'Israel Fellows' Work to Counter Anti-Semitism on College Campuses - SHALLE’ MCDONALD/JNS.ORG CHARISMA NEWS

'Israel Fellows' Work to Counter Anti-Semitism on College Campuses

 5/27/2016 SHALLE’ MCDONALD/JNS.ORG  charisma news

An event organized by Rebecca Avera (front, far right), the Israel Fellow at Stanford University. (Rebecca Avera)

In today's climate on college campuses, Jewish students often face a fight-or-flight choice in the face of increasing anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rhetoric, discrimination, and even physical violence.

There are numerous ways that Jewish advocacy groups advise students to counter the hatred on campus, ranging from holding demonstrations to simply ignoring the threats. 

Promoting a positive connection to Israel is instrumental in countering anti-Zionism, according to The Jewish Agency for Israel, which together with Hillel International created the Israel Fellows program—a network of 75 Israeli young professionals serving as "ambassadors" at more than 100 North American university campuses. The fellows come from Ethiopian, Middle Eastern, Indian, European and central Asian backgrounds.

According to the Jewish Agency, the goal of the program is "to promote connections to Israel and Israelis, create positive Israel-related experiences and educational opportunities, and combat rising anti-Israel sentiment and anti-Semitism on campuses."

The Israel Fellows focus on demystifying Israel for those who have little knowledge about the country.

Shachar Levi, an Israel Fellow at the University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin), told JNS.org that the program is not about "positive or negative" views of Israel, but about "variety" in terms of providing students with a more nuanced connection to Israelis and their diverse culture. 

Levi, 28, was raised in Tel Aviv, served in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), and studied government, diplomacy, and counter-terrorism. He said each fellow can share a personal narrative about Israel to students who simply "don't have enough knowledge" about the Jewish state. Levi hopes that sharing personal stories will provide a more realistic picture of Israelis in lieu of one-sided, negative portrayals in the media—both for Jewish students who aren't very connected to Israel and for the wider campus community.

The Israel Fellows aim to organize events in which students from different cultures can discover shared values, fostering a climate of mutual respect. One of Levi's events, for instance, brought together Indian students celebrating the Diwali festival and Jewish students celebrating Hanukkah around the same time. Both holidays are known as their culture's festival of lights.

Rabbi Daniel Septimus, executive director of Texas Hillel, said Levi's efforts have made a significant difference for the discourse about Israel on campus.

"Shachar's creative spirit is exciting and inspiring to our students," Septimus said. "He provides an informal way to learn about Israel through one-on-one conversations, and helps students navigate their personal relationships to Israel by providing the cultural and historical context only an Israeli can offer."

Rebecca Avera, the Israel Fellow at Stanford University in California, is an Ethiopian Israeli from Haifa. Her parents were Jewish refugees from Ethiopia who raised nine siblings with a strong Jewish identity.

Realizing that many students who meet her are seeing a black Jew for the first time, Avera has successfully built connections with not only Jewish students, but also African-American and Asian students, particularly by collaborating on events with the campus associations representing students of color.

Last December, during Hanukkah, Avera centered an event around the Ethiopian-Jewish holiday "Sigd." The event taught more than 200 attendees about Ethiopian-Jewish dress, dance and food. Avera shared her family's story, highlighted by her mother's journey to Israel, in which she walked hundreds of miles across northern Africa to Sudan and was ultimately rescued by the IDF.

Avera's outreach to other student communities is enabling more people to learn about the realities of Israeli life. In a coffee date with a freshman student from Stanford's Black Student Union, Avera said she spoke about her personal challenges related to being black in Israel. The student was so impressed that she now wants to organize an event about Avera's life story.    

In reaching out to campus minorities, Levi and Avera attempt to use diversity to Israel's advantage on campus, countering anti-Israel groups' usual recruitment of minority students to support the Palestinian cause—most often through comparing Israel to apartheid-era South Africa and eventually convincing black students to support the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement.

Avera said she has noticed a decrease in the aggression of the anti-Israel voices on her campus, explaining that the pro-Palestinian student group at Stanford now tends to focus on educational and cultural issues rather than BDS. While a resolution encouraging the university to divest from Israel passed last year in Stanford's student government, this year "they don't want to focus on [divestment]," she said.

