security Program at Reichman University’s Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy, and journalist Ohad Hemo, Channel 12’s Palestinian affairs correspondent.

Defense Minister Lt. Gen. (res.) Benjamin Gantz

Journalist Alon Ben-David with Israeli Air Force Commander Maj. Gen. Amikam Norkin

Another discussion took place on the topic “A Multi-Arena Confrontation: What is the End Game?” Former IDF Chief Gen. (res.) Gadi Eisenkot was interviewed by IDF Radio journalist Tali LipkinShahak, and said that in the face of changing threats, there is “a fundamental flaw in the fact that Israel has no national security perspective.”

Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman speaks with journalist Shimon Shiffer

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Maj. Gen. Amos Gilead, Reichman University CEO and Vice President Dr. Ayelet Ben-Ezer, Prof. Rafi Melnick, and Prof. Uriel Reichman

Prof. Jonathan Gershoni and Dr. Anthony Fauci discuss the Israeli health system

The topic of “The Expanding Influence of Russia in the Middle East” was discussed by Matthew Rojansky, a Director and Distinguished Fellow at the Wilson Center’s Kennan Institute in the U.S., with Ksenia Svetlova, Senior Research Fellow at the IPS, and IPS Executive Director Gilead. A joint report published by the Kennan Institute and the IPS analyzed Russia’s role in the Middle East and the challenges its actions in Syria and Iran pose both to Israel and to the U.S. It was said that Israel should preserve its strategic ties with Russia so it can maintain its operational freedom in Syria, including to degrade Iranian military capabilities there, and that the U.S. and Israel would both benefit from formalizing their discussions on Russia. In a session devoted to the topic “National Resilience as a Key Dimension in Israel’s National Security,” Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President of Reichman University and Chairman of the Board of Directors, spoke with Gilead about the growing rifts in Israeli society, including tensions between the Jewish and Arab populations, increasing violence and law-breaking by right-wing extremists in areas over the Green Line, and rising crime rates that undermine civilians’ sense of personal safety. Reichman said these processes are detrimental to social cohesion in Israel and weaken it in its enemies’ eyes. He said cohesion must be enhanced and socio-economic gaps bridged for Israel to be able to face its future challenges strongly. Prof. Rafi Melnick, President of Reichman University, said that increasing productivity in Israel is an important socio-economic objective. He said productivity per worker in Israel is already far below the OECD average, and this gap will only widen if not addressed, leading to a poorer quality of life, greater inequality, and damage to Israel’s resilience.

Former IDF Chief Gen. (res.) Gadi Eisenkot speaks with journalist Tali Lipkin-Shahak

MK Yuli Edelstein, former Knesset Speaker and former Health Minister, also spoke about national resilience, in a discussion with Channel 13 political correspondent Sefi Ovadia. Edelstein said the Covid pandemic was not just a medical issue but also a threat to the social order. 65

The Israeli health system’s performance during the pandemic was the subject of a discussion between Dr. Anthony Fauci, Chief Medical Advisor to the U.S. President, and Prof. Jonathan Gershoni from Tel Aviv University. “One should never underestimate the capability of an emerging infection,” Fauci said. He praised Israeli authorities for actively working to vaccinate the entire population and minimize the fatality rate, saying this policy had been a success. The insights and policy recommendations from the conference are viewable online in English. EXPERTS APPOINTED TO IPS Dr. Moshe Albo, an expert in Middle East security and strategy issues, has been appointed a Senior Researcher at the IPS. Albo is a former research division head in the IDF’s Military Intelligence Directorate and has almost three decades of experience in intelligence research, military thought, and strategic planning. Dr. Michael Milshtein, an expert on Palestinian issues, has been appointed a Senior Researcher at the IPS. Milshtein is a former advisor on Palestinian affairs to the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, and headed the Palestinian Affairs Department in the IDF’s Israel Defense Intelligence. Dr. Shay Har-Zvi, an expert on international strategic issues and on the involvement of the great powers, especially Russia, in the Middle East, has been appointed a Senior Researcher at the IPS. Har-Zvi is a former Acting Director General in the Strategic Affairs Ministry and has held senior positions in the analysis division of the IDF’s Military Intelligence Directorate, including as head of an arena.

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/// INSTITUTE FOR LIBERTY AND RESPONSIBILITY LAUNCHES The Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy has inaugurated its new Institute for Liberty and Responsibility, a prestigious research institute dedicated to the study and practice of democracy in Israel and its challenges and opportunities. Headed by the Lauder School’s Dr. Amnon Cavari, the new institute brings together leading academic researchers, experts, and experienced practitioners from the field to work to enhance democratic and liberal values and strengthen Israel’s commitment to the principles of liberty, political responsibility, and good governance.

NADAV FOUNDATION ESTABLISHED BY THE NEVZLIN FAMILY

Funded with the generous support of the Nevzlin family’s Nadav Foundation and the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation, the new institute becomes the Lauder School’s fourth inhouse research institute, joining the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism, the Institute for Policy and Strategy, and the Abba Eban Institute for International Diplomacy. The new institute was officially launched at a gala event marking the anniversary of the November 1947 United Nations resolution that led to the establishment of a Jewish state in Israel. Israeli President Isaac Herzog greeted the audience and emphasized Israel’s commitment to maintaining a liberal democracy based on the principles in the U.N. resolution and Israel’s Declaration of Independence. Reichman University’s Founding President and Chairman of the Board of Directors, Prof. Uriel Reichman, spoke about the myriad challenges facing Israeli democracy, and welcomed the new institute into the university.

Attending the opening ceremony were Nadav Foundation founder Leonid Nevzlin and Schusterman Family Foundation Program Officer Yarden Ben Yosef. Cavari presented the institute’s mission statement, saying that it will serve as a meaningful academic platform to study trends and processes in Israeli politics. “The institute will work to strengthen the values, institutions and processes that are necessary to maintain a democratic and liberal state in the spirit of the basic principles enshrined in the Declaration of Independence,” he said. “The objectives will be achieved through promoting rigorous academic research and advanced theorical and practical teaching and by influencing the political agenda and the public discourse in Israel.” The institute has already conducted a series of public opinion surveys examining the democratic values of Israelis, their desired government policy priorities, and their trust in governmental and political institutions, with the results published in various media outlets. It has also organized a highprofile event, Israel’s Governing Rules, at which proposals to amend Israel’s constitutional structure were discussed.

Justice Minister Gideon Saar and Constitution, Law and Justice Committee Chairman Gilad Kariv each sat down for conversations about the merits and prospects of current proposals for reform. In addition, Knesset members, legal and political science scholars, and journalists took part in panel discussions and debates. The institute has also established an honors program for undergraduate and graduate students that focuses on political involvement, and an internship program for students interested in research on Israeli politics. It is also planning to host conferences on topics such as political violence and political polarization in Israel, and is already becoming a major center for important research and expert discussion about democracy in Israel.

Prof. Rafi Melnick, Rachel Azaria, former Knesset member and former Jerusalem Deputy Mayor, Prof. Uriel Reichman, and Dr. Amnon Cavari at the institute’s inauguration

Eric Samson z”l and Sheila Samson

Prof. Uriel Reichman and Dr. Sheikh Abdullah bin Ahmed El Khalifa stand behind Amb. Ron Prosor and Dr. Hamed Ibrahim Al Abdullah at the signing event

/// ABBA EBAN INSTITUTE DEEPENS RELATIONS IN GULF AND WORLDWIDE Despite the continuing pandemic, the Abba Eban Institute for International Diplomacy together with the Samson Family Chair for International Diplomacy have been making great strides in creating new partnerships and in advancing existing ones around the globe – changes that have only been accelerating under the leadership of Executive Director Goor Tsalalyachin, who took over from Adv. Yaniv Cohen, the institute’s co-founder with Amb. Ron Prosor. Tsalalyachin, a Reichmann University alumnus, joined the institute after serving as Senior Researcher and Head of Strategic War Games in the IDF Operations Directorate. He began his career as a military and diplomatic television journalist and worked as a media adviser to the Israeli defense minister and a spokesman on security affairs in the Prime Minister’s Office before taking on the IDF position.

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Tsalalyachin and the institute’s team have reached out to new regions, including Japan and India, and have been deeply involved in the warming of relations with the Persian Gulf kingdom of Bahrain. Among other activities, the institute signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Derasat, the Bahrain Center for Strategic, International and Energy Studies, laying the foundation for expanding cooperation between them. The two institutes have already begun cooperating, preparing joint programs, annual meetings, research projects, seminars and workshops. The memorandum was signed by Prosor with Derasat’s Executive Director, Dr. Hamed Ibrahim Al Abdullah, in the presence of Dr. Sheikh Abdullah bin Ahmed El Khalifa, Chairman of Derasat’s Board of Trustees and Undersecretary for Political Affairs in Bahrain’s Foreign Ministry, and Prof. Uriel Reichman, Reichman University’s Founding President and Chairman of the Board of Directors. The signing was swiftly followed by a joint online seminar on the history of Bahrain, presented by Al-Abdulla. Abba Eban Institute members also twice visited Bahrain’s capital, Manama, to further enhance the relationship. Prosor traveled on the first mission, while Tsalalyachin and Dr. Gedaliah Afterman, Head of the Asia-Israel Policy Program at the institute, traveled on the second mission.

The two attended the Global Think Tank Summit, where delegates from think tanks on six continents discussed global policy challenges during the pandemic, the contribution of think tanks to government decision-making, and the role of women in research and policy leadership positions in the Middle East and beyond. The institute is bidding farewell to its founding Chairman, Amb. Ron Prosor, who is returning to the diplomatic service as Israel’s Ambassador to Germany. The institute thanks him for his years of hard work, wishes him the best, and will continue to follow in his legacy in leading the field of innovative diplomacy.

ACT.IL FIGHTS ANTI-SEMITIC AND ANTI-ISRAEL MESSAGES Another focal point for the institute was the May 2021 eruption of violence by the Palestinians and Israel’s campaign of defense, known as Operation Guardian of the Walls. The institute’s Act.IL Israel support program successfully ran a public diplomacy campaign during which its team, together with interns and volunteers, fought anti-Israel incitement and misinformation online. Working tirelessly for almost 24 hours each day, even as missiles were being launched into Israel, the Act.IL team exposed anti-Israel lies and combated online anti-Semitism.

