An Historic First

An historic first took place here when some 65 women representing American chapters of the Women’s International Zionist Organization (WIZO) gathered for the first national executive convention of WIZO-USA.

Representatives from San Francisco, Chicago, Miami, Georgia, Boston and elsewhere, met for three days to mark the official entry of WIZO-USA, founded in 1982, into the 50 international federation network of WIZO.

“We have joined the family of world WIZO,” declared Evelyn Sommer, president of WIZO-USA and WIZO’s representative to the United Nations. WIZO is the only Zionist organization to have consultative status at the world organization.

Also attending the convention earlier this month, held at the offices of the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies of Greater New York, was Raya Jaglom, president of WIZO. She told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the addition of WIZO-USA “is like starting a new state for us.”

WIZO’S MULTI-FACETED ACTIVITIES

Founded in 1920 in Great Britain, and presently headquartered in Israel, WIZO is the largest women’s Zionist organization concerned with Jewish education and social welfare in Israel.

WIZO’s $40 million yearly budget is primarily raised in Israel, according to Sommer. Sixty-seven percent is raised in Israel with 33 percent coming from international fundraising efforts, she said.

The organization maintains, among its many social welfare and educational programs, 220 day care centers in Israel, serving some 15,000 children daily. “This means,” Jaglom said, “that 40,000 mothers in Israel can go to work and help provide financial support to their families.”

In addition, 25 percent of world WIZO’s work in Israel involves schools; eleven agricultural, vocational and technical schools attended by over 4,600 students, 2,000 boarding students in 157 classrooms. WIZO maintains also about 80 youth centers in developing towns and underprivileged neighborhoods throughout Israel.

The history of WIZO can be divided into three critical stages, Jaglom said, beginning with the organization’s inception and its efforts building day care centers and schools. In 1940, after contact was lost with East European countries during World War II Jaglom said WIZO extended its activities to Latin America and other countries. The third stage began with the founding of the Jewish State and the movement of WIZO’s headquarters to Israel.

Sommer, meanwhile, told the JTA she has been involved in numerous WIZO-activities, though she devotes considerable energies to the post at the UN. She attended all three UN-sponsored women’s End of the Decade Conferences — in Copenhagen in 1975, Mexico City in 1980 and Nairobi in 1985.

The central goals of the WIZO convention included setting a course of action for a major membership drive in the United States to enlist “as many Zionists as possible,” as well as the adoption of a constitutional convention for WIZO-USA, according to Sommer. WIZO-USA will seek to also strengthen and improve the work of WIZO in Israel, she said.