Levi believes many college students participate in anti-Israel protests because there is "a lot of pressure to build strong opinions." Students tend to embrace the anti-Israel movement because they mistakenly "think it's a human rights issue," he said.

Last year, UT Austin's Palestinian Solidarity Committee student group disrupted a lecture by a visiting professor who was speaking about Israeli military culture. After protesters shouted "free, free Palestine" and "long live the intifada," the confrontation became physical and the police needed to intervene.

Israel Fellows, according to the Jewish Agency, have been able to respond in a proactively positive way to more than 100 incidents of campus tension through hosting discussion groups, speakers, cultural programs and leadership development opportunities. While anti-Israel groups at UT Austin "try to separate people," said Levi, Israel Fellows "try to bring people together." 

For the original article, visit jns.org.

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How Israeli Christians are Coping With the Wave of Terror By Shalle’ McDonald JNS - BREAKING ISRAEL NEWS

Eastern Orthodox Christian nuns hold candles and flowers as they walk along the Via Dolorosa in the Old City of Jerusalem on Aug. 25, 2015. (Photo: Micah Bond/Flash90)

How Israeli Christians are Coping With the Wave of Terror

By JNS January 22, 2016  BREAKING ISRAEL NEWS

“The bows of the mighty men are broken, and they that stumbled are girded with strength.” (1 Samuel 2:4)

By: Shalle’ McDonald

For two of the three major monotheistic religions, the connection to Israel’s current wave of terror—whose latest and 29th victim was Dafna Meir, a mother of six stabbed to death in her home—is clear. While Jews like Meir have been targeted by numerous stabbing, shooting, and car-ramming attacks, the Israeli government points to Palestinian incitement over an Islamic holy site, the Temple Mount compound’s Al-Aqsa mosque, as a root cause of the violence.

But how do the 166,000 Christians living in Israel fit into the picture?

Comprising 2 percent of the country’s population, Christians are fully integrated members of Israeli society—including their rising voluntary enlistment in the Israel Defense Forces—standing in stark contrast to the widespread persecution of Christians elsewhere in the Middle East. For the following Israeli Christians interviewed by JNS.org, daily life during the terror wave essentially goes on as normal, but with extra vigilance and a little more faith.

Callie Mitchell, a mother of two, says she has needed to re-map the daily route she takes to her son’s kindergarten near Jerusalem’s Damascus Gate, an area where many of the recent terror attacks have occurred.

“The new route has added 20-30 minutes of travel both in the morning at drop-off, and the afternoon at pickup,” she says. “That’s nearly an hour more on the bus each day, and I feel that difference—emotionally, in our patience levels, since little children do not love sitting on a bus, and very practically in simply having a little less time to care for our home.”

Other Israeli Christians are trying to maintain normalcy.

“Israelis are quite used to threats in many different forms. I have learned from them to embrace every day and to live it to the fullest. This generally means going about life as usual…but with some precautions,” says Kasey Barr, a political psychology researcher who lives with her husband and newborn baby in Kfar Saba.

For Barr, “precautions” range from praying for protection to being more alert, or even avoiding certain areas on her daily stroller walks with her son at road crossings, especially because of the threat of car-rammings. She feels particularly vulnerable because she’s a new mother, but also because of the realization “that attacks are just as likely to happen even in so called ‘non-disputed’ areas such as central Israel, where I live.”

Leora, a Christian mother of three who asked that her last name not be published, was born and raised in Israel and believes that “life goes on.” She’s careful to not let her girls play outdoors unsupervised, but is determined not to allow fear to grip her.

Besides avoiding the gruesome news headlines, Leora focuses on scripture, praying, and making wise choices.

“Although I make situation-related decisions about where I go and what I do, I’m calm about it. I still haven’t ventured to my mechanic in an Arab neighborhood, even though I need to get the car fixed, but I have ridden buses and the light rail and I’ve been to the Old City [of Jerusalem]. Life goes on, and these [attacks] aren’t happening 24/7,” says Leora.

Daniel, who works in the media and also asked to remain anonymous, has lived in Jerusalem for seven years with his wife and toddler son. He has made practical adjustments as a father to try to protect his family.