An infographic produced by Act.IL during the conflict, exposing fake news aimed at damaging Israel

From left: Dr Gedaliah Afterman and Goor Tsalalyachin with Dr. Sheikh Abdullah bin Ahmed El Khalifa and Dr. Hamed Ibrahim Al Abdullah in Manama 69

ARISON SCHOOL OF BUSINESS Equipping students in an era of digital transformation

/// NEW DEAN OUTLINES HIS VISION Prof. Niron Hashai, Dean

Prof. Niron Hashai, who in September took up the role of Dean of the Arison School of Business, has outlined his vision for the school, saying that three fundamental pillars are critical to the study of business today and will be the focus of the school’s wide-ranging and innovative programs in the future. “Today’s manager needs to have an excellent analytical understanding, that is, how to collect, analyze and present data. So we will be focusing strongly on analytical data through all our undergraduate and graduate degrees,” he said.

Ted Arison z”l

“The second skill that we will focus on is leadership. A manager today needs to be able to lead a team, think creatively as well as critically. Our focus will shift slightly to give credits to ‘soft’ skills such as presentation ability, negotiation, teamwork, and team-building, in addition to the main disciplines such as business management, finance, and marketing. “Our third focus will be to increase the learning by doing approach, which will include practicums for undergraduates in companies, where students will be able to apply what they have learned in the classroom.”

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Hashai also said the school will strengthen and expand its existing collaborations with universities and institutions abroad, including INSEAD business school in France, Columbia University in the United States, and Dartmouth College, University College London, and the University of Cambridge, all in the U.K. “Our collaborations abroad are integral to our undergraduate and graduate degrees. For example our partnership with INSEAD is in the field of virtual reality and immersive learning, a field in which we believe we are pioneers,” he said. “We believe immersive learning is vital to learning; students remember an experience more than something that they read or hear. And therefore, together with INSEAD, we have classes in marketing and strategy and creativity that are based on virtual reality.” Another innovation will be that Business Administration students will be offered the chance to enroll in a mentorship program, with graduates who have established their careers available to mentor the students. The Arison School of Business is also weighing a new undergraduate degree program in Business and Sustainability from 2023, which would be the first of its kind in Israel. Prof. Hashai, Dean of the Arison School, said there is an urgent need for a degree that combines business and sustainability.

“A significant change in business administration today is that whereas managers in the past were expected to predominantly focus on maximizing the value or profits of companies, today this is not enough,” he said. “In today’s climate, investors and consumers are looking at a company and asking what is its effect on the environment and the society in which it is operating? Today’s consumer is not only interested in the product, but also in the environmental and social footprint of the company. Corporations today must ensure their long-term financial health and integrity while simultaneously fostering environmental and social well-being.” The degree would emphasize the functions of profits, environmental impact and societal effects. Students in the program will acquire skills and tools in mathematics, statistics, economics, and business administration, as well as in subjects central to sustainability. “To be a future leader or CEO, you will need to be able to lead your company in terms of its environmental and sustainable impact, while at the same time ensuring its profits,” Hashai said.

“This is a very significant moment in the history of the Arison School of Business,” said the school’s Dean, Prof. Niron Hashai. “My wish for the program participants is that they take advantage of their time here in Israel and use the knowledge and abilities they will receive to make a positive change in this field, both in Israel and around the world.”

Prof. Niron Hashai

/// FIRST ISRAELI-GERMAN M.A. PROGRAM LAUNCHES The first dual master’s degree program between the Arison School of Business and Germany’s University of Mannheim Business School kicked off at the beginning of the academic year with a cohort of 24 international students from a range of countries, including India, Peru, Canada, Cameroon, China and Vietnam, as well as Germany. Students were spending the first semester of the one-year full-time program in Israel, attending lectures at Reichman University and being exposed to the Israeli technological world. In the second semester, they will be heading off to study at Mannheim, one of Europe’s leading business schools. Graduates of the program will earn a double degree of M.A. in Management Analytics from two prestigious institutions. With a focus on training future leaders in digital transformation, the program gives students exposure to companies and organizations in various sectors and provides practical experience as well as networking opportunities with senior executives locally and internationally. The students will acquire knowledge and skills in data analytics and management through courses, workshops, and company projects. The lecturers are internationally renowned experts in their fields from Israel and Germany.

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Dr. Ofrit Lesser

Robert Kluge, a B.A. in Business Administration graduate from Germany, said he had enrolled in the program in order to have “the unique possibility to explore the essentials of entrepreneurship and digital innovation in the startup nation, Israel.” Ajeta Krishnatre, a mechanical engineer from India, said that for her, “the program provides a perfect blend of technological and managerial curricula.” Ambreen Ahsan, originally from India and currently living in the United Arab Emirates, said her motivation for joining the program is to increase her professional network and help her launch a managerial career. “I believe that studying at Reichman University and Mannheim Business School will make me a better problem solver and will be crucial in enabling me to learn subjects in a groundbreaking industry, as well as equip me to transition into senior positions of management and leadership,” she said. Dr. Ofrit Lesser, the program’s Academic Director, said: “We are excited to welcome this diverse group of people to our program, which will have a strong focus on teamwork by students from multiple disciplines, with engineering students teaming up with students from business, economics and social sciences, ultimately to present a final project together. We are excited to launch this program and we look forward to seeing the results.”

Mitch Julis

/// JULIS-RABINOWITZ ACADEMIC CHAIR IN DATA SCIENCE A team led by Dr. Shai Fine, Head of the Data Science Institute and the Julis-Rabinowitz Academic Chair in Data Science, is focused on key areas of public health as well as Israel’s national security through its in-depth computational research and analysis. Several students met with Chair supporter Mitch Julis via Zoom to present their research.

WORKING TO PREVENT YOUTH SUICIDE Reichman University MBA AI & Big Data program graduate Inbar Kinarty is leading a digital project at the Data Science Institute, in collaboration with the Schneider Children’s Medical Center, that is working to prevent youth suicide and self-harm. Kinarty is leading efforts to develop digital biomarkers to better understand behavioral patterns related to depression, anxiety, insomnia, chronic pain, and chronic fatigue. The study examined smartphone usage to obtain clinical insights, collecting and analyzing behavioral data on the usage of applications, data, calls and text messages, as well as on screen and device times. A significant correlation was found between digital markers and clinical measurements of quality of life in this study, with abnormal usage patterns associated with a range of psychological distress levels, including a suicide attempt resulting in psychiatric hospitalization.

Dr. Shai Fine

COMPUTATIONAL SOCIAL SCIENCE PROJECT Avrahami Israeli, head of the Social Analytics program at the Data Science Institute and a research assistant in the Advanced Machine Learning course at the Efi Arazi School of Computer Science, has been running a project focused on detecting and quantifying how language is used on social media platforms, specifically on Twitter. The project utilizes NLP (natural language processing) as well as SNA (social network analysis) capabilities to highlight significantly interesting discussions between Twitter users. The project has involved retrieving a large amount of discussion trees (threads) over a long period of time. Out of these discussion trees, 328,000 tweet pairs (conversations between two users - a single post and a response) were constructed. From this study, significant conclusions could be drawn about online behavior and the influence level of users over social platforms. Such information and its analysis is critical to tackling cyber-bullying, hate speech, and other threats over the web.

Inbar Kinarty

Avrahami Israeli 73

/// MBA IN HEALTHCARE INNOVATION BRINGS BENEFITS AROUND THE WORLD The international one-year MBA program, initiated and led by Prof. Varda Liberman, Reichman University Provost and Head of the MBA in Healthcare Innovation, was launched by the Arison School of Business in partnership with the Sheba Medical Center in the 2018-2019 academic year. The program aims to provide future leaders of the healthcare industry with the tools and skills necessary to address the challenges, changes and complexities of modern healthcare in all its diverse fields. The program has attracted professionals from Israel and abroad, guest lecturers come from leading universities, including Stanford and Harvard. Entrepreneur Ariel Zylbersztejn, originally from Mexico, has spent years focusing on how best to take care of ill and elderly people at home. He developed a startup in his native Mexico, called Paz Mental (“Peace of Mind” in Spanish), and also a platform called ANA that offers an artificial intelligence-driven management tool for companies that provide homecare services. But not having come from a medical background, Zylbersztejn wanted to understand the world of healthcare professionals better, and when he learned about Reichman University’s MBA in Healthcare Innovation, he knew it was the ideal program for him. “In one of the first lectures, I learned that 70 percent of admitted patients at Sheba Medical Center [Israel’s largest hospital] would be dependent on homecare upon their release from hospital. This was eyeopening to me. I understood that I had a lot to learn here in Israel and at the same time, with my software platform ANA, I had a lot to contribute,” he said.

Ariel Zylbersztejn

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Prof. Varda Liberman

During his practicum, which is a major part of the MBA program, he interned at Schneider Children’s Medical Center, and said, “I was able to assess Schneider’s entire home-care platform; I interviewed their entire management, and together we built a valuable proposition.” Zylbersztejn said he also had the opportunity to build up an immensely valuable professional network. “I was able to meet with leading CEOs, founders, and experts in the field, as well as my colleagues in the MBA, who were talented and driven and came from all over the world. We are still in touch and some have even joined my company as well as become my mentors and friends.” “The MBA provided me with a deep understanding of the weaknesses in the healthcare industry, and a better understanding of the needs of the different stakeholders. The program allowed me to see the weaknesses as opportunities that, combined with the right technology and people, could really add value to people’s lives,” he said. According to Liberman, “Healthcare systems are going through enormous changes worldwide and with the Covid-19, these changes were accelerated. There is an immediate need for a complete redesign that will necessitate innovative multidisciplinary solutions, leveraging technology, science, information systems, and national policy. Our MBA program in Healthcare Innovation, in collaboration with Israel’s largest hospital, the Sheba Medical Center, is designed to prepare the future leaders of the healthcare industry to develop solutions that will enable the needed redesign. The program brings together all the key players of the ecosystem – those coming from the healthcare system, engineering, entrepreneurship, AI, law, biomedicine, pharmacology, high tech, investment, management, and public policy.”

NEW!

GLOBAL MBA: BIG DATA

WE ARE EXCITED TO INTRODUCE OUR BRAND NEW TRACK IN THE GMBA PROGRAM! The information revolution is changing the rules of the game in the business world. Managers must take advantage of the data at their disposal for optimizing their decisions. The Big Data track at Reichman University prepares students to deal with this challenge. • Study core management courses, in addition to data analysis. • For your practical final project, you will work on a real problem in your industry or establish a venture with a Data-Driven Business Model. • Students will travel to New York to visit companies and innovation centers, and to expand their networks with managers and entrepreneurs in the industry. Applicants should have experience as managers, should not be afraid to work with numbers, and should be interested in perfecting and upgrading their management ability through data analysis. No prior programming knowledge is required.

