Bridging The Divide

Orli Fridman Ben-Shalom, executive director of Kvutzat Reut, right. Above, Kibbutz Bet Israel.

Orli Fridman Ben-Shalom, executive director of Kvutzat Reut, right. Above, Kibbutz Bet Israel.

by Merri Rosenberg
Special To The Jewish Week

It’s no accident that representatives of Kibbutz Bet Yisrael, one of Israel’s urban kibbutzim, felt so comfortable at a recent meeting sponsored by the Five Synagogues of White Plains Israel Action Committee.

Founded in 1993 to “bring people together from different backgrounds,” according to Amy Simon, one of the kibbutz’s co-founders, the kibbutz members live in Jerusalem’s gritty Gilo Aleph housing project alongside mostly third-generation immigrant families who have remained impoverished. “Instead of tearing apart, we’re bringing together. We don’t go home at the end of the day, or the end of the year. We’re really there.”

As part of that social experiment, the kibbutz launched a nonprofit agency, Kvutzat Reut, to provide social and academic services to the housing project’s children and

teenagers. Similarly, its yearlong, pre-Army program for 18-year-old Israelis, both secular and religious, enables young Israelis to study together in the kibbutz and provide community service projects for the children of Gilo Aleph.

Such boundary-breaking is familiar ground for the White Plains group that hosted the kibbutz leaders. The Israel Action Committee was founded in the wake of the second intifida eight years ago to encourage Jewish Westchester residents to support Israeli companies and buy Israeli products, said co-chair and co-founder, Dr. Eric Mandel.
What is distinctive about the group is that from the beginning it was intended to encompass the city’s different Jewish congregations. Inspired in part by their respective rabbis, who regularly study and meet together, individual congregants thought that pooling their collective resources would be a more effective way to make a difference for Israel. So members come from Young Israel of White Plains and the Hebrew Institute of White Plains, which are Orthodox; Temple Israel Center of White Plains, which is Conservative; Congregation Kol Ami-White Plains, a Reform temple, and Bet Am Shalom Synagogue-White Plains, a Reconstructionist congregation.

“We brought in everybody,” said co-founder John Lightstone. “You’re Jewish. You can’t tell who’s from which shul. We don’t take sides. We support the people of Israel and the land of Israel.”

As Orli Fridman Ben-Shalom, executive director of Kvutzat Reut, acknowledged, “What you’re doing is what we’re trying to do in our community. That diversity is what we’re trying to build.”

There are other distinctions in the way the White Plains group approaches its mission. Educating the Jewish and non-Jewish communities of White Plains and Westchester about Israel and the Middle East is part of its work.

“We’ll present social programs that Israel has done that other people can learn from,” said Lightstone. Other activities include encouraging trips to Israel and e-mail exchanges between American children and Israeli children.

In terms of fundraising, the White Plains group is seeking out smaller organizations and programs that might not be on the radar for traditional Jewish philanthropy. The committee is particularly interested in providing tzedakah for the most vulnerable populations: the poor, the young and the elderly.

“We want to encourage Israelis to support themselves,” said Lightstone.
As Ellen Cutler Levy, a committee member, added, “The Five Synagogues of White Plains Israel Action Committee tries to push one or two projects in Israel to raise funds. It’s about support for the State of Israel. We try to be very tangible, very specific.”
To help Kvutzat Reut purchase modern computers for its learning center, which serves about 400 children and teenagers, the committee is hoping to raise about $10,000. Earlier efforts included funding an ambulance and a fluoroscope machine for hospitals — even a clown to cheer up patients at the Bikkur Cholim hospital in Jerusalem.

“We’ve sent tons of books, we’ve provided glasses for poor people in Jerusalem — we do something tangible, so people feel they’re doing something,” said Mandel, an ophthalmologist who is also the political education director of AIPAC in Westchester. “Our projects have to be specific, where everybody can participate. I lead a trip once a year, with about a dozen people, where we have access to high-level officials in Israel. We try to keep people interested and want to keep people involved.”

Underlying all the committee’s work is a focus on shared values and principles.
“Here you have five synagogues of four different denominations,” said Mandel. “We are one people — Kol Yisroel. What brings us together is more important than what keeps us apart. It’s not only American Jews in the diaspora trying to help Israelis, but it’s about the secular and the religious, the poor and the rich, the Ashkenazi and Sephardic communities — we’re trying to bridge the divide.”

For more information, please check the group’s Web site, www.WhitePlainsForIsrael.org.

Westchester Jewish Conference

Westchester’s Jewish Community Relations Organization

Jerusalem Hotel

Dan Panorama Hotel in Jerusalem