Fifty years after his grandmother Rabbanit Sarah Herzog was awarded an honorary doctorate by Bar-Ilan University, Brig.-Gen. (ret.) Mike Herzog, the immediate former ambassador to the US, will be among this year’s recipients of honorary doctorates from BIU.
His uncle Yaakov Herzog followed Mike Herzog’s grandfather Yitzhak Halevi Herzog into the rabbinate, but was also a diplomat, serving as Israel’s ambassador to Canada. Mike’s father, Chaim Herzog was also a diplomat and subsequently an MK, and after that the sixth president of Israel. Mike’s younger brother, President Isaac Herzog, followed their father in a legal career, then became an MK, a minister, a political party leader, the chairman of the Jewish Agency, where both his parents had worked in the nascent period of the state, and then was elected the 11th president.
Mike Herzog had a long and distinguished military career prior to entering civilian life, and his father had built an equally distinguished military career as a senior officer in both the British and Israeli armies.
BIU is this year marking its 70th anniversary, and the conferring of honorary doctorates will take place within the framework of the weeklong celebrations, on Tuesday evening, May 20, at the Dahan Family Unity Park on the BIU campus in Ramat Gan.
In addition to Herzog, honorees will include Rita, the singer and composer; Prof. Patrick Cramer, president of the Max Planck Society; the NATAL – Israel Trauma and Resiliency Center; Rebecca Boukhris, trustee of the Adelis Foundation; and Michael Jesselson, former chairman of BIU’s board of trustees.
Rita, one of Israel’s most iconic and celebrated vocalists, will be honored for her exceptional contribution to the State of Israel, to Israeli culture, and to Hebrew music. Her distinctive voice and artistic expression have deeply resonated with audiences, creating powerful emotional connections and expanding the country’s musical landscape.
In a letter informing her of the honorary doctorate, BIU President Prof. Arie Zaban wrote, “As an artist, you build bridges between worlds, bring people together, and serve as a source of comfort, hope, compassion, and healing.”
Rita emigrated from her native Tehran at the age of eight and has since built a remarkable career spanning more than 35 years. She has also represented Israel at Eurovision.
Herzog will be recognized for over 50 years of distinguished service to the State of Israel.
“Throughout your career, you have exemplified the highest ideals of public service, prioritizing the nation’s well-being, guiding strategic policy, and demonstrating unwavering commitment, whether as head of the IDF’s Strategic Planning Division, the military secretary to the prime minister, or as a trusted envoy navigating delicate political initiatives across party lines,” wrote Zaban in his letter to Herzog. “In these especially challenging times since October 7, you have represented Israel with dignity and strength before our most important ally, acting as a true ambassador not just to governments but to the people.”
Cramer will be recognized for his groundbreaking scientific achievements and his bold stance against antisemitism.
Appointed president of the Max Planck Society in Göttingen, Germany, in 2023, Prof. Cramer is renowned for his discovery of the three-dimensional structure of RNA polymerase – the key enzyme involved in gene transcription. This pioneering work, conducted during his postdoctoral research at Stanford University, provided foundational insights into the mechanisms of gene expression.
NATAL offers emotional and psychological treatment and support to soldiers and civilians
NATAL, since its establishment in 1998, has offered emotional and psychological treatment and support to soldiers and civilians. It is being recognized for its profound contribution to Israeli society for more than quarter of a century, and especially in the wake of the events of October 7.
NATAL has played a pioneering role in addressing psychological trauma and invisible injuries among soldiers, civilians, and entire communities in Israel and abroad. With a unique approach grounded in professionalism, compassion, and innovation, the organization has raised awareness of mental health challenges and helped countless individuals find healing and resilience.
In recent months, NATAL has provided support to more than four times its usual caseload, reaching victims, first responders, and others in need, and working tirelessly to prevent long-term trauma.
Just a few days prior to the awards ceremony, there was a changing of the guard. Judith Recanati, NATAL founder and chairwoman for the past 25 years, relinquished her position to Reuven Krupik, the former chairman of Bank Hapoalim. However Recanati will remain on board with the title of president.
