Israeli Diaspora Minister Isaac Herzog. [Frances Kraft photo]

NASHVILLE —

That was the question Bruce Pearl, coach of the Tennessee Volunteers – the University of Tennessee’s men’s basketball team – asked on Sunday afternoon at the GA’s opening plenary at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel Resort and Convention Center in Nashville.

To Julia Koschitzky, a longtime community leader in Toronto and a member of the Jewish Agency executive who attended her first GA 26 years ago, the answer was obvious. “He knows what teamwork is about,” she told The CJN later that day. She said she found Pearl’s speech motivating.

“Shalom y’all,” said Pearl, a Boston native.

“Focus on the process and not the end result,” he advised at the meeting, which was hosted by the federations of Chatanooga, Knoxville, Memphis and Nashville, whose Jewish populations make up the bulk of Tennessee’s Jewish population of about 19,000.

“Raise the expectations for yourself and what your goals are,” said Pearl. “Focus on the positive. Think about what’s good… Hard work alone won’t guarantee success, but without hard work, I guarantee you won’t have success.”

The more than 500 groups represented by the UJC suppport Jewish communities locally and abroad, particularly in Israel.

“We raised more than $360 million [US] to help people in Israel during and after the war in Lebanon,” Kathy Manning, chair of the UJC executive committee, told the meeting. The most recent UJC initiative, which is still ongoing, was a fund for victims of the fires in Southern California, she said.

Manning said this year’s GA would include sessions about enhancing connections with the State of Israel and with Israelis, and on getting the next generation involved in a meaningful way. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to speak at the closing plenary on Tuesday.

Isaac Herzog – Israel’s minister of the Diaspora, society and the fight against anti-Semitism and also minister of welfare and social services – said in his address that sometimes he tells his wife at the end of a long day that no other government has as many daily challenges as Israel. Aside from terror attacks, he cited alienated young immigrants, sexual harassment and abuse of women as a few examples.

Yet, he noted, Israel is a very optimistic society. “We always overcome our challenges when we know that our brothers and sisters are with us.”

He added that Israel-Diaspora relations are a two-way street. Noting high assimilation levels, and the importance of Jewish education and “keeping the faith together,” Herzog said, “For this, you need Israel, and Israel needs you.”

Modern times offer a solution, he said, citing increased ease of long-distance travel compared to previous generations, programs for Diaspora youth in Israel, and availability of the Internet, which all facilitate greater closeness between Israel and Diaspora Jews.

Turning to politics, he said he believes the upcoming Annapolis, Md., peace meeting “offers a golden opportunity to reignite a peace process that has been dormant or dead for many years.”

Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean said one job for the next American president would be to restore America’s moral authority in the world. “We can’t bring the Israelis and the Palestinians together unless they recognize our moral legitimacy and our moral authority, and we have squandered that over the last seven years… Frankly, the moral high ground is the major reason Israel has survived for 60 years.”

GA scholar-in-residence Rabbi Jacob Schacter, of Yeshiva University, touched on politics when he used midrashic commentary on Genesis to suggest that “two religions can coexist and engage in mutually respectful dialogue for the betterment of the community as a whole.”

He was referring to an account of Abraham visiting his banished son Ishmael in the desert three years after exiling him (but only after promising his wife, Sarah, that he wouldn’t dismount from his camel).

The rabbi noted that the midrash includes the names of Ishmael’s wives: Ayyisha and Fatima. Ayyisha was the name of the prophet Mohammed’s wife, and Fatima was his daughter’s name, said Rabbi Schacter. “We’re brought back to an earlier era when Muslims and Jews knew one another, and incorporated elements [of the other culture] into their texts” said the rabbi. “Surely this too is an important value for all of us, to create [such] a context.”

Pointing to personal lessons from the midrash, Rabbi Shacter said, “Our children grow up, move away, but we parents never stop thinking about them. In some cases, like Abraham’s, it’s complicated. There’s a rift. There’s exile. There’s strong disagreement between husband and wife.

“But Abraham doesn’t stand on ceremony. He doesn’t say, ‘Where is Ishmael?’ He doesn’t say, ‘Why hasn’t he called me?’ or ‘I’m not going to him until he comes to me.’ He works out a compromise. She lets him go. He promises not to get off the camel.”

The lesson, Rabbi Schacter said, is not to be obstinate by waiting for the other person to make the first move, but to “get on your camel, even go into the desert” and not wait until the other person’s funeral.”

On a broader level, the midrash teaches about communal family, he said, referring to the GA’s theme – One People, One Destiny.

“How many Jews do we know – sweet Jews, wonderful Jewish people – who feel themselves as having been banished from the communal household of the Jewish people?” he asked. “It’s our responsibility to embrace them, to love them, to find them an honoured place at our UJC table.”

Organizers have been vocal about making an effort to find a place for students and young adults. Barbara Farber of Ottawa, who took over from Stanley Plotnick as president of UIA Federations Canada in June, told attendees at a reception for Canadians that young leadership was something she wanted to focus on “because if we don’t do something about replacing us, we’re all going to be in trouble.”

First-time GA participant Tovah Grafstein, a religious studies student at York University and one of more than 275 Hillel students from across North America to attend, felt that organizers of the annual event were making good on their word when it came to focusing on the next generation.

“It’s nice that they included us so much… We hope we’re going to show them how much we care about them,” she told The CJN.

“This is pretty amazing. This is definitely the place to be,” said Grafstein, who aspires to work in the Jewish community. “To see the real people [who work in the community], to see the passion they have, is very inspiring.”

Marc Gold, president of Federation CJA in Montreal, told The CJN he finds it exciting that the GA this year is serious about being “à l’écoute,” or attentive, to the aspirations of the younger generation. Although he said it was early to talk about details, the Montreal community is working on an initiative “with our young people, to create a very vibrant Jewish life for the younger generations of Montreal for now and the future.”

The UJC represents 155 Jewish federations and 400 independent Jewish communities, and Farber said that at the GA, even more significant than the content of the event is “the networking you can do and the associations and the friendships. When you’ve got the friendships around the world, I think you can solve a lot of crises by being able to speak one on one.

“Hopefully we can work together to make a better Jewish world and a better world in general.”