Dear Friends:
If Israel is important to you and you want to hear directly from someone who is involved at the highest echelons of Israeli society, you will want to attend an important talk by Dr. Yizhar Hess that we are co-sponsoring on September 10
Yizhar Hess currently serves as Vice President of the World Zionist Organization and as a member of both the Board of Governors and the Executive of the Jewish Agency for Israel. Together, these two organizations direct hundreds of millions of dollars in investments in Israeli society and around the world.
Before assuming his current positions, Dr. Hess was the Executive Director of the Masorti Movement, Israel’s affiliate of Conservative Judaism, for 13 years. In that role, he represented our Movement in negotiations over egalitarian prayer at the Western Wall, Yizhar is a tenth generation Jerusalemite. He holds a law degree and is a member of the Israeli Bar, has an MA in Jewish Studies from the Schechter Institute, and a PhD in Sociology and Education from Sussex University in the UK. He is one of the leading commentators and activists in Israeli society on issues of religious pluralism. I got to know Yizhar ten years ago, during a previous Israel - Hamas War, when he accompanied a Conservative Movement solidarity delegation in which I participated,
Yizhar’s talk is called “Between October 7 and 8.” He will be discussing the aftermath of October 7 and building the future of Israeli society. We are sponsoring this discussion along with five other Conservative synagogues in central and upper Montgomery County.
The talk will take place on Tuesday September 10 at Shaare Torah at 6 pm. While the talk had originally been scheduled for 7:30 pm, the rabbis of the sponsoring congregations decided to move it to 6 pm so that our congregants could attend the talk and be home in time to watch the presidential debate that same evening at 9 pm.
The link to register is here:
You may see that the link still says 7:30 pm but it is the right link and the lecture is at 6 pm.
As a reminder, I am having drop-in hours on Thursday afternoons from 2 to 4 at the shul. For my drop-in hours, you do not need to make an appointment -- that would negate the whole point of drop-in hours -- but I’d urge you to check and make sure I am there regardless as sometimes there are unavoidable pastoral or other emergencies which might take me away from the building.
As always, if I can do anything for you or you need to talk, please contact me at rabbi@kehilatshalom.org or 301-977-0768 rather than through the synagogue office. I am happy to meet you at the synagogue by appointment; if you want to speak with me it’s best to make an appointment rather than assuming I will be there when you stop by.
Additionally, if you know of a Kehilat Shalom congregant or another member of our Jewish community who could use a phone call, please let me know.
L’shalom,
Rabbi Charles L. Arian
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