Boukhris, a trustee of the Adelis Foundation, will be recognized for its steadfast support of the university and the State of Israel. A long-standing partner of BIU, the foundation champions education, scientific research, and medical advancement, driven by its mission to secure the future of the Jewish people and enhance the well-being of Israeli society.
Jesselson will receive an honorary doctorate in recognition of his enduring leadership and commitment to BIU. His efforts have been instrumental in advancing the university’s mission to integrate academic excellence with Jewish values and heritage.
“The Jesselsons have been long-standing members of the Bar-Ilan family, and their association with the university is most valued. Michael Jesselson has continued his family’s legacy of friendship and support, serving for years on Bar-Ilan’s board of trustees, including as chairman. His devotion and dedication to the university is most commendable and praiseworthy,” said Zaban.
■ MUSEUMS AND other cultural institutions are suffering a downturn in financial support, as philanthropists have to a large extent turned their attention to medicine, science, and technology. Also among recipients are educational institutions that are devoting considerable attention to Holocaust education, which is becoming more significant with fading numbers of Holocaust survivors. Within the next decade, very few, if any, will be left, and organizations and institutions dedicated to the preservation of Holocaust memory and all that this entails are constantly thinking of new ways to bring the Holocaust to greater attention, with the aim of preventing a second Holocaust.
Although several major philanthropists, along with the US government, have ceased funding of universities in which there have been violent demonstrations of antisemitism and anti-Zionism, the University of Southern California, which houses the USC Shoah Foundation that was established by Steven Spielberg in1994, has received a transformative $30 million gift from one of its members, Mickey Shapiro, who is a leading American figure in the field of Holocaust remembrance.
Shapiro was born in a displaced persons camp to Holocaust survivor parents. In appreciation of his generosity, the foundation’s headquarters was renamed Mickey Shapiro Headquarters of the USC Shoah Foundation. The foundation also has offices in Tel Aviv.
■ LOCALLY, TEL Aviv University has benefited from even greater generosity – not for Holocaust education but for the establishment of advanced research laboratories and enlarged teaching facilities in the Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences, which will be renamed the Jonathan and Mindy Gray Faculty in honor of the donor, Jonathan Gray and his wife.
Gray, who is the president and COO of Blackstone, has donated $125m., which, in addition to the expansion of the building, will enable the faculty to increase its annual student intake from 300 to 400. For some years now, Israel has suffered a shortage of physicians and nurses. Gray’s gift will relieve some of the pressure.
■ PARTICIPANTS FROM Israel and abroad will gather at Yad Vashem’s Beit Wohlin in Givatayim on May 21, for an international conference on “Shaping the Memory of the Holocaust.” It is jointly organized by the Center Organizations of Holocaust Survivors in Israel (COHSI), Yad Vashem, the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, and the World Jewish Congress.
Among the subjects to be discussed are future challenges to Holocaust education, contemporary antisemitism, and the mutation and mainstreaming of antisemitism in a post-October 7 world.
Speakers will include Colette Avital, chairwoman COHSI, Dani Dayan, chairman of Yad Vashem, Gideon Taylor, president, Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, Maram Stern, executive vice president of the WJC, Piotr Cywinski, director the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, Michal Cotler-Wunsh, Israel’s special envoy for combating antisemitism, and Robert Rehak, special envoy for Holocaust, interfaith dialogue, and freedom of religion, Czech Republic.
■ US AMBASSADOR Mike Huckabee will in all probability go down in history as the most accessible of American ambassadors to Israel. This was obvious in the press conference on humanitarian aid to Gazans that he gave at the embassy in Jerusalem last Friday, when he mingled with the many journalists who showed up at short notice; in the number of interviews he’s given; and in the number of events that he has attended.
Coming up in a few days is the opening plenary of the WJC, which will be held at the Museum of Tolerance in Jerusalem in a few days’ time, and will be hosted by Sylvan Adams, the president of the Israel branch of the WJC.
