We’ve come to think of reality television as a source of schadenfreude, so the idea of such a show devoting airtime to spreading a message of fairness and respect for diversity knocks us on our heels. But that’s just what happened on the season finale of Kochav Nolad, the Israeli version of American Idol.

On the show’s July 23rd finale, Kulanana, an initiative supported by UJA-Federation of New York that aims to help young Israelis of all backgrounds become comfortable with the diversity of Israeli society, completed the launch phase of its educational campaign with Kochav Nolad’s finalists singing the song “A Million Heartbeats.” The song, which was written for the occasion, deals with the shared hopes, dreams, and joys that bind together Israelis of all different backgrounds.

Arab and Jewish students come together for a dialogue in the Negev at a program conducted by one of Kulanana’s founding partners the Arab-Jewish Center for Equality Empowerment and Cooperation (AJEEC). Photo credit: Merchavim.

“Music is a great medium for bringing people together,” said Mike Prashker, the executive director of Merchavim, the Institute for the Advancement of Shared Citizenship in Israel, which is spearheading the coalition of 15 organizations that are founding partners of Kulanana. “Remember ‘We are the World?’ Creating better inter-group relations is as much about feelings of belonging and worth as it is knowledge about others.”

Prashker related that producers of the show were won over by Merchavim’s long-standing relationship with the Ministry of Education, and assurances that the initiative was strictly non-political. The show reaches a large audience, including many young Israelis, so it seemed like an ideal platform for spreading the message of citizenship, diversity, and fairness. In fact, this season’s finale was viewed by 1.25 million people.

Israel Bucks the Trend

In most democracies, young people tend to be more open-minded, while the older generation is more entrenched in its views, but public opinion research commissioned by Kulanana found that Israel is bucking that trend. Israelis under age 30 are less comfortable with diversity than their forebears. However, the same research found that Israeli youth remain curious about their fellow citizens and more open to change, which the organizations behind Kulanana see as a source of hope for the future.

“We are thrilled to be a part of this groundbreaking and creative initiative,” said Alisa F. Levin, Chair of UJA-Federation’s Commission on the Jewish People. “With our support, Kulanana is helping Israelis of all backgrounds to foster social cohesion and advance a common, inclusive and fair Israeli society.”

In addition to the media boost from the Kochav Nolad song, the participating organizations that make up Kulanana are already rolling out a slew of education, advocacy and volunteering projects designed to ease the major internal tensions they see threatening the success and strength of Israeli society.

Hundreds of young Israeli fans of Kochav Nolad and others posted suggestions online for lyrics to the song, and prominent Israeli songwriters culled the submissions to create the finished product. When translated into English, the song’s final verse reads, “See how all of us are moving as one / A journey of hopes, beliefs and fears / All of us painting the same picture / A perfect picture of Kulanana.”

The word kulanana is an “an optimistic new word,” Prashker said, which combines the words for “all of us” in Israel’s two official languages, Hebrew and Arabic.

“Who would have thought that after 72 years of active oppression of Judaism in Russia, synagogues and community centers are being revived,” remarks Rabbi Elie Abadie, spiritual leader of Congregation Edmund J. Safra in Manhattan, who recently traveled to Moscow and St. Petersburg along with 15 other rabbis on a trip supported by UJA-Federation of New York.

The purpose of the four-day mission, says Dru Greenwood, director of SYNERGY: UJA-Federation and Synagogues Together, was to allow New York congregational rabbis across the religious spectrum to experience the renewal of Jewish life taking place in the former Soviet Union, and to see first-hand the critical help extended to 165,000 elderly Jews living in poverty — all work made possible in part by UJA-Federation.

A delegation of 16 New York rabbis and spouses visited Moscow and St. Petersburg on a UJA-Federation mission led by John S. Ruskay.

UJA-Federation executive vice president and CEO John S. Ruskay led the mission that also met with the leader of the Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI), Natan Sharansky, who served nine years in Soviet prisons as a refusnik, and his wife Avital, who led the struggle for human rights during the Soviet era.

Rabbi Abadie, who participated in rallies for Soviet Jews during the 1970s, says he was deeply impressed by the abilities of the rabbis in Moscow to handle a multitude of issues around Jewish law regarding whether a person is Jewish by birth or identity.

“If someone has Jewish grandparents but not a Jewish mother and identifies with being Jewish,” he notes, “the rabbis try to bring them closer to the Jewish community with the hope they will become part of the Jewish mainstream, and convert.”