For more information: rris.master@idc.ac.il

SAMMY OFER SCHOOL OF COMMUNICATIONS A training hub for content marketing, media and journalism

/// FREEDOM AND RESPONSIBILITY IN THE NEW WORLD OF COMMUNICATIONS Dr. Amit Lavie-Dinur, Dean

Dr. Amit Lavie-Dinur, new Dean of the Sammy Ofer School of Communications, lays out her vision for the school. “Our school has always been characterized by a broad view of the communications world, always with reference to the new technologies that have appeared in recent decades and have so utterly altered the world of information, media, and society.

Sammy Ofer z”l

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These new technologies have allowed for new freedoms in platforms of expression. Social media, apps, augmented reality and virtual reality have made us all participants in the public media arena. The concepts of freedom of the press and freedom of expression, which in the past were limited to a chosen few, have become applicable to the general public. While such communications technologies offer wonderful freedoms, we must strive, both as a society and as individuals, to develop responsibility, limitations, and professional ethics for the use of these technologies and open spaces, so as to prevent harm to individuals and to society. This is my greatest challenge as Dean, and this is what I am focusing on in the bachelor’s and master’s degree programs.

/// AUDIOVERSITY GIVES VOICE TO THE ISSUES In addition, over the past two years of the pandemic, we have discovered the technologies of learning and teaching from a distance. These all permit new freedoms in learning, training, and academia. And yet, questions of responsibility also arise. Who are the learners? Which technologies make it possible for everyone to realize their right to learn? How do we protect the rights of the various learners and of the lecturers? My goal is for our school to lead the use of training and the teaching of the new communications technologies, both for academic purposes and for training and employment purposes, and even for additional social purposes such as leisure, tourism, and culture. All of these must be done with environmental and social responsibility, taking care to avoid the potential harm that occurs all the time in these new spaces. This school provides, and will continue to provide, innovative skills and abilities in all communications fields, and I will continue to place particular weight on how we create the limitations, frameworks, and content that so greatly influence awareness. My focus for the coming years is to continue to develop this school in the spirit of Reichman University’s motto of freedom and responsibility.”

Formerly known as IDC Radio, AudioVersity initiates and takes part in events throughout the academic year, covering events on campus, creating diverse content, producing popular podcasts, and giving a voice to students and faculty members. Despite the challenges of the pandemic, AudioVersity continued to broadcast as usual and began the 2021-2022 academic year with more than 450 applications from students, both Israeli and international, who wanted to join the station. After receiving special training, the students were able to produce, edit, host, and broadcast their podcasts to listeners in Israel and abroad, via AudioVersity’s website and various podcast applications. A major event covered by AudioVersity was the 20th International Institute for Counter-Terrorism’s annual conference at Reichman University, with secondyear, Government student Dan Ganor, recording live interviews with leading participants such as Knesset member Nir Barkat, Amb. Ron Prosor, former head of the Abba Eban Institute, and Igal Unna, Director General at the Israel. AudioVersity also covered the Institute for Policy and Strategy’s Security and Policy Conference, which was opened by Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. Third-year Government students Hila Roded and Sharon Bresler conducted interviews with Knesset member Yuli Edelstein and with Channel 12’s Palestinian affairs correspondent, Ohad Hemo. 77

Several special podcast episodes were produced by AudioVersity to highlight significant topics. To mark International Day for People with Disabilities, a graduate of the communications school, Eden Ornstein, interviewed fellow student Sean Yorman, a communications student in her final year, who spoke about dealing with celebral palsy, the importance of accessibility in everyday life, and how Reichman University is a truly accessible institution for those with disabilities. Another special was produced for International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, which featured an interview by Keren Asaf, an M.A. in Law student, with Dr. Galia Sheinboim, a law professor at Reichman University, on sexual offenses and sexual harassment, as well as a discussion with Adv. Ziv Lidror, Director of the Street Law Legal Clinic. AudioVersity represented Israel in the annual World College Radio Day event, a 24-hour global marathon of stations from all over the world that aired in more than 500 college radio stations around the world. The theme of the day was “In tough times we thrive,” and AudioVersity, which is a member of the event’s advisory board, was proud to represent Israel and feature one of the hours in the marathon, hosted by Yvonne Saba, AudioVersity’s student coordinator, along with student broadcasters Alan Azulay, Gal Balaban, Shiri Epstein and Taly Cohn.

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/// STUDENT CAMPAIGN WORKS TO KICK DISCRIMINATION OFF THE FIELD While a men’s soccer team in Israel’s senior league has an average annual budget of NIS 31.6 million, a women’s soccer team has an average annual budget of just NIS 700,000, Yael Sinai, the representative of women’s rights organization the Israel Women’s Network (“Shdulat HaNashim”) told third-year Reichman University Communications students in the Marketing Lab’s Cross-Platform P.R. course. Three students – Maya Amid, Karin Fendler and Romi Nest – took on the network’s campaign to kick discrimination off the soccer field. After studying the organization’s activities and the campaign brief, they decided that the campaign would focus on raising awareness of the need to reduce gender discrimination in sports. They focused the campaign on three channels in parallel: digital activity, media publications, and social media. For the digital activity, the students recruited 16 senior football players, including Hanan Maman, Shoval Gozlan, Idan Vered, Maor Kandil, and Omri Altman, and produced a video. Karin Sandel, Chairwoman of the Israel Football and Basketball Players’ Association and one of the most recognizable figures in Israeli sports in the fight against discrimination against women, was chosen to be the leading voice of the campaign. The video gained momentum, and actors, journalists and public figures, such as Ofira Asayag and Shiran Sendel joined the initiative. At the same time, Israel Women’s Network’s Facebook page shared the video with a post, which reached over 250,000 people. The social media campaign was accompanied by extensive exposure in the mainstream media.

At the end of the campaign, the students received positive feedback from the management of the Israel Women’s Network, which told the students that the campaign had made a real contribution to raising public awareness of discrimination against women in Israeli sports and had laid an important foundation for the continuing struggle to eradicate the phenomenon in the future. Jordana Dumont, a graduate of the M.A. in Human-Computer Interaction

/// “THEORY INTO PRACTICE” AS PART OF THE M.A. IN HCI PROGRAM The M.A. degree in Human-Computer Interaction at the Sammy Ofer School of Communications is a transformative degree, providing students the methodologies and skills required to lead usercentered products in technology companies, interactive experiences in design companies, and cutting-edge research in academic and industry innovation labs. During their second and third semesters, students can join an industry practicum with leading technological companies in Israel. Jordana Dumont, a former elementary school teacher in New York city, who was looking to transition into a career that combines technology and human perspective to impact the future joined the program in 2020 and interned at monday.com.

Jordana explains: “I interned at monday.com to gain real world experience in UX research, bridging the studies and methodology from our M.A. program with the practices in industry. During my internship, I contributed to three core projects: competitor analysis of relevant products and services, researching and improving existing features for Monday’s users, and developing internal UX Research resources for employees. I saw my coursework come to life, as I applied qualitative research techniques learned in class while forming research questions, interviewing Monday.com users, and communicating findings to the product team. One of the most rewarding aspects of the internship was getting to speak with diverse groups of people across the world and understanding how the product impacts their livelihood and day to day lives. It was motivating to see how our improvements could ultimately deeply resonate with their users.” Jordana graduated the program with success and in her current position as a UX researcher at Lightricks ,a startup company in Israel that helps create powerful products through creative process.

/// MILAB LEADS THE WAY FOR PRACTICAL TECHNOLOGICAL SOLUTIONS Milab, the Media Innovation Lab at the Sammy Ofer School of Communications, has long been known for its groundbreaking research and prototyping work exploring the future of media, technology, and human-computer interaction. More than 100 students take part each year in a variety of B.A. and M.A. teaching programs at the lab, and faculty members are research experts from fields including technology studies, interactive media, design, psychology, and computer science. B.A. students were issued with a challenge to consider how technology can foster transparency and lead to improved behavior and awareness among users. The students had to develop working prototypes, giving them experience in applying theoretical knowledge to practical solutions. Ultimately, they presented a number of ideas and developed several prototypes. One such prototype, called Wattson, was a system for more informed electrical consumption, in which a smart plug measures the electricity usage of devices in the home and an application gives the user updates about the costs in real time.

Wattson: A system for more informed electrical consumption

SeeMe: A physical-digital tree for the classroom

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A second prototype was SeeMe, a digital tree designed to reflect children’s emotions and to encourage discourse about issues such as bullying. The tree is placed in an elementary school classroom and lights up in different colors as the children report positive or negative experiences after school hours. The following day, when the children come into class and see their emotions reflected in the tree, discussions take place about their experiences.

/// NOCAMELS SHINES A SPOTLIGHT ON ISRAEL’S VIBRANT TECH ECOSYSTEM The Asper Foundation dedicated the Asper Institute for New Media Diplomacy at the Sammy Ofer School in 2007. The institute is headed by Prof. Noam Lemelshtrich Latar, Founding Dean of the Sammy Ofer School of Communications and journalist and lecturer Anouk Lorie, who together co-founded NoCamels.com in 2011. Based at the Asper Institute, NoCamels.com is supported by The Asper Foundation.

Courtesy: PLANETech

NoCamels has predicted seven tech trends where Israel could make an impact in 2022 as well as reporting on the record growth in climate tech investment in recent years. In addition to ongoing CoviD-19 coverage NoCamels reported on Israeli research into black holes, the high-profile acquisition of Mobileye by Intel, and immigrants making waves in the tech ecosystem. NoCamels is run by a team of professional journalists, together with Reichman University students.

Gail Asper, President and Trustee, The Asper Foundation

Mobileye’s fleet of self-driving vehicles in Israel Photo: Courtesy of Mobileye

EFI ARAZI SCHOOL OF COMPUTER SCIENCE Combining deep theoretical studies with up-to-date knowledge

Prof. Yacov Hel-Or, Dean

Efi Arazi z”l

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/// NEW B.SC. IN COMPUTER SCIENCE WITH A SPECIALIZATION IN COGNITION AND BRAIN RESEARCH The Efi Arazi School of Computer Science and the Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology are jointly offering a new B.Sc. in Computer Science with a specialization in Cognition and Brain Research. Students in the program will focus on exploring human mental capacities and brain infrastructure, and will learn principles from neuroscience, neurogenetics, the evolution of cognition and emotion, perception, attention, memory, learning, and creative thinking. The program is designed for students interested in becoming acquainted with the behavioral and cognitive sciences, along with neuroscience research, neural computation, and machine-brain interfaces.

