Trying to Save Itself: G.A. Grapples with Continuity

After rescuing Soviet, Syrian and Yemenite Jewry, the American Jewish community is trying to save itself.

For the third year in a row, the American Jewish community was the focus of fear, concern, and occasional consolation at the annual General Assembly of the Council of Jewish Federations.

Considered one of the major gathering of the organized Jewish community, this year’s assembly brought together 2,600 leaders of federations and other organizations for several days of speeches and workshop, study and shmoozing.

While hallway discussions and session turnout indicate a healthy concern over the Republican victory in this month’s congressional election, the delegates’ attention focused primarily on issues falling under the rubric of “Jewish continuity”: Jewish identity, affiliation and intermarriage.

Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin endorsed the direction of the conference, saying that with the opening of all the gates once closed to Jews, the rallying cry of “Let My People Go” has succeeded.

Now, he said,” the question should be, `Let My People Be Jewish.’ That is the agenda for you.”

Twenty-five year ago, the only voices demanding the “Jewish agenda” were those of hundreds of college students, who picked outside the convention demanding that Jewish education become a federation priority.

And apparently it has. This year, according to CJF, half of local federation allocations go to educational programming – including community centers and camps.

In stark contrast to the protesting student of 25 years ago, this year, a student leader delivered an address long on plaudits and short on lamentations.

Wendy Smith, the 21-year-old President of the Yale University Hillel, praised the “successful and budding partnership between the community and the campus.”

She was referring to CJF’s decision earlier this year to bring Hillel, the central body for Jewish student, into the federation system.

The move followed years of cutbacks by B’nai B’rith, Hillel’s original sponsor.

A 100-member contingent of college student added life to the assembly – particularly during Shabbat dinner – as it urged federation leaders to move forward and approve a plan to increase Hillel funding over seven years.

Similarly, some progress was evident as the North American Commission on Jewish Identity and Continuity, created two years ago, discussed and debated its first draft report.

The report set forth a variety of principles, method and projects by which the institutions of American Jewish life could gear up to reverse trends of assimilation and intermarriage.

Some controversy erupted, however, over how the commission should proceed, whether in its current form or as a newly created CJF-sponsored implementation committee.

The continuity commission discussed the need to balance what it called “formative” educational experiences – such as day school or supplementary programs – with one-shot “transformative” experiences such as Israel trips.

But the commission did not venture into the thorny issue of either pricing or funding.

Even as these discussion moved forward at their slow, deliberate pace, there were signs that concern over Jewish education – and its potential price tag – was only going to accelerate.

The Jewish community is “warming to the challenge,” Rabbi Brain Lurie, executive vice president of the United Jewish Appeal, said in an interview here.

In his keynote address, World Jewish Congress President Edgar Bronfman called for an affordable system of Jewish education, including high quality boarding schools.

Likud Party leader Benjamin Netanyahu, in his address, also urged the assembly to “construct a plan to finance the airfare and upkeep for two months in Israel for every young person aged 17 to 25.”

On the opposite end of the political spectrum, Deputy Foreign Minister Yossi Beilin has been similarly urging communities to fully subsidize Israel trips for Jewish youth.

During his recent visit to America, Beilin raised the idea with Boston’s federation leaders. While they were receptive in theory to signing on as a pilot project, there was some question about how to come up with the estimated $4 million it would cost the community.

In neighboring Marblehead, Mass, meanwhile, the Jewish Federation of the North Shore became the first to sign on to such a plan.

Shortly before the G.A., the Marblehead federation passed a resolution making available 50 full subsidies for Israel trips, with the idea of expanding the program to encompass the several hundred Jewish teens believed to live in the community.

Shortly these moves raise the question: How can federations pay for programs of Jewish education?

At the North Shore federation, which prides itself on its maverick ways, money for the Israel trips will come at the direct expense of allocations to UJA.

The federation’s decision is based “on the rationale that the money will be spent directly in Israel,” Neil Cooper, the federation’s executive director, said in an interview here.

Beilin, for his part, has insisted that money could be freed up to subsidize Israel programs by transferring social welfare functions of the Jewish Agency for Israel, such as rural settlement and youth aliyah, to the Israeli government.

The Jewish Agency is the primary recipient of the money raised for Israel by the United Jewish Appeal-federation campaign.

Bronfman, in his address, proposed that money be found by “reprioritizing the Jewish tax dollar,” with an eye towards combining or closing the Anti- Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee and the American Jewish Congress.

ADL’s national chairman, Abraham Foxman, disagreed that the money for education should come at the expense of his agency. He said a such transfer “wouldn’t make a dent” since only a tiny percentage of his group’s budget comes from federation.

Also arguing against a redistribution of funds was Mendel Kaplan, who will soon conclude five years as chairman of the board of governors of the Jewish Agency.

Calling on American Jews to “build more high schools,” he argued that the money can be found.

“We have never been wealthier. We don’t have to do it at the expense of anything else – certainly not at the expense of Israel,” he said.

Funds-raisers in the field agreed that money can be found to fund continuity programs.

Ivan Schaeffer of Washington said his community federation’s Israel Quest program, which encourages and partially subsidizes Israel trips, “is proving to be popular topic” in discussion with prospective endowment donors.

“This approach is donor centered,” Schaeffer said at a session here that focused on Israel experiences. “We’re talking about your children or grandchildren.

“Parents with an intermarried child or grandchild love Israel Quest. It’s sad but it’s true,” said Schaeffer, who serves as national chair of the Israel Experience Program, which was launched two years ago by a coalition including CJF, UJA, and the CRB Foundation.

The contention that new money can be found was borne out by a half-million dollar endowment received by the Jewish Federation Council of Greater Los Angles to help fund Israel experience programs.

And Barry Shrage, president of Boston’s Combined Jewish Philanthropies, argued that fostering Jewish identity is so effective in explaining and marketing the broader mandate of the Jewish community that it more than pays for itself.

“We have to create a new vision of the Jewish people, rooted in the Land of Israel, the people of Israel, and also the God and Torah of Israel,” he said.

Such a new vision of the Jewish future and Jewish culture, said Shrage, would enable the community to compete against the vision that other causes are trying to sell to philanthropists.

“Then you can go and say (to prospect donor), `You’re going to be giving a $2 million chair to Harvard, but I know you also care about the Jewish future,” Shrage said.

“People are willing to pay for it, but we have to provide a very compelling vision of what Jewish learning means.”

As was the case two years ago, session of Jewish study were a featured part of the G.A. schedule.

While these session were not as well attended as plenaries headlines by Israeli or American politicians, for some delegates these constituted the high point.

“When we talk about continuity, we are really talking about Jewish content,” said Martin Kraar, executive vice president of CJF.

For some at CJF, this inward focus explained why many participants found this G.A. quieter than many of its predecessors.

“What struck me about this G.A.,” said Carl Sheingold, the assembly program coordinator, “was that the organizations of Jewish life are trying to connect to the intimate, personal side of people’s lives.”