Rabbi Abadie adds that the teens he visited at JAFI summer camp also left him with a vivid memory.

“I met teenagers who had just learned their Jewish identity before they left for camp,” he says. “They were thirsty to learn about their Jewish heritage and Jewish knowledge and are trying to embrace it.”

Rabbi Abadie says he wants to share the enthusiasm of learning about Jewish life, against all odds, with his congregation. “We can learn from the Jewish community in Russia how to value our Jewish identity and tradition with all our minds and all our hearts.”

Redeeming Lost Jewish Souls

The summer camp visit was also a highlight of the mission for Rabbi David A. Schuck, spiritual leader of Pelham Jewish Center.

“These camps take children who have no idea what it means to be Jewish and begin to tell them this magnificent story about the Jewish people, and over time they begin to see themselves in it,” Rabbi Schuck says.

He was inspired as well by the Russian Jewish community’s openness. “In Russia when a person shows up, the door is wide open and she or he is embraced, period,” Rabbi Schuck says. “Redeeming lost Jewish souls trumps everything else, and this generates an openness, warmth, and passion within the Jewish community; judgment and coercion are checked at the door.”

He adds that he sees this spirit as a model to follow. “If my community can emulate the warmth, openness, and creativity that I felt within the Russian Jewish community,” Rabbi Schuck says, “we would move further toward our mandate of holiness.

Jewish renewal efforts in summer camps and schools and outreach to the elderly are supported by UJA-Federation and through the work of two beneficiary agencies, JAFI and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee.

By John S. Ruskay

The great American writer, Henry Miller, once observed about travel: “One’s destination is never a place but rather a new way of looking at things.”

These words captured my mood when returning home last Friday from a remarkable four-day mission to Moscow and St. Petersburg. It was a mission that brought 16 New York congregational rabbis from across the religious spectrum to witness and experience the renewal of Jewish life in the former Soviet Union.

We gathered for prayer three times daily, and one evening, we found ourselves in Red Square. Just yards from Lenin’s Tomb, we prayed ma’ariv, the evening service. Lenin and his comrades were probably turning in their graves, as were some of our great-grandparents and grandparents. For 70 years, the Soviet regime did everything it could to eliminate religion, and yet, it is now clear, the search for meaning and community cannot be contained.

Nowhere is this more apparent than at the more than 60 summer camp sessions that are being operated by the Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI). Natan Sharansky, who served nine years in Soviet prisons and now leads JAFI, and his wife Avital, who led the struggle for human rights, joined us when we visited one of these camps.

I met one young woman named Anna. She had not even known she was Jewish when her grandmother suggested that she attend one of the JAFI summer camps. So she did. She said, “At camp, I experienced Shabbat for the first time.” Her eyes lit up. “It changed my life. I returned for two summers as a camper, am now a counselor, am part of a youth group during the year, and I am going to Israel on a special program.” There are 6,000 like Anna who will attend summer camps this summer, but for lack of funds, an equal number cannot. This weighs on me heavily.

Before visiting the summer camps, we spent time with some of the 165,000 elderly, isolated, and often homebound seniors, who are being provided meals and medical care by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and the extended hand of world Jewry. We were also introduced to some of the educational and cultural start-up initiatives that UJA-Federation is also supporting.

The camps, schools, youth groups, and voluntarism that accompany the welfare efforts are together giving birth to emerging Jewish life. Yes, some are drifting away from Judaism, and intermarriage continues. Said differently, in Moscow and St. Petersburg there is today both erosion and renewal, just like in New York. The difference, as some of the rabbis observed, is that the Russian community is under-organized and welcomes support for all positive initiatives.

At the final session, many rabbis, moved by what they had seen, spoke about taking back observations and lessons learned to their synagogues and communities. This was my fifth trip to the former Soviet Union and, like the rabbis, I continue to be inspired by what is happening there. But 20 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, young and old are being magnetically attracted to Jewish community. One sees so clearly there how the power of Jewish life is deep and abiding. What a privilege to help make this possible. Sometimes it takes a trip across the world to illuminate what we already know.

Ramiz Rafailov, 17, knows that his experiences at Camp B’Yachad are leaving an indelible mark on him. The eight-day overnight camp is designed to help teens from Russian-speaking families in New York City develop their Jewish identity.