Over the first three months of 2018, Shaharit’s intellectual, leadership development, and local grassroots work has grown by leaps and bounds. Here are some highlights of our activities thus far this year:
Intellectual Work: Reframing Economics and Sociology
As a continuation and outgrowth of our successful 2015 Academic Conference on the future Israeli liberalism, Shaharit has developed a blossoming partnership with the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, including a working group of some 30 leading sociology professors and doctoral students which has been meeting monthly since last 2016 to ask empirical questions about how we build the bridges between deep diversity, nurturing a growing cadre of sociologists who are approaching Israeli society from a Shaharit perspective; we know of already three academic courses that with a syllabus drawn from these meetings.
In addition, work has just begun for a large economics project between Van Leer and Shaharit, asking questions about the working class, populism and economic policy and interested in creating new options beyond the neo-liberal/social-democratic divide, with an international workshop hosted at Van Leer scheduled for this summer.
Leadership Development: Fourth Cohort of 120 in Morocco, New Working Group for Young Religious Zionists
The fourth cohort of our 120 program for Rising Multicultural Political Leadership has recently returned from their eight-day long trip to Morocco. Click Here to read more about their trip and to get a taste of what they experienced.
Meanwhile, the second cohort of our working group in the Religious Zionist community, From Tribalism to Solidarity, opened at the end of 2017, with a cohort of 15 young leaders in education, the media, and religion, and participants continue to meet once every three weeks for sessions in which they discuss hot-button issues in society and meet with the other “tribes” of Israel. During a recent session, they watched and discussed The Ancestral Sin, a headline-grabbing documentary about Israel’s development towns and the experience of Mizrahi immigrants from North Africa, together with the producer of the film.
Local Communities: Spreading the Common Good Agenda Across Israel
Leading up to the 2018 Municipal elections, our organizers and local communities are working hard to place the common good agenda on the map in dozens of towns and cities across Israel, from Kiryat Shmona to Eilat and everywhere in between. Click Here for more information about our efforts.
Public Events and Media Roundup: From the 5th Tribe to Religious Feminism, and Everything in Between
This January, we co-sponsored an event together with the San Francisco Jewish Federation, “Re-connecting with ‘The Fifth Tribe’: A New Paradigm for Israel-Diaspora Relations,” at Beit Avi Chai in Jerusalem. Dr. Arnold Eisen, the Chancellor of the Conservative Movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary, was the featured speaker, with respondents including representatives of the other “Four Tribes” of Israeli/Jewish society (secular, Orthodox, Arab, and ultra-Orthodox). Read more about the event in the Times of Israel.
Shaharit’s team of diverse thought leaders and fellows are continuing to influence the Israeli discourse and bring new ideas to the table. Here are some highlights of our press coverage so far this year (note: all articles are in Hebrew):
- Tehila Friedman, Director of Shaharit’s Fellows Program, wrote about the complexities of being a Religious Zionist and Feminist in Ha’aretz
- Shaharit fellow and Haredi activist Malki Rotner wrote about the importance of finding a common good solution to the Shabbat conflict in Ashdod for Kan Ashdod
- Dvora Abramzon, former Director of the Local Communities Department and Shaharit member, wrote about the need for decentralization in government decision-making for Ma’ariv
