| | They Need Our Tefillos
In the wee hours of the night, as the Jews in Israel are asleep, the soldiers are pounding the battlefields of Gaza. It is the time of the most dangerous and perilous of their operations. With tremendous dedication and מסירת נפש, they battle with tanks and weapons, and they know where their true strength lies. אלה ברכב ואלה בסוסים ואנחנו בשם ד' אלקינו נזכיר We know how critical our prayers are in these battles. And yet, there is a shortage of tehillim and tefillah during these dangerous hours when the soldiers fight and Israel sleeps. We, who live in America, are awake between the hours of 6-10 p.m. It is our turn to arm up. It is our responsibility to bolster their strength, to give chizuk to our soldiers with our tefillos. They feel the difference, they sense the strength of our words. And they have no one to ask but us. We are not in Gaza but we can join this war, doing the most important job that only we can do. Who can answer their call? We can! By joining Achim B'Tefillah you can choose a ten-minute time slot between the hours of 6-10 p.m. By saying the specific tehillim assigned to your timeslot, you, together with all of Klal Yisrael, will complete Sefer Tehillim hundreds of times each night during these crucial hours. This is not a calling. It's a responsibility. Achim B'Tefillah. With Unity We Will Succeed.
Please join this important initiative by signing up here | | | | |
| On the morning of the historic rally on the National Mall, OU Advocacy participated in a crucial event for our community and its cause. The place was the hearing room of the House of Representatives Committee on Education and the topic was the scourge of antisemitism on American campuses. OU Executive Vice President Rabbi Moshe Hauer testified before the Committee alongside Ms. Sahar Tartak, a student from Yale involved with OU-JLIC, and other key witnesses. This hearing was a critical piece of our advocacy to the Biden Administration to take strong action to keep Jewish students safe at universities and public schools.
Watch the full hearing
Just days after the hearing and the rally on the National Mall, the U.S. Dept. of Education announced investigations into several universities for potential violations of their legal obligations to ensure students are not discriminated against – a real example of collective advocacy yielding results.
Read more | | | OU Israel is at the forefront, providing spiritual, emotional, educational and material support to tens of thousands of Israelis. It's been over six weeks since our brothers and sisters from Sderot and so many other cities in the south and north were forced to evacuate their homes. The longer they live as refugees, the greater their needs become – especially the needs of the youth. They long for normalcy, for their friends, to go back to their homes. OU Israel is addressing their social and emotional needs through regular contact between its youth counselors and refugee teens, programming in the hotels for children of all ages and so much more. OU Israel continues to emotionally support and provide opportunities for English speakers in Israel. Recent volunteer opportunities include tzitzit tying at the OU Israel Center, volunteering in the field and making Chanukah gift packages for families whose husband/father is in the IDF. NCSY Israel ran its first Latte & Learning since the start of the war. Teens there studied and discussed the topic "The Chosen People" and learned in memory of Rose Lubin HY"D, a beloved JSU alumna. This Wednesday, November 22, L'Ayla, OU Israel's women's learning initiative, is running its second chizuk evening for Anglo mothers of soldiers, to take place in Efrat. How you can get involved: | | | The March for Israel rally this past Tuesday was an incredible event for the Jewish community and its supporters. NCSY was privileged to bring nearly 1,000 students from across North America, including Toronto, New York, Texas, Oregon, New Jersey, California, Pennsylvania, and many more. Special thanks goes to Root One for organizing the teen rally before the main event. It was so heartwarming to see Jewish youth at the forefront of the rally and to know that NCSY's collective efforts strengthening Jewish teens contributed to the vibrancy of that day.
How you can get involved: - One Nation. One Action.
