Last update - 00:00 12/11/2006
Five ministers in L.A. for United Jewish Communities GA event
By Amiram Barkat, Haaretz Correspondent, and Haaretz Service
A total of five cabinet ministers headed by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will lead an unprecedented Israeli delegation to the General Assembly (GA) of the United Jewish Communities, opening in Los Angeles on Sunday.
Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu and fellow Likud MK Gideon Saar will also participate in the event, as will Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fischer and Karnit Goldwasser, wife of IDF reservist Ehud Goldwasser, held by Hezbollah since his kidnapping in July.
The cabinet ministers attending the gathering are Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, Public Security Minister Avi Dichter, Tourism Minister Yitzhak Herzog, and Education Minister Yuli Tamir.
A group of Israeli business people including Eitan Wertheimer, president and CEO of Iscar Ltd., will also take part.
The business people's participation could create a turning point in the Jewish establishment, Wertheimer told Haaretz in an interview.
He believes Israelis must take part in the struggle against assimilation, and the Jewish Agency must focus on increasing Israelis' income and reducing the social gaps.
Rehabilitation for the north
Since the beginning of the war the United Jewish Communities have raised some $350 million - NIS 1.5 billion - for rehabilitating and developing northern communities. The GA's three days of meetings will consist of dozens of conferrals, debates and workshops on Jewish continuity, Jewish education, raising funds and social activity.
Wertheimer, who took part in the GA for the first time last year, says he discovered how ignorant he was on Jewish issues.
"At first I didn't understand what was happening. I felt like a mezuzah that people pass, kiss and walk on," he says.
In retrospect, participating in the conference last year inspired Wertheimer and the business people with him. "We discovered we had been ignoramuses and didn't know we belonged to the best international group in the world. What is wonderful about the GA is the Jewish 'togetherness.' There are lots of clever people there exchanging views and discussing the problems of the Jewish people. We felt that it opened up our eyes."
He is accompanied by Ofra Strauss, Didi Arazi, Roni Douek, Dov Lautman and other business people. About three years ago former Jewish Agency chairman Salai Meridor persuaded them to join the Jewish Agency's board of directors.
Wertheimer says he and his friends are motivated by the desire to connect to Jewish identity. "As long as we remained in Israel, we were Israelis but in the world we are Jews," he said.
The growing involvement of business people is shifting the power balance between Israelis and American Jews. Unlike the Jewish Agency, which is run by paid functionaries, the Jewish American establishment is ruled by wealthy community leaders who do their job on a volunteer basis. For years the Israelis have complained of the condescending treatment on the part of the Americans who pay their wages.
Wertheimer, who sold Iscar this year to invester Warren Buffett for $4.5 billion, says the Americans "are happy to meet guys who are willing to invest money and be partners. We don't feel they're doing us any favors."
In the last GA gatherings Israel's place was marginal. This year the program was changed at the last moment due to the war.
Wertheimer is interested in general Jewish issues. "We will have to make sure that Jews remain Jews" he says. But the Jewish establishment's main focus must be Israel, "because it's in the interest of all the Jews in the world that Israel succeeds," he says.