“I don’t let her (his wife) and the boy go anywhere without me if I can help it. I started carrying pepper spray and a collapsible baton, in addition to the pocket knife I’ve been carrying for years,” he says.

In many Israeli apartment complexes with secure entrances, doors are propped open with a stone, especially on hot days. But Leora says her building’s management recently put up a sign telling residents to keep the door closed. After she heard about the murder of Dafna Meir, Leora found it wise to heed that advice.

“We can’t live in fear, but we have to be sensible and not take unnecessary risks,” she says.

For Israelis who don’t actually experience or witness a terrorist attack, they’re certain to be nearby or know someone who was there.

“On one occasion, my husband, children, and I were sitting at a bus stop in the evening, in the dark,” recalls Callie Mitchell. “While waiting for the bus we heard the sirens, then we saw them pass and stop at the central bus station…while we waited, my head filled with worry about whether or not the terrorist had been apprehended, or if he or she would show up at our bus stop….Once we finally got on the bus, I started singing with my son, ‘Do not fear for I am with you, do not be dismayed for I am your God,’ out of Isaiah 41:10. It made a huge difference on the ride home. The kids and I took the next day off to re-gather and feel physically safe.”

Daniel has also found himself near terrorist attacks. “I’ve seen blood splattered on the ground and concrete walls pocked by shrapnel, and all that stuff. The first time is the hardest and has the most potential to make one freak out. After that you don’t ‘get used to it’ exactly, but your system doesn’t go into shock and you’re generally calmer about the whole thing,” he says.

On a recent walk home, Daniel heard shots and sirens only a few blocks away. It wasn’t until later that he discovered police had shot a terrorist who stabbed an 82-year-old woman. “I just continued walking home. What else was there to do?” he says.

Indeed, many Israelis like Daniel must be quick to move past the shock of witnessing a terror attack. But according to a study by the Israel Trauma Coalition, 8,000 Israelis have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as a result of the current terror wave.

Chad Holland, senior pastor of the King of Kings Community Church in Jerusalem, says the church has a “channel of help ready should someone need it. We would recommend them to our counseling center, called Anchor of Hope, right here in our building in Jerusalem.”

While they may deal with fear and anxiety in different ways, the common thread among the Israeli Christians interviewed by JNS.org is the belief that ultimately, they are safe in Israel.

Kasey Barr focuses on trusting God, but she doesn’t believe Christians “are guaranteed to be protected.”

“In fact, Christians throughout the Middle East are suffering incredible persecution,” says Barr. “Israel is the only nation where the Christian population is growing and not shrinking, and where there is religious freedom. But even though there is religious freedom, and we know we are under God’s sovereign care, we also realize that none of us are guaranteed tomorrow and we need to keep our house in order.”

Daniel believes that safety in Jerusalem is a matter of trusting God, but also a matter of math. “Yes, I feel safe. I’m a great student of statistics and I know I’m statistically safer in Jerusalem than almost any city of comparable size anywhere else on Earth, including several I’ve lived in and/or visited in North America and Europe,” he says.

Leora, who works as a travel coordinator, says Christians shouldn’t be afraid to visit the Jewish state. “Israel is doing everything in its power to protect tourists and tourism sites around the country….Our organization has had [tour] groups cancel, but we also had groups come despite the situation and have a blessed and spiritually enriching time with no incident,” she says.

Pastor Holland explains that if someone is “waiting for a time in which there was no conflict in Israel, they may never be able to visit. At this point, we have not discouraged anyone from coming, but just encourage them to have security measures in place, for groups to stay together and for everyone to be on alert for those around them.”

Mitchell calls it “encouraging for us to see tour groups present, and it stimulates our economy.” “Coming on a tour is definitely a way to bless Israel,” she says.

“As we see, lone-wolf terror attacks are becoming common even in the U.S. and Europe,” adds Barr. “It is important to stand with Israel right now, and one major way to do that is by expressing solidarity by visiting the country….It is also an incredible opportunity to begin to understand the facts on the ground here. And even with the increase in terror attacks, life here is full of beauty and joy, and even peace most days. If people feel God is opening the doors for them to come, I say don’t delay and book the ticket!”