/// M.SC. IN MACHINE LEARNING AND DATA SCIENCE As part of Reichman University’s commitment to prioritizing new technologies, the Efi Arazi School of Computer Science offers an innovative intensive M.Sc. program in Machine Learning and Data Science, aimed at providing in-depth theoretical and practical understanding of machine learning, data analysis and data-driven technologies. Now in its fourth year and headed by Prof. Zohar Yakhini, the program offers a series of rigorous mandatory courses, including statistics, machine learning, deep learning, and big data platforms. Also on offer is a wide variety of elective courses, in which the students are exposed to machine learning applications in different domains. The students gain experience in real data science work through course work and by doing a practical final project. “The program is offered through the Efi Arazi School, which allows the students to gain a rigorous understanding of algorithms and statistics. We also leverage existing platforms within the school, such as the CONNECT Computer Science Affiliation Program, to facilitate collaborations with partners in the high-tech industry,” said Dr. Leon Anavy, the program’s Academic Director.

/// NEW COLLABORATION WITH ISRAELI UNICORN QueenB middle school students at Reichman University

/// PARTNERSHIP WITH QUEENB Students from the Efi Arazi School have joined the QueenB initiative, a program that aims to give female middle school students a taste of the worlds of coding and computer science and increase the number of women in the high-tech industry. Women currently make up less than 30 percent of high-tech employees in Israel. “Our goal as instructors is to convey the material in the best and most interesting way, alongside the message that anyone can do it,” said Stav Yemin, coordinator of the program and a second-year Computer Science student at Reichman University. She said the school students are primarily taught programming and website-building skills. Eighthgrade students, who mostly have no prior knowledge, are taught basic programming, while ninth-graders learn more advanced material. In 10th grade, the students are invited to make a personal commitment to QueenB and help the instructors in the meetings with younger participants. During the program the students also hear from inspiring women in the industry about their experiences. The Reichman University students who participate in this program receive a scholarship funded by our CONNECT affiliation program.

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MONDAY.COM

Much has been said about the high-tech problem, and the paradox of today’s labor market. On the one hand, there is a huge shortage of skilled workers and on the other hand, fresh graduates with a bachelor’s degree, have difficulty finding their first job as companies are looking for proven experience and if possible, proven talent. The CONNECT Computer Science Affiliation Program at the Efi Arazi School of Computer Science addresses this challenge and attracts dozens of new companies who join the program in order to have the opportunity to connect with undergraduate and graduate students during their study phase in a variety of capacities – project facilitation, guest lectures, courses and workshops delivered in close collaboration with the companies. In turn, scholarships are provided to excelling students. Companies can also connect with the academy, and their employees are invited to courses as free listeners where they are exposed to the forefront of research in various fields. They are also invited to conduct collaborative research with our students. “It’s a net profit for all parties – the students, the companies and the school,” says Prof. Anat Bremler-Barr, Academic Director of CONNECT. “Academic studies are enriched with the content and technologies of the high-tech industry, and the CONNECT program is able to provide opportunities which include scholarships for excellent students. The new collaboration with monday.com, an Israeli unicorn is very exciting and has taken the program to the next level. The company has created a monday.com community on campus where students receive scholarships on behalf of monday.com, and enjoy enrichment activities by the company.”

Yuval Azulay, Vice President of Programs at monday. com elaborates on the company perspective, “We are proud to take part in this important dialogue between academia and the industry. We see this as an opportunity to proactively support the career growth of future computer science engineers, even before they enter the job market.” Other companies who have joined the program include Microsoft, Salesforce, Red Hat, WhiteSource, CrazyLabs and Similarweb. Gili Dinstein, CEO of Friends of Reichman University and External Relations Israel, is proud that “so many companies have joined the program, either because our graduates are in key positions in those companies, entrepreneurs have recommend it to them or simply because of the excellent reputation of the school.” For more information: https://www.runi.ac.il/en/schools/computerscience/connect-program/

Prof Anat Bremler-Barr

/// SPOTLIGHT ON PH.D. STUDENT ORON NIR “Video understanding is a field of artificial intelligence which fascinates me, particularly in relation to animation. This domain presents many unique challenges, which is why I’ve decided to pursue my passion in my postdoctoral studies under the supervision of Prof. Ariel Shamir, Former Dean of the Efi Arazi School of Computer Science. Animation presents many challenges because characters can change appearance as well as shape more drastically than in photorealistic (nonanimated) movies. By tracking characters throughout a video, we have been able to learn a representation that groups them by identity, even when they change their outfits, pose and even their shape. This kind of capability has far reaching possibilities. For example, it could assist with analyzing the cast of a video, monitoring gender bias in animation, or when retrieving video highlights. I am pleased to advise that my research paper was recently accepted to Eurographics – the European Association for Computer Graphics.”

Ph.D. student Oron Nir 85

TIOMKIN SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS Preparing the global financial leaders of tomorrow

Prof. Zvi Eckstein, Dean

Judy and Avi Tiomkin

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/// WORKING TOWARDS STUDENT SUCCESS AND PUBLIC FINANCIAL LITERACY The Tiomkin School of Economics has not only been working to give students the tools to succeed in the international high-tech market, it has been reaching out to increase financial literacy among the general public as well. Together with the Aaron Institute for Economic Policy, the Tiomkin School held a seminar for students titled “Economists in the High-Tech Market.” The keynote address was delivered by Prof. Zvi Eckstein, Dean of the Tiomkin School and Head of the Aaron Institute, who spoke about. He was followed by Ronen Nir, Senior Advisor at Viola Ventures, and Shani Breslauer, Financial Operations Project Manager at Pagaya, who provided an overview of the positions available to economists in startup companies, especially in the fintech sector, and then by Gilad Yehudai, Head of Finance at the Israeli office of Palo Alto Networks, who reviewed the range of positions offered to economists by large international high-tech firms.

Nirit Eibi Birman, who was in the first cohort of graduates from the Tiomkin School and is currently the Business Development Manager (EMEA) at Amazon Web Services, described her professional path and gave the students tips for rapid and successful integration into the high-tech market. The lectures were followed by a question-andanswer session with the speakers, moderated by Tiomkin School second-year students Adi Or and Michal Oren. Israel’s first conference on financial literacy was held at Reichman University by the Tiomkin School together with the Financial Growth Center of Bank Hapoalim. The conference aimed to provide financial organizations, economic consultants, and the general public with knowledge and tools to cope with the financial crisis caused by the pandemic. Organized by Dr. Moran Ofir from the Harry Radzyner Law School and Dr. Guy Hochman and Prof. Shahar Ayal from the Harry Radzyner Law School, the conference featured panels with Israeli CEOs, regulators, and leaders of financial and social institutions. Keynote speaker Prof. Uri Gneezy, the Epstein/Atkinson Endowed Chair in Behavioral Economics and Professor of Economics and Strategy at the University of California in San Diego’s Rady School of Management, a renowned expert in behavioral economics, spoke about the ways in which incentives shape behavior.

/// AARON INSTITUTE CONFERENCE FOCUSES ON CRISIS AS OPPORTUNITY The Aaron Institute of Economic Policy held its annual conference on the topic “The Exit from the Covid Crisis” and attracted numerous distinguished participants, including senior government officials, leading business people, and prominent academics. Prof. Uriel Reichman, Founding President of Reichman University and Chairman of the Board of Directors, gave the opening speech and outlined the achievements of the Aaron Institute and Reichman University. He was followed by Prof. Lawrence Summers, former U.S. Treasury Secretary and former Director of the White House National Economic Council, in conversation with Dr. Nadine Bodo-Trachtenberg, former Bank of Israel Deputy Governor. Summers spoke of his concerns that future policies will repeat past mistakes. Next were Prof. Amir Yaron, Bank of Israel Governor, and Shlomo Dovrat, Chairman of the Aaron Institute Board and founder and general partner at Viola Ventures. Yaron spoke of how the high government budget deficit is a significant problem, and that policies should focus on supporting economic growth, while Dovrat discussed the development of the high-tech industry, and warned that powerful monopolies such as Google and Facebook are a threat to the success of smaller companies. The following day, the first session revolved around economic policy for crisis recovery. Prof. Zvi Eckstein, Dean of the Tiomkin School of Economics and Head of the Aaron Institute, gave a lecture titled “The Crisis as an Opportunity for a Growth-Enhancing Policy.” He was followed by several senior speakers from the private and public sectors, among them Prof. Avi Simchon, former Head of the National Economic Council, who was interviewed by Prof. Omer Moav,

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Chairman of the conference and a lecturer at the Tiomkin School. Moav criticized the financial benefits handed out during the pandemic by the Netanyahu government, but Simhon disagreed, arguing that extended unemployment benefits had caused little damage to employment and that money transfers supported economic activity. Yogev Gardus, Budget Director at the Finance Ministry, spoke of how the construction of underground mass transportation in Israel’s center is crucial. Knesset member Mansour Abbas, head of the United Arab List, Deputy Knesset Speaker and Chairman of the Special Parliamentary Committee on Arab Society Affairs, gave a plenary address titled “Economic Policy for Israeli Arab Society,” in which he discussed long-term plans for the sector. He was followed by Dr. Marian Tehawkho, Director of the Aaron Institute’s Center for Economic Policy for Arab Society in Israel, in conversation with Yael Mevorach, Director General of the Social Equality Ministry, and Hassan Tawafra, Director of the Authority for Economic Development of Arab Society, on the topic of “A Five-Year Plan for Israeli Arab Society.” The discussion addressed the special challenges facing the sector, especially the need for investment in digital infrastructure and the crucial need to improve the education system.

WORKING TO RESOLVE ISSUES IN ISRAELI SOCIETY As well as its annual conference, the Aaron Institute also held several significant roundtable conferences on a variety of issues facing Israeli society, attended by decision-makers, experts, academics, and leading public figures. One such discussion took place in the northern Israeli Arab town of Ar’ara, on the topic “A Policy for Reducing the Divide between Arab and Hebrew Education.” Attended by Ar’ara Mayor and Chairman of the Council of Heads of Arab Municipalities Mudar Younes, the discussion was led by the Aaron Institute’s

A panel on social activities for financial literacy at Israel’s first conference on financial literacy (from left): Omer Peretz, founder of Clyf, Dr. Tali Regev of the Tiomkin School, Karin Meyer, former head of Bank Hapoalim’s Financial Growth Center, David Kochmeister, former CEO of Paamonim, and Bar Shade, host of the panel and a graduate of the M.A. program in Social Psychology

Dr. Marian Tehawkho. At the conference, Aaron Institute researchers recommended setting specific outcome and input targets to improve student proficiency and results in the Arab sector education system. Outcome targets include increasing Hebrew fluency so that by 2030, 90 percent of Arab sector students will be eligible for Hebrew matriculation and the overall secondary school completion rate will be at least 95 percent, similar to that in the Hebrew education sector. Input targets include improving the quality of teachers and teaching through incentive programs that offer rewards to teachers and principals to meet performance targets, encourage professional development, and measure improvements to teaching skills. Tehawkho emphasized in her lecture that the public education system fails to reduce the large gaps between the graduates of the Arab and Hebrew systems, and fails to provide its graduates with the required skills to integrate into the labor market.