Sign up today to take on a mitzvah on behalf of the IDF
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- NCSY Adopt a Soldier
4,000+ students have already requested names of soldiers to daven for
Sign up to receive the name of a soldier
- NCSY Shmirah Project
Sign up for a 15-minute time slot to learn Torah or say Tehillim
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| | | Yachad Israel continues to run programs in Jerusalem, Beit Shemesh and Efrat, creating an environment that is emotionally safe for participants and gives them a sense of normalcy. The Marilyn and Sheldon David IVDU Boys High School took a group of 30 people to the rally in Washington, D.C., teaching the students the value of advocacy. While there, the students went on a tour of the White House, organized by OU Advocacy. | | | OU-JLIC's Yavneh is a group of passionate and inspired student leaders who have taken incredible action in support of Israel on campuses across North America. Here are just some highlights of the many Yavneh student activities on campus:
With school closures and many parents being called to reserve duty, Yavneh members at Princeton and Penn founded the Yavneh Pen Pals initiative, currently featuring 150 college students who tutor and build connections with children in Israel. As a response to the war, Yavneh students have led 43 vigils and solidarity events on 29 campuses and organized special shiurim in New York City, Boston and Los Angeles, engaging over 100 students in Torah learning. 100 students across 7 campuses organized challah bakes in the merit of our soldiers.
Yavneh West created Tefillin Together, encouraging dozens of students in the LA area to wrap Tefillin in response to the war, and initiated Kippas on Campus, a social media page to promote pride in wearing a kippa on campus. Cooper Union's Yavneh students lobbied the school administration to come out with a public statement supporting Jewish students and Yavneh at UMass Amherst, organized an OU-JLIC-wide 25 hours of learning with hundreds of students participating from 20 campuses.
Students worked with the Mayor of Binghamton, Jared M. Kraham, to raise the Israeli flag outside City Hall and, together with students from YU, created a national day for love and kindness in response to the rise of antisemitism. The Yavneh Video Project was launched, sharing dozens of videos from students across the country with soldiers and people in Israel, re-affirming that college students of America stand with them. How you can get involved: | | | COMMUNITY PROJECTS AND PARTNERSHIPS | | | What do you say when others are making comments about Israel that make you uncomfortable? Do you have the information you need to discuss the topic accurately and articulately? The OU's SPIRIT program for retirees presents "Concepts and Misconceptions," a presentation that prepares you to make your points clearly and succinctly and helps you win the "war of words" that is so important now.
Register for the program to receive the recording | | | In an incredible display of achdut, almost 300,000 Jews gathered together this past Tuesday, showing both our concern for our brothers and sisters in Israel and our presence in the USA. As we experienced in the midbar, the complete unity of Klal Yisrael was not only a prerequisite for accepting the Torah, but also a tool to grow and experience the true sweetness of Torah. Along this vein, Torah Initiatives encourages you to channel this achdut and energy into your daily schedule through the power of learning. May our collective learning be a zechus for all of Klal Yisrael worldwide and to protect those on the front lines in Israel. How you can get involved: - Use the All Torah platform to enhance your learning of Daf Yomi, Mishnah Yomi, Yerushalmi Yomi, Shnayim Mikrah or by viewing the hundreds of curated shiurim on other topics.
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- Sign up for the new bitachon series based on Beis HaLevi with Rabbi David Sutton, a timely topic during the current situation.
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- Sign up to learn shas for the siyum on January 2, 2024, in memory of Steve Neuwirth a"h, All Daf's visionary and founding supporter.
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- Please also consider powering the All Torah platforms with a dedication, allowing thousands daily access to Torah study in an organized and clear way.
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| | | In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis recently signed a bill providing $25 million in security funding for yeshivas and Jewish day schools – representing a 5X increase from the previous allocation. Meanwhile, in New York, Deputy Majority Leader State Senator Michael Gianaris recently announced a historic push to double NYS security funding to nonpublic schools – going from $45 million to $90 million – and the proposal is now with Gov. Kathy Hochul for consideration. In Pennsylvania, the House of Representatives voted to double the Nonprofit Security Program fund from $5 million to $10 million, and is now with the Senate for consideration. Amidst a nationwide rise in antisemitism following October 7, Project Protect, Teach Coalition's security-focused initiative alongside OU Advocacy, has urged Jewish communities to mobilize and demand increased security funding for our Jewish institutions, including for our yeshivas and Jewish day schools. Since then, Jewish communities have banded together in activism, sending in nearly 50,000 letters to legislators.
Learn more about Project Protect
How you can get involved: - In the next year, Project Protect has pledged to advocate for $1 billion nationally in security funding. Over the next 100 days, Project Protect aims to raise $5 million to support its advocacy work to secure our yeshivas and Jewish day schools.
Donate now
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