by Jenn Ross
This year is Israel’s 72nd birthday. Earlier in the year, we were planning an expanded community celebration which would have involved children and young families. Although we won’t be able to host this program at the J, we have most of the groundwork for next year.
I encourage you to participate in two virtual services: You can join Masa Israel Journey at 12:50pm (Israel time 7:50 pm) Monday, April 27 for a Yom Hazikaron Memorial Service http://join.masaisrael.org/LastWords. Then, celebrate with us virtually with Jewish Federation of North America from 2-3pm on April 29 for “A Global Celebration of Israel’s 72nd Independence Day. Watch for communications from us about this in our Friday emails and on our Facebook page: http://jfeds.org/YomHaatzmaut.
The Israeli Consulate was in touch with me on April 7 to see how our community is doing. We are coordinating a zoom briefing with them so you can learn what is happening in Israel.
Prior to this crisis, our goal was to reenergize our efforts to raise funds to help the people of Israel and Jews overseas. According to JAFI (the Jewish Agency for Israel), during the COVID-19 crisis, “Our highest priority remains the physical safety and mental health of our staff and Shlichim (Israeli emissaries), wherever they are in the world, as well as thousands of lives we are responsible for 24/7, mainly olim (immigrants) in our facilities and senior citizens in our Amigour social housing communities.” You can learn more about their efforts at www.jewishagency.org.
We will continue to provide ongoing education about Israel virtually or in person. Next year in Jerusalem!
I hope you are healthy and safe. For now, you can continue reaching me at j.ross@jewishfedhbg.org. I look forward to hearing from you.