The Aaron Institute also held a roundtable discussion on campus titled “Increase the Debt, Invest, Grow.” Prof. Zvi Eckstein presented a study he co-authored with Aaron Institute senior researcher Dr. Sergei Sumkin and with Prof. Benny Bental, Chairman of the Taub Center’s Economic Policy Program, which found that the current low interest rates in Israel represent a historic opportunity to invest in growth-enhancing projects, particularly public infrastructure. In particular, increasing public capital investment by 2 percent of gross domestic product each year until 2030 would boost the growth rate of the Israeli economy far more than predicted by the Bank of Israel without such investment. While there was a broad consensus among the participants that the government should invest in growth-enhancing infrastructure, several concerns were raised, in particular, that the government might interpret investment in a very broad way and use the recommendation to increase public debt to finance spending that is not helpful for economic growth, and that it would avoid optimizing the existing budget, leading to wasteful spending and a larger debt burden on future generations, without investing sufficiently to increase their incomes and welfare.

Dr. Yael Hadass (far left), Academic Head of Economics

/// RRIS BUSINESS STUDENTS TOUR THE BANK OF ISRAEL Third-year students in the B.A. in Business Administration and Economics degree program at the Raphael Recanati International School had the opportunity to visit the Bank of Israel, where they heard a talk by Lilah Shema-Zlatokrilov, a Bank of Israel researcher in financial innovation, and toured the exhibition in the visitors’ center, led by curator Ravit Dekel. There they learned about the bank’s role and activities and about the history of Israeli money. Two students, Yehuda Stone and David Muscati, gave a presentation on crypto currencies and bank digital currencies.

at the Raphael Recanati International School, with the students at the Bank of Israel

/// ALUMNI SHARE EXPERIENCES WITH STUDENTS Dr. Yael Hadass, Academic Head of Economics, invited nine Reichman University alumni now working in prestigious high-tech, management consulting, venture capital and banking companies to share their experiences in the labor market with current and prospective students. The event was a great success, with the alumni telling the students how they found their jobs, what their daily work routines involve, and about their future promotion prospects. Many of the students later contacted the speakers and formed an important network for future job searches. The panel participants were: Sacha Dray, Barbara Spizzichino, Eitan Dooreck-Aloni, Zach Blank, Kyle Blank, Sara Wahlhaus, Saul Levin, Simon Rouxel-Haouzi, and Josh Rod.

From left: Noam Zetouni, Adi Zetouni, Dr .Yael Hadass, Skye Solomon, Rebecca Nathan

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OneOne YearYear

One-Year

Take your Take your career totothe tonext thelevel next Boost yourcareer career the next levellevel We are pleased to introduce our MBA program in Healthcare Innovation, offered by Reichman University’s Arison School of Business, in collaboration with Israel’s largest hospital, The Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Tel HaShomer, ranked among the top ten hospitals in the world.

PROF. VARDA LIBERMAN Provost Head & Director MBA in Healthcare Innovation Reichman University

Our program is designed to prepare future healthcare leaders to develop solutions that will enable them to redesign the industry on the technological, scientific, pharmaceutical, digital, and policy levels.

PROF. YITSHAK KREISS Director General The Chaim Sheba Medical Center Tel HaShomer

The program brings together all the unique advantages of Israeli innovation, to provide our students with the tools and skills necessary to understand the complexity of the healthcare industry today. Our curriculum and practical experience emphasize innovative thinking and entrepreneurship. We are inviting you to join our group of talented professionals who will be tomorrow’s leaders in the healthcare ecosystem.

Dr. Chidanand Kumar, MD, MBA India

Nicole Schvartzman Gdud, MBA Brazil

Health-Tech, Bio-Convergence, Healthcare Investments

Project Manager, Healthcare Team Leader at Meidata

The Healthcare Innovation MBA is a very unique and dynamic program that brings together a carefully selected multidisciplinary group of people, all with the same drive for innovation in healthcare. This one-year program has completely changed the way I approach problems in the healthcare industry. The excellent selection of guest lecturers, networking opportunities, and most of all, the hands-on practicum, makes this an excellent program for anyone who wants to be an innovator/entrepreneur in the healthcare industry.”

The MBA in Healthcare Innovation provided me with the most amazing and multidisciplinary group of people; each of them bringing unique skills, areas of expertise, levels of experience and great passion for improving healthcare. Through its lectures and hands-on experiences, this one-year program gave me the tools and confidence to understand and approach any healthcare-related challenge. This experience definitely helped me grow further in my professional career.”

For more information: rris.master@idc.ac.il 91

HARRY RADZYNER LAW SCHOOL At the forefront of legal education, academic research and service to society

Prof. Lior Zemer, Dean

Dr. Harry L. Radzyner z”l

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/// STUDENTS FOCUS ON URBAN RENEWAL The Harry Radzyner Law School’s Clinic for Housing Rights and Urban Development opened the school year with a tour of the southern seaside city of Ashdod to study urban renewal. Hosted by the Ashdod Municipality, the students heard from Head of the Ashdod Urban Renewal Administration Lior Levy about the contribution urban renewal planning makes to housing quality, as well as the challenges involved in it. They visited several major urban renewal centers across the city, as well as residential apartment buildings undergoing reinforcement and renovation under a special government program and other residential construction sites. The tour was followed by further theoretical study in the classroom. During the semester, students provided legal assistance to residents of various cities on issues relating to urban renewal, helping them to learn and exercise their legal rights. The clinic worked with the Urban Renewal Administration in the cities of Holon, Ramle and Kfar Saba and provided its service for free, with the Urban Renewal Administration paying a symbolic amount to the clinic for its assistance.

The clinic also staged a negotiating exercise in which students were divided into several groups and worked on reviewing a contract for eviction pending construction, so as to best protect the interests of home owners. Each group met with a lawyer from a leading firm in the area of urban renewal and worked with them on the agreement. The exercise enabled students to gain valuable practical experience from experts in the field.

/// CEO ADDRESSES GAZIT GLOBE INSTITUTE Oren Hod, the Deputy CEO and Vice President of Operations at the Gazit Globe Institute for Real Estate Research, was the guest speaker at a Gazit Globe Institute lecture on current real estate practices and challenges, held in the framework of the MBA in Business Administration with a specialization in real estate at the Arison School of Business. There was also a series of other lectures, open to the public via Zoom, including on the quality of planning and construction in Israel and on whether working near home has become a trend for office workers.

Legal Clinic students at the first training day at Pearl Cohen Zedek Latzer Baratz law office in Tel Aviv

/// FOLKMAN GLADSTONE LEGAL CLINIC FOR STARTUPS HELPS UNDERPRIVILEGED POPULATIONS

The clinic’s academic year commenced with three intensive training days to prepare the students for their work with the clients with lectures in various fields, such as, contract drafting, corporate structure, intellectual property, labor law, tax law, terms of use & privacy policy and many more. The training days were hosted by our legal partners, Pearl Cohen Zedek Latzer Baratz Law.

The Folkman Gladstone Legal Clinic for Startups, which provides free legal services to entrepreneurs from underrepresented communities, has launched several new collaborations with organizations with similar interests, such as Nefesh B’Nefesh, 50:50 Startups, Aharai! and many more. Such collaborations help the clinic to reach out to new groups of entrepreneurs from underrepresented communities and provide valuable services where others fail to see the potential. Joey Folkman Students from the Clinic for Housing Rights and Urban Development in Ashdod

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Roger Gladstone

Prof. Dov Greenbaum (standing, far right), Director of the Zvi Meitar Institute, with the first cohort of students in the M.A. in Law, Technology and Business Innovation program

/// PH.D. IN LAW REACHES NEW HEIGHTS The Harry Radzyner Law School Ph.D. in Law program, which offers small groups of distinguished students the chance to pursue independent research projects at the highest academic level, entered its third year with a cohort of 15 select students. From the outset, the program has aimed to admit doctoral candidates from diverse careers, especially established practitioners and lawyers working in the public sector. Among the current cohort are Knesset members Rabbi Moshe Arbel and Rabbi Gilad Kariv, and the Deputy Director of the Israel Patent Office, Jacqueline Bracha. We expect the first graduate to be musician and lawyer Eyal Brook who is specializing in the field of IP (intellectual property) Several of the doctoral candidates have completed the first stage of their studies and have moved on to the second stage, in which they conduct their independent research.

/// FIRST COHORT GRADUATES WITH M.A. IN LAW, TECHNOLOGY AND BUSINESS INNOVATION The first cohort of students from the M.A. Law, Technology and Business Innovation program graduated last summer, with three of the graduates continuing on to the school’s Ph.D. program, and 12 students joining the thesis track. The unique multidisciplinary M.A. program is designed for legal and non-legal graduates alike, and offers an advanced degree dealing with the intersection between law, science, technology and business. Now in its fourth year, the current program has more than 100 students. In the 2021-2022 academic year, the school launched a new and innovative Technology Transfer Program, led by Harvard University’s Senior Associate Provost and Chief Technology Development Officer, Isaac Kohlberg. The new program enables students to engage practically with a wide range of emerging technologies and their applications to different fields.

Speakers present at the conference on the digital mental health industry

/// SHIRA BANKI ANTI-HATE LEGAL CLINIC REACHES THE KNESSET The Shira Banki Anti-Hate Legal Clinic, launched in 2016 by the Harry Radzyner Law School in conjunction with the Berl Katznelson Foundation and the Shira Banki’s Way Foundation to fight racism and incitement, recently hosted the launch of a Knesset lobby for fighting violence on social media, initiated by MK Meir Itzhak Halevy. Shira Banki z”l was a teenager stabbed to death by an ultra-Orthodox extremist at a pride march in Jerusalem in 2015. At the launch event, prominent speakers included the Justice Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Gideon Saar, Former Supreme Court Justice Edna Arbel, and Founding President and Chairman of the Board of Directors Prof. Uriel Reichman.

