Monday 2 June 2003

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Our first meeting this morning was with Sara Bogen, who works for the Joint Distribution Committee in the former Soviet Union. She provided an overview of the work to be done there, and the challenges they face. We then went to see Dani Daniel, who runs a program called Tzav Pius for the Avichai Foundation. Tzav Pius is a program that sets up dialogue groups between dati (religious) and chiloni (secular) Jews to work towards improved relations in this regard. The program is heavily advertised, and has had some success in bringing together people on opposite sides of this divide.

Later in the afternoon, the youth project group went to meet some of the volunteers at Noar Oneh Noar (Na'an, Youth Answering Youth). This is a teen-run hotline for teens who have problems. The idea is that teens may be more comfortable talking to teens rather than adults, and the volunteers are trained in how to handle calls as well as how to refer the callers to other resources in the community. In addition to dealing with many of the teen problems that exist in other countries (suicide, drugs, eating disorders, etc.), the hotline handles some calls more particular to Israel (such as ultra-Orthodox teens in conflict with the ultra-Orthodox lifestyle).

We had dinner together at the hotel, followed by a workshop with Shira that explored our feelings about Zionism, Israel, and Israel's place in the Jewish world. The discussion was quite animated, and we had a chance to explore our feelings on some of these very emotional topics.

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