AJC Young Leaders are Building Connections that Span the Globe

By Josh Fialkoff

November 27, 2010

Young Jewish leaders from Boston are building relationships with diplomats and community leaders after traveling to Washington, D.C. to meet with international democracy activists, diplomats, leaders of the American Jewish Committee (AJC) and even a White House staffer. The November 7th and 8th trip, sponsored by ACCESS, AJC Boston’s young leadership division, gave the group a first-hand taste—quite literally—of international diplomacy and an inside look at the work of one of the premiere Jewish advocacy groups.

The “taste” came when the Egyptian ambassador invited us to the Middle East nation’s embassy for lunch (hummus, falefel and a kind of baba ghanoush which I had never had before). Now that I’ve whetted your palette, let’s start at the beginning, but don’t worry, there’s more food involved. Our first official meeting was dinner and drinks on Sunday night, November 7th, with a group of journalism students who received scholarships from an AJC institute called, “Thanks To Scandinavia.” The organization provides dozens of scholarships for students and teachers from Scandinavia and Bulgaria each year in gratitude for the heroic rescue and protection of Jews in Europe during the Second World War.

As we ate Turkish food with the students, we heard from international journalists, as well as Noam Shiver of the New Republic. We quizzed the panel on their views on Israel’s international perception, the Obama Administration’s Middle East policy, and we heard stories about the inner workings of the Washington press corps. This was a theme of the trip: developing relationships with other groups some of whom had little knowledge of or experience with Jews. And this is one of the aspects of AJC’s work that has prompted me to get increasingly involved with the group.

I started volunteering with AJC Boston in early 2009 when the regional office was starting a Website and blog focusing on the U.N. Human Rights Commission’s so-called Durban II conference. Israel advocates feared that this conference would take a similar tact as the first Durban conference in 2001. Rather than being a “World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance” as its official name suggested, the meeting focused on attacking Israel for its treatment of Palestinians. I quickly became enamored with AJC Boston’s intellectual, principle-based defense of human rights and core Jewish principles for all peoples. My commitment to AJC and ACCESS quickly grew, and I am now the co-chair of ACCESS and a member of the Board of Directors for AJC Boston. It is the mix of a strong focus on human rights for all people and vigorous international political discourse that energizes me to be active in AJC and ACCESS.

That focus was clearly evident the next morning, when we had breakfast with emerging political leaders in Central and Eastern Europe. These young people are part of another AJC program called, Promoting Tolerance. This is an 18-year-old project to combat intolerance based on racism, sexism, religious and ethic differences in emerging democracies.

We met an awe-inspiring selection of leaders. I sat next to Bojan Bajić, a political leader who had just stepped down as the head of his party in Bosnia and Herzogovenia after it suffered a bruising loss in elections in October. Hearing stories from Bojan and his counterparts in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Croatia, Georgia, Kyrgystan, Poland, Russia and Ukraine lifted my spirits. Each leader was working to make his or her country more democratic, freer and more hospitable to minorities. I felt so proud to be associated with an organization that pursues these goals around the world. And we quickly became Facebook friends. International diplomacy doesn’t have to be staid.

Our next stop was at AJC’s Project Interchange. This program has brought more than 5,000 influential leaders from more than 60 countries to see Israel first hand. The leaders have backgrounds in fields from healthcare to academia to politics and come from a variety of religions. We met with the organizers of Project Interchange and heard how these visits change leaders’ views and political positions on Israel. While nearly all of the ACCESS members had been to Israel at least once (I had just returned from the country), it was easy for me to see how people who spent less time focusing on Israel could be swayed by the incomplete coverage in the media. This program seems like an important way to underscore the strategic and potential economic importance of Israel to a wider group.

Our next hosts needed no introduction to the State of Israel. We were off to the Egyptian Embassy…and just in time for lunch too. We met with a class of new diplomats from Egypt’s Foreign Service corps. The new diplomatic class was comprised of less than two dozen young people who had been picked from more than 1,000 applicants. Most said they had had little experience with Jews; it was a unique opportunity for us as well. We ate a wonderful meal surrounded by art and artifacts illustrating Egypt’s rich history as we forged relationships with the very people who will help shape the future not only of Egypt, but of the Middle East and Israel too.

Our final, stop was with a woman who is helping to shape the Middle East right now, the Obama Administration’s liaison with the Jewish community. Danielle Borrin gave us a detailed briefing on the White House’s diplomatic efforts and goals in the Middle East. Asking questions and exchanging views on key issues in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building with someone so closely connected with top policy thinkers was a fitting end to our trip.

We returned to Boston with a deeper respect for the work of AJC and for the range of complex issues confronting the state of Israel and Jews around the world.

In a matter of hours and in a few miles, we met a new generation of diplomats, democracy activists, journalists, politicians and humanitarians. We built bonds with young people from countries around the world, all of us on our own missions, but with goals and hopes that can only be fulfilled together.

More information about the work of  AJC in Boston and beyond can be found online at ajcboston.org