Shira Banki z”l

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/// ZVI MEITAR INSTITUTE PAVES THE WAY FOR DIGITAL MENTAL HEALTH INDUSTRY The Zvi Meitar Institute for Legal Implications of Emerging Technologies held a conference on the digital mental health industry, in collaboration with the Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, and the Ehrlich Group. Keynote speaker Roy Wisner, Managing Director of the aMoon Investment Fund, said the conference was especially timely as advancements in digital health services combined with the pandemic had created a demand for digital mental health services. Representatives from successful startups and industry professionals presented two panel sessions that discussed the future of mental health technology and the challenges of detecting mental distress using artificial intelligence. Guests included (from left in above photo) Dr. Amir Gefen, Business Development Consultant, Mood Knight 4 Girls, Haddas Herzog-Manor, CEO and co-founder of CoBe Labs, and Yael Pomerance, Deputy Director of the National Suicide Prevention Program at the Health Ministry.

/// ANNUAL ZMI ALUMNI EVENT Special guests at the annual ZMI Alumni event

Prof. Dov Greenbaum (standing at left), Director of the Zvi Meitar Institute, and Inbar Carmel (seated near front, third from right), Program Manager at the Zvi Meitar Institute, with alumni at the annual ZMI alumni event

The fourth annual ZMI Alumni event was held at Microsoft’s headquarters in Herzliya, and, despite the rain and pandemic restrictions, brought together a large turnout, offering former and current students an opportunity to connect or reconnect and enlarge their networks. Adi Diamant, Microsoft’s Partner Director for Advanced Technology Labs, gave an engrossing talk on Microsoft’s principles for responsible AI. From left: Prof. Dov Greenbaum, Director of the Zvi Meitar Institute, Dafna Meitar-Nechmad, Zvi and Ofra Meitar Family Fund, Dr. Aviv Gaon, Executive Director of the Harry Radzyner Law School, Linda Rubinstein, post doctorate student at the Zvi Meitar Institute, and Ofra and Aviad Meitar, also Zvi and Ofra Meitar Family Fund.

BARUCH IVCHER SCHOOL OF PSYCHOLOGY Changing the world through science

Prof. Anat Brunstein Klomek, Dean

Baruch Ivcher

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/// BARUCH IVCHER SCHOOL OF PSYCHOLOGY VISION Prof. Anat Brunstein Klomek, new Dean of the Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, lays out her vision for the school. “The Covid pandemic has increased emotional burdens and distress, posing a significant challenge for individuals, societies and organizations. It is has become more acceptable to express mental pain, discuss organizational difficulties, and ask for help. We are very happy to see a change of attitude from the government, which has been putting greater emphasis on mental health of both individuals and groups. It is important to point out that prevention is effective. We believe that the Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology can help individuals, groups and organizations learn how to be aware of the mental aspects of life and learn how to develop the skills needed to deal with psychological hardships.

The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology has four current goals. The first goal is to create more connections within the school. Students will be offered the chance to enroll in a mentorship program, in which they will meet graduate mentors who have established their psychological careers. Second, the school will invest in becoming more accessible to the general public and making our research findings applicable more than ever. We want every child, adolescent, adult, and elderly person to be familiar with the concept of psychological health. This includes understanding what to do to prevent pathological processes, as well as how to deal with stress and crises. One mission, for example, is to educate all members of society on how to improve emotional, cognitive, interpersonal social and bodily skills. Our third goal is to continue to expand our interdisciplinary perspective. We are working on expanding our collaboration with each and every one of the schools on campus. Our last goal is to make our school more international. We are looking for additional collaboration with faculties abroad and for more potential student exchange programs. We encourage every collaboration among students, faculty, labs and clinics, to continue to build our international effort.”

/// WORKING TO IMPROVE MORAL BEHAVIOR Studies in behavioral ethics show that while most people value honesty and morality, when an opportunity arises to benefit from immoral behavior, many people will choose to act on it, at least to a certain extent. Prof. Shahar Ayal and Dr. Guy Hochman from Reichman University, together with Prof. Jeremy Celse from the University of Burgundy, recently conducted field research to test whether focused behavioral tools could reduce immoral behavior more effectively than traditional external enforcement and penalties. For their study, they chose to tackle fare evasion in the French train system, which is estimated to run as high as 25 percent and to cost some €600 million annually in direct losses, with a further €195 million lost each year from the costs of combating fare evasion: ticket inspectors, anti-evasion technologies, and more. Rather than relying on traditional enforcement methods, the researchers designed a behavioral tool to encourage moral behavior and compliance with the rules, based on two internal enforcement techniques: social proof and visibility. Social proof involves behavior being influenced by the actions of others, while visibility involves the feeling of being watched by others. The researchers tested whether creating a social norm – a poster placed in a French train station stating that 90 percent of passengers there pay their fares – and the feeling of being watched would encourage moral behavior and reduce fare evasion. They found that after passengers had been exposed to the poster for two weeks, together with cues suggesting that people were watching, fare evasion decreased by 53 percent. The findings suggest that by understanding human behavior and implementing behavioral tools, immoral behavior can be reduced efficiently and cost-effectively.

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Loralee West

/// LORALEE WEST LAB RESEARCHES RESILIENCE The Loralee West Laboratory for Brain Research and Human Development, housed in the Center for Developmental Social Neuroscience and headed by Simms-Mann Chair in Developmental Neuroscience Prof. Ruth Feldman together with Dr. Orna ZagoorySharon, combines groundbreaking psychological and biological research into subjects including hormones, genetics, the digestive system, and the immune system. Studies have been advancing into diverse topics, including the neurobiology of close relationships, new therapies for post-partum depression, and the microbiome (gut bacteria) in post-traumatic stress disorder to detect a signature for mental health. Several current projects are assessing the role of chemical signals in human communication and specifically how people process information subliminally from their partners through the sense of smell. Another project examines how exposure to its mother’s smell impacts an infant’s neural synchronicity with others.

Dr. Guy Hochman

/// PROF. AMIR AMEDI PIONEERS BRAIN, COGNITION AND TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH World-renowned neuroscientist Prof. Amir Amedi, Founding Director of the Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition and Technology, is a recognized pioneer in multisensory and cross-modal plasticity research. He has been working with his team of 20 students and professionals from Israel and abroad to conduct groundbreaking research into the mechanisms of sensory perception by the brain, and to develop and test new multisensory technologies designed to improve mental health by combating chronic pain, decreasing anxiety, and inducing relaxation. Among the projects they are working on are a study in collaboration with the Radiotherapy and Cancer Institute at the Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem, where they are developing innovative technologies and environments to reduce anxiety and relax children and adults undergoing treatments for cancer in the hospital. Once established at Shaare Zedek, it is planned to implement the technologies in further hospitals in Israel and internationally. Another project is working to tackle the visual challenges faced by helicopter pilots, who must watch a thermal camera with one eye while watching their surroundings with the other. Amedi has been holding discussions with the Israeli Air Force’s technology development unit on the cognitive training methods of pilots and sensory technologies in the cockpit. The project aims to ease the challenges for the pilots using scientific training methods and applying sensory substitution technologies.

Prof. Amir Amedi

Amedi and his team are also studying more effective methods for meditation and mindfulness, which can assist those seeking to overcome addiction, chronic pain, depression, stress, and other issues. It is well known that during such exercises, the mind can wander, reducing the effectiveness of the process. Amedi’s team has aimed to combat this by building a unique research environment in which the subject undergoes a soothing, allencompassing multisensory experience, with touch stimuli from vibrating motors, sights from virtual reality, and sounds from numerous speakers. This enveloping multisensory environment creates a deep focus and sense of peace. Another major project developed by Amedi and his team is “EyeMusic,” a sensory substitution tool that provides sightless people with visual information through music. The tool enables a blind person to identify the shapes, locations, and colors of objects, “hearing” an image of 1,500 pixels in one second of music.

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SCHOOL OF SUSTAINABILITY

Preparing students to tackle global climate challenges

Prof. Yoav Yair, Dean

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/// LEADING RESEARCH INTO FUTURE CHALLENGES

/// WATER, ENERGY AND FOOD COME TOGETHER

The need to tackle climate change climbed to the top of the international agenda in 2021, with numerous countries pledging to reach zero carbon emissions by 2050 in the wake of the international climate conference in Glasgow. At the same time, the ongoing pandemic and its effects emphasized the need to reshape priorities to improve social, economic and environmental resilience and wellbeing for all people. At Reichman University’s School of Sustainability, faculty members are leading groundbreaking research into the challenges and solutions for sustainability in the future.

Water, energy and food are all resources necessary for human wellbeing and social stability. Although traditionally managed as separate sectors, it has become increasingly clear that this concept needs to be revised and the areas need to be integrated, into what has been termed the Water-Energy-FoodEcosystems nexus. This WEFE nexus is the subject of a major research project being conducted by a consortium from Reichman University’s School of Sustainability, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and other leading practitioners, in collaboration with the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre, with Israel’s Energy Ministry funding the Israeli research. At Reichman University, the research is being conducted by: Prof. Yoav Yair, Dean of the School of Sustainability, who is leading the work on local climate scenarios and evaluating the implications for water, energy and food resources; Prof. Yael Parag Cohen Mintz, Vice Dean of the School of Sustainability, whose team is modeling the Israeli energy system and examining its interface with water and agriculture; and Dr. Shiri Zemah-Shamir, senior lecturer at Reichman University, who is leading the economic assessment of the trade-offs and links between resources and the environment. “Israel’s population is rapidly growing, and so is the demand for water, energy and food,” said Parag. “To be able to provide these resources while minimizing negative impacts on the natural environment, we must manage them wisely and carefully. The WEFE research, which explores the relations and tradeoffs between these resources, will help policymakers in Israel manage them in a sustainable way.”

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Dr. Shiri Zemah Shamir

Prof. Yael Parag Cohen Mintz

/// PROBING FUTURE ENERGY CHALLENGES A sustainable and resilient energy system aims to achieve three goals: energy security, energy equity, and environmental sustainability. But balancing those three goals – also known as the “energy trilemma” – can be a challenge, with one often coming at the expense of another. And while this challenge has been studied for traditional energy systems, few studies have considered future energy systems, which are expected to be low-carbon, renewable, decentralized, and liberalized, bringing new dilemmas and trade-offs that are not currently addressed and can be hard to envisage. Prof. Yael Parag and Dr. Shiri Zemah-Shamir, in collaboration with researchers from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and with funding from the Israeli Science Foundation, are investigating how future energy systems are likely to look in terms of innovative technologies and new players, and how these technologies and players will affect the ability to achieve the energy trilemma goals. One output of the research will be a modified trilemma evaluation index that captures the unique characteristics of future systems.

Dr. Nathan Marom 104 | Herzliyan 2022

/// PLANNING POLICY TO REDUCE PERSONAL CARBON EMISSIONS Personal carbon trading, or PCT, has been touted as a policy that aims to reduce individual carbon emissions by focusing on energy users rather than producers, targeting household and personal transport energy use in particular – both of which are significant components of emissions in developed economies. A PCT policy would involve establishing a national cap on personal carbon emissions, which would shrink in line with national emission reduction targets, giving each person an equal per capita carbon allowance for them to use for activities that result in carbon emissions, such as purchasing fuel for cars or domestic electricity. Individuals who emit more than their allocated allowance would be able to purchase additional credits, while those who emit less would be able to sell their credits. The theory is that the policy would deliver change by working on three different mechanisms to change behavior: economic, putting a price tag on personal emissions; cognitive, bringing increased awareness of personal emissions; and societal, creating a new social norm of low-carbon lifestyles. With the growing concern around climate change, PCT policy attracts the interest of policy makers. Prof. Yael Parag and Dr. Tina Fawcett, Senior Researcher and Acting Deputy Leader of the energy research team at Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute, have been investigating the possibilities of PCT for more than a decade and argue that carbon allowances would recognize individuals as world citizens with a moral responsibility to contribute to protecting current and future generations from the climate crisis. Together with Dr. Francesco Fuso Nerini from KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and Prof. Paul Ekins from University College London,

Prof. Yael Parag Cohen Mintz with students at the Dean’s List Ceremony

Parag and Fawcett published a paper in the journal “Nature Sustainability” discussing how personal carbon allowances could help achieve international climate mitigation targets. They wrote that recent advances in artificial intelligence, together with the increasingly recognized need to move to low-carbon lifestyles, open a new window of opportunity for the policy. They presented a number of design principles for the future adoption of the policy, and concluded that the policy could be trialled in selected technologically advanced countries.

/// WORKING TO SAVE THE WORLD FROM FAMINE Two billion people – roughly a quarter of the world’s population – including some 300 million children, suffer from food insecurity globally, and malnutrition is arguably humanity’s most persistent humanitarian crisis. However, state-of-the-art food systems could already be deployed to help mitigate malnutrition around the world, according to a paper by Reichman University Senior Lecturer Dr. Asaf Tzachor, and Cambridge University researchers Catherine Richards and Lauren Holt, published in the journal “Nature Food.” Tzachor and his fellow researchers wrote that recent events have highlighted the fragility of the conventional agricultural system, with the pandemic disrupting food production, processing and distribution worldwide, and local factors such as cyclones, cattle diseases and insect attacks

Dr. Asaf Tzachor

causing crop and livestock failures in regions already experiencing severe food insecurity. The researchers said that these crises only emphasize the risks of continuing to rely on traditional foods such as wheat, maize and potatoes, and of continuing to cultivate them using standard farming techniques, which require favorable weather and fertile soil. Eradicating malnutrition promptly will require radical advances in farming systems, not just piecemeal improvements in crop and livestock productivity, the researchers said. They proposed that global agriculture be overhauled by deploying innovative food farming systems to achieve healthy, sustainable, and risk-resilient diets. Among the most promising foods of the future are microalgae such as spirulina and chlorella, macroalgae such as sugar kelp, mycoproteins derived from fungi, various insect larvae, and several species of bivalve molluscs, such as mussels. These non-conventional foods are not only rich in essential nutrients, they also offer advantages for sustainability over conventional agriculture, requiring less land and resulting in fewer greenhouse gases. Future farming systems, such as microalgae photobioreactors and insect breeding greenhouses, would be able to continue providing essential nutrition in the face of systemic disturbances. Another benefit would be that such food systems would be compact and discrete, meaning that they could be incorporated into local distribution networks in regional and urban settings alike. The researchers concluded that advances in biotechnology indicate that production of such foods in controlled conditions is already a viable option.

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/// TAKING A BIO-ECONOMIC APPROACH TO SEAWEEDS With seaweeds – macroalgae – expected to become a major food source in the future, Dr. Shiri Zemah-Shamir, and the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research Institute, conducted a study into factors affecting seaweed growth rates and how to maximize output for minimum cost. For the study, two species of seaweeds common in the Mediterranean Sea and already cultivated by the local seaweed industry were grown in two tanks on land. The researchers tested how different levels of carbon dioxide in the sea water, as well as seasonal changes to the water temperature, affected the seaweeds’ growth rates. They found that enriching the sea water with dissolved carbon dioxide to almost double the level found in air led to faster growth for one species and dramatically faster growth for the other. They also found that each species of seaweed grew best at different temperatures. The findings could prove useful for seaweed growers, suggesting which species to grow and where, depending on temperatures and carbon dioxide concentrations. In addition, as well as providing food for human consumption, by taking up carbon dioxide, seaweeds could help ameliorate and regulate global climate change.

/// THE HUMAN FACTOR IN URBAN SUSTAINABILITY Cities house just over half of the world’s population but use 80 percent of the world’s energy and emit more than 75 percent of its carbon emissions. With such an immense impact on the planet, the need for urban sustainability is urgent. Yet cities and their residents are complex systems, and urban sustainability cannot be achieved without an understanding of the human perspective involved. Dr. Nathan Marom, senior lecturer at Reichman University, set out to study the human factor in one city in his long-term project, Tel Aviv Metropolitan Ecologies, funded by the Israel Science Foundation. Together with fellow researchers, he has written two papers from that project on different aspects of the human factor in urban sustainability. The first was written with Dr. Tal Shamur, then doing his post-doctorate at Reichman University and now the ISEF International Visiting Fellow in the Social Anthropology Department at Cambridge University in the U.K. Published in the journal “Local Environment,” the paper suggests that people tend to perceive their urban environment primarily in relation to other people, disregarding actual environmental hazards such as pollution or flooding risks. This finding is particularly true for socially marginalized groups and neighborhoods, where people rely on supportive social networks to overcome daily hardships. Thus longtime residents are seen as an environmental resource, while newcomers and outsiders are perceived as an environmental threat. The second paper, written with Dr. Mor Shilon, a visiting scholar from the Urban Studies and Planning Department at the University of California San Diego, examines how the sensory impressions, physical reactions and emotional responses of activists against air pollution shape their experiences and their tactics, including whether they direct their campaigns to be inclusive or exclusive. Both papers demonstrate that social factors are critical for successful urban sustainability strategies.

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Ashager Araro Photo: Courtesy of Ashager Araro

ASHAGER ARARO: FIGHTING ANTI-SEMITISM AND ADVOCATING FOR ISRAEL ONLINE

Reichman University alumna Ashager Araro is a fighter. Born in Ethiopia and raised in Israel, she speaks out uncompromisingly on causes she feels passionately about, advocating for Israel, for Zionism, and for Ethiopian Jewish heritage, and against racism and anti-Semitism. Currently the Deputy Director of the Israel advocacy platform StandWithUs, she completed her studies at the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy in 2015 and has become one of Israel’s leading global advocates online, with her personal Instagram page, BlackJewishMagic, gaining more than 37,000 followers. Araro was born in extraordinarily harsh circumstances. Operation Solomon, the 1991 operation to bring Ethiopian Jews to Israel, had begun. Araro’s parents set off on foot for the difficult, days-long journey to the capital, Addis Ababa. Her mother was already nine months’ pregnant with her at the time. Araro was born along the way. Her parents named her Ashager, “going forward” in Amharic, symbolizing their journey forward to Israel. Araro says that in Ethiopia, the Jews, including her own family, experienced relentless anti-Semitism, being termed “falasha,” an offensive word meaning “outsider” or “exile,” even though Jews had lived in the country for generations. That anti-Semitism drove Araro’s family, and many other Ethiopian Jews, to seek to immigrate to Israel. “It’s the same old anti-Semitism we experienced in every other country around the world,” she says.

Raised in Yavne in central Israel, Araro completed her army service by graduating top of her class as a lieutenant in the Paratroopers Brigade. “It was there [in the army] I learned how to speak up and conduct myself in a confident manner, particularly in a male dominated environment. I’ve built on this strength in future areas of my life,” she says. While at Reichman University, Araro received an Israel at Heart scholarship. The Israel at Heart program, supported by Joey Low, the Broward Jewish Federation, Dorit and Benjamin Genet, and other generous and kind donors around the world, awards scholarships to outstanding young Israelis of Ethiopian origin. After graduating from Reichman University, Araro founded the Battae Ethiopian Israeli Heritage Center in Tel Aviv in 2019, a unique institution focusing on the story of Ethiopian Jews in Israel. “We offer an important leadership building program for youth, sharing ideas of Zionism through influential characters in Ethiopian Jewish history,” Araro says. “It’s incredible to see a shift in perspectives from the simple act of exploring new ideas, and how owning and narrating our own stories has the power to educate, inspire, and fend off discrimination, often born from ignorance.” She says that many young Jews, despite being Zionists, “feel uneasy” about openly speaking of their support for Israel. “I’m a madly optimistic person, and I truly believe that if Jews from all walks of life unite as one, we can protect our history and dismantle anti-Semitism, one step at a time,” she says. “If we are bold and proud in owning our truth, then no one else can define it for us.” 107

GLOBAL ENGAGEMENT AT REICHMAN UNIVERSITY Christian Jowers, Head of Global Engagement

/// INTERNATIONAL VISITS TO CAMPUS Despite continuing travel restrictions caused by the pandemic, Reichman University was able to host a number of international delegations on visits to campus. Small but important delegations came from: • American University, Washington D.C., United States • Berlin School of Economics and Law, Germany • Pontifical Xaverian University, Bogota, Colombia • O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat, India • PACE University, New York City, United States • Comillas Pontifical University, Madrid, Spain • The Czech Embassy in Israel • The Mexican Embassy in Israel • The Bahraini Embassy in Israel • The Moroccan Embassy in Israel • African delegation of university Vice-Chancellors

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/// AGREEMENTS AND MEMORANDA OF UNDERSTANDING Reichman University also signed a number of new agreements, including student exchange agreements and memoranda of understanding, with academic institutions around the world: • Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates • International University of Rabat, Morocco • James Cook University, Singapore • Metropolitan University Prague, Czech Republic • Mohammed VI Polytechnic University, Rabat, Morocco • Pontifical Xaverian University, Bogota, Colombia • Camilo José Cela University, Madrid, Spain • University of Bucharest, Romania • University of Hong Kong Business School, China • University of Milan, Italy • University of Pisa, Italy • University of Trento, Italy

/// REICHMAN UNIVERSITY PROJECTS RECEIVE MCDONNELL SEED GRANTS Reichman University has been named the recipient of two out of 17 global seed grants awarded by the McDonnell International Scholars Academy at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. The grants provide support to advance competitive research projects shared through the university’s international network. One of the grants was awarded for a project led by Prof. Zvi Eckstein, Dean of the Tiomkin School of Economics, on the effects of the pandemic on social mobility in Israel and the economic impacts of and policy responses to the pandemic in Israel in comparison with the United States. The other grant was awarded for a project led by Prof. Alex Mintz, Director of the Computerized Decision Making Lab and a former Dean and former Provost at Reichman University, on the effects of information processing biases on success or failure in diagnosing Covid patients, with a comparison of American, Canadian, Swiss, and Israeli doctors.

/// REICHMAN UNIVERSITY JOINS SCIENCEABROAD

employment in Israel, and facilitates the return of scientists to Israel. Since its inception in 2006, it has grown to more than 4,500 members across 300 campuses, and more than 1,200 Science Abroad members have returned to Israel. Prof. Daphna Kariv, Head of the Double Major in Business Administration and Entrepreneurship/ Adelson School of Entrepreneurship, Prof. Janko Goldenberg, Professor of Marketing/ Arison School of Business, and Prof. Dov Greenbaum, Director of the Zvi Meitar Institute for Emerging Technologies/ Harry Radzyner Law School, presented their research and career choices via Zoom to 30 Israeli scientists interested in returning to Israel.

/// MASARYK CHAIR MARKS 10 YEARS Reichman University has marked the 10th anniversary of the establishment of the Masaryk Distinguished Chair, named after the late 19th to early 20th century Czechoslovakian statesman and supporter of Zionism Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk and funded initially by the Czech government in the spirit of bilateral cooperation between the Czech Republic and Israel. Since its establishment in 2012, with the support of the Czech government, Reichman University has hosted 41 Masaryk scholars from a variety of Czech universities.

Reichman University has joined ScienceAbroad, an Israel-based nonprofit organization that offers a professional and social network for Israeli scientists living abroad. The organization works to bolster the connection with Israel of scientists living overseas, helps Israeli scientists living abroad find

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At the Student Exchange Fair, back row from left: Jorge Paredes Esteban from Comillas Pontifical University , Madrid, Spain; Mathilde Clanet from Sciences Po Bordeaux, France; and Julián García Restrepo from CESA (the College of Higher Administrative Studies), Bogota, Colombia. Front row: Diego García Gitterle and Michelle Cundy Pombo, both from CESA

/// STUDENT EXCHANGE FAIR SHOWCASES OPPORTUNITIES ABROAD The Office of Global Engagement and Student Exchange held its first Student Exchange Fair on campus, where Reichman University students were able to learn about exchange opportunities abroad. About 70 foreign exchange students from Europe, Asia and South America who are currently studying at Reichman University represented and promoted their home institutions. Reichman University has some 130 bilateral and Erasmus agreements that offer its students a large number and variety of exchange programs with its partner universities around the world. In an average year, Reichman University sends about 200 students abroad and receives about 300 foreign students. Some of the visiting and returned exchange students at Reichman University share their experiences here: Lea Maria Percht, visiting M.A. in International Management and Leadership student from the Lauder Business School, Vienna, Austria:

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“Having found myself in the fortunate set of circumstance of being offered to come to Israel and study at Reichman University for half a year, this place has taught me not only fundamentals beneficial for my future professional path, but also personal connections I will long yearn for afterwards. Despite neither being in the possession of the local language nor a religious background, Israel embraces everyone with open arms and the kindness offered constitutes a once-in-a-lifetime warmth not experienced elsewhere. With Reichman University being one of the leading institutions in the Middle Eastern countries, the privilege of getting exposed to a magnitude of brilliant minds all around campus is what made this stay so noteworthy.” Julia Brase, visiting M.A. in Political Science student from Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany: “My time in Israel and at Reichman University has been a very precious experience for me. The academic life at Reichman University, as well as living in a new country with a new language, brought some challenges but also even more chances. Being able to learn from professors with unique careers, studying with amazing international students and dipping into the culture of a country with so many diverse characteristics was the best experience that I could have wished for. Now, I feel even more prepared to finish my master’s thesis and start working in a field where I can use all the knowledge I gained during the last years.” Marie Gabenisch, visiting M.A. in International Relations student from Sciences Po Bordeaux, France, and the University of Stuttgart, Germany: “As I wanted to specialize in defense and counterterrorism, I thought Reichman University was the perfect place to spend an exchange semester. I was not disappointed. Teachers have both academic and field experience in counter-terrorism, intelligence and defense, which I found stimulating. I decided to prolong this experience – I am coming back next year for another master’s at Reichman University!”

Daniel Lifshitz, LL.B. in Law and Business student at Reichman University, went on exchange to Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, United States: “Taking part in the student exchange program and being a student at Washington University was a great experience for me. I had the chance to meet people from all over the world and create friendships for life, as well as studying and meeting with different cultures. In terms of studies, the law school has the best professors and has huge diversity of classes, which I found really interesting and practical.” Ido Kaplan, B.A. in Economics with Cluster in Technological Entrepreneurship student at Reichman University, went on exchange to Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany: “Participating in the student exchange program in Munich was a once-in-a-lifetime adventure for me. I had the opportunity to study at Germany’s top university and one of the best universities in the world, sharing an apartment abroad with my best friend, studying outstanding and very interesting courses, meeting new people from all over the world, and traveling all across Europe with friends. The exchange program fulfilled my expectations and more, and I am delighted and thankful for the opportunity.” Noa Morad, B.A. in Law and Government student at Reichman University, went on exchange to Paris Dauphine University, France: “I spent the last semester at Paris Dauphine University and it was amazing. Dauphine University welcomed the exchange students with great hospitality and really made us feel at home. The exchange student office at Dauphine was always there for us and was eager to help with anything. The professors went out of their way to integrate the exchange students during lessons and to make everything understandable for us. Living in Paris was a dream come true. Living in such a cultural city was amazing. I met new people from all around the world, made friends and lots of memories.”

Sophia Baranes, B.A. in Sustainability and Government student at Reichman University, went on exchange to Universidad San Francisco de Quito (Galápagos Campus), Ecuador: “Studying at the Galápagos and Tiputini Biodiversity Station extension program of USFQ was a dream come true in so many ways. Throughout the program, we learned how to conduct meaningful research within the Amazon rainforest and all over the Galápagos islands, both on land and at sea. The wildlife was beyond comparison to anything I had ever seen, and each day felt like I was living in National Geographic. From giant tortoises and thousands of bird species to a group of hammerhead sharks, I was lucky enough to witness the true beauty of our planet, and learn the importance of why we must save it.”

Noam Genet, B.A. in Communications student at Reichman University, went on exchange to IE Business School, Madrid, Spain: “Words can’t describe my semester abroad. I am incredibly grateful to have studied at IE Madrid on exchange. I even took the travel experience a step further and lived with a Spanish family. The entire trip was totally out of my comfort zone, which posed numerous challenges. However, overcoming these obstacles allowed me to immerse myself into Spanish culture and to connect to students from all over the world. It’s something that I will never forget.” 111

Founder and supporter Joey Low (in the back row with a blue cap) with Israel at Heart students

REICHMAN UNIVERSITY SUPPORTS SCHOLARSHIP STUDENTS

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Reichman University is proud that one in six of its students receives a scholarship. Scholarships are granted to deserving students from Israel’s social and geographic peripheries, from the Ethiopian community through the Israel at Heart program, to international students, and to lone soldiers.

ISRAEL AT HEART SCHOLARSHIPS The Israel at Heart Ethiopian Scholarship Program founded by businessman and philanthropist Joey Low provides Israeli students of Ethiopian origin with a full scholarship, living stipend, English lessons, public speaking training, and tutoring, accompanied by a fulltime program coordinator to ensure support. A select group of Israel at Heart students participate in public advocacy training and are sent on overseas missions and internships. After graduation, Reichman University continues to assist alumni with finding internships and employment and joining graduate programs.

Many of the program’s alumni are now serving in key leadership positions, including as Israeli diplomats, as well as pursuing higher degrees, with two having received prestigious Fulbright Scholarships – Yaniv Jembler (Government 2009) and Ester Biro (Communications 2014). Israel at Heart graduate Eden Yitbarek (Government 2020) has been awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to study at Oxford University.

RRIS SCHOLARSHIPS The Raphael Recanati International School provides undergraduate and graduate degrees to over 2,000 students at Reichman University, taught in English. Over 160 of these students are given needs-based scholarships each year. Many of these students face socio-economic challenges and, in some cases, come from countries enduring severe economic problems and conflicts. Deserving students come from Panama, Brazil, Mexico, Spain, France, Ukraine, and South Africa.

Longtime supporters of the Israel at Heart program, Dorit and Benjamin Genet

In return for their scholarships, each student performs 30 hours of volunteer work per year, including tutoring children, working with the elderly, or distributing meals to the poor. Many of these students end up formally making aliyah. Reichman University often refers to the RRIS as the largest academic absorption center in Israel.

LONE SOLDIER SCHOLARSHIPS Reichman University offers scholarships to former IDF soldiers and current reservists who are lone soldiers, those who move to Israel to serve in the military without any families in the country. The Brian Knez Center for the Welfare of IDF Reserve Soldiers, part of the Reichman University Student Union, is dedicated to assisting reservists and protecting their rights. Reichman University goes out of its way to provide a home for current and former lone soldiers, and some 300 lone soldiers have completed their studies through the RRIS.

Longtime supporters of the RRIS scholarship program, Lynda and Stewart Resnick

Longtime supporter of scholarship students, Bob Wiener

To support a scholarship student at Reichman University: From the USA or Canada (website): www.afidc.org/donate From other countries (email): ext.relations@idc.ac.il

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LIVE IN ISRAEL STUDY IN ENGLISH 54 36

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THE RAPHAEL RECANATI INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL HAS

OVER 2,500 STUDENTS FROM 90 COUNTRIES ON CAMPUS!

UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAMS

GRADUATE PROGRAMS

• Business Administration • Business & Economics (double major) • Communications • Computer Science (BSc) • Entrepreneurship & Business (double major) • Entrepreneurship, BA & Computer Science, BSc (double major) • Government • Sustainability & Government (double major) • Psychology

ONE SEMESTER / ONE YEAR / FULL DEGREE

• Behavioral Economics • Counter-Terrorism & Homeland Security Studies • Diplomacy & Conﬂict Studies • Financial Economics • Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) • Organizational Behavior & Development (OBD)

GLOBAL MBA • Innovation & Entrepreneurship • Big Data MBA • One-Year MBA • Healthcare Innovation MSc • Machine Learning & Data Science

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