At a special session on May 19, President Herzog will award the Presidential Medal of Honor to WJC President Ronald S. Lauder, in recognition of his leadership and dedication to the Jewish people.
From the time that the medal, originally known as the Presidential Medal of Distinction, was first awarded by president Shimon Peres, in 2012, the question was repeatedly asked in this column why Lauder had not yet been recognized.
For the most part, Jewish life in Eastern Europe was dormant from the period of the Holocaust till the late 1980s. It was gradually revived by Lauder following his appointment as US ambassador to Austria in 1986. He established educational facilities and other community services, and Jews who had hidden their religious identities gradually emerged from the woodwork.
Later, at the request of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Lauder initiated negotiations with Syria on Israel’s behalf.
Lauder has been involved at the executive level with organizations such as the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the Joint Distribution Committee, the Anti-Defamation League, the Rabbinical College of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, Brandeis University, and the Jewish National Fund.
He also established an employment office in Beersheba with the aim of giving graduates of Ben-Gurion University a reason to remain in the Negev. He has also invested millions of dollars in Israeli business enterprises. He has been president of WJC since 2007.
Last year, he was named with a group of other distinguished people as a recipient of the award, but was unable to attend the award ceremony at the President’s Residence this past January. It is actually more fitting for him to receive his medal in the presence of global Jewish leaders, with and for whom he works, and has worked for so long.
Given his track record, few people could be considered as or more deserving than Lauder.
■ LEGENDARY JERUSALEM mayor Teddy Kollek took office in 1965, which was also the year in which the Israel Museum, in the creation of which he played a seminal role, was opened. On Wednesday it will officially celebrate its 60th anniversary.
Kollek maintained an abiding interest in the museum, and it was as a result of his connections that the museum has more than 200 Chagall items and some extraordinary pieces from the Rothschilds and from other prominent figures and art collectors.
Kollek and his wife, Tamar, who owned several valuable ancient Israel artifacts, donated them to the Israel Museum, whose first director and chief curator was art historian Karl Katz, who had previously been director of the Bezalel National Museum, which evolved into the Israel Museum.
But the directors who left the greatest imprint on the museum and served in their positions for the longest period were child Holocaust survivor Martin Weyl and his immediate successor, James Snyder.
Weyl was with the museum from its very beginning. Following his army service, he worked as a construction laborer and literally helped to build the facility. He then studied art history, and after the museum’s opening worked as a guide and later as a curator, rising in the ranks to chief curator. In 1981 he was appointed director, and held the position until 1996.
Weyl subsequently headed the Beracha Foundation, which supports environmental, cultural, and educational initiatives. He retired from that position approximately a decade ago.
Snyder oversaw the $100m. revamping of the museum, and presided over the yearlong 50th anniversary celebrations, which began with a gala event in May 2015. He served as director from 1997 to 2016.
Following his retirement as director, Snyder, who is a talented fundraiser, stayed with the museum for a year or two, and then transferred to the Jerusalem Foundation, on whose behalf he worked from his home in New York, coming to Israel at least six times a year to look at different projects around Jerusalem. He is currently the director of the Jewish Museum in New York.
Snyder was succeeded at the Israel Museum by Eran Neuman, who resigned less than a month after his appointment.
The next director, Denis Weil, who came to the Museum with impeccable credentials, lasted barely a year, and resigned in August 2023.
Current director Suzanne Landau, who is widely regarded as one of the most influential people in Israel’s art world, has a very long history with the Israel Museum, as well as a long hiatus from the museum prior to her return in 2023.
Landau became a registrar at the museum in 1978. In 1982 she was appointed curator of contemporary art, and in 1998 was named chief curator of fine arts.
Her career and her reputation continued to flourish, and in August 2012, following the death of Mordechai Omer, the director of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, she was appointed as his successor. She revolutionized the museum to the extent that annual attendance soared and passed the one million mark. In December 2018, she stopped being the director but continued to work as chief curator, prior to being weaned back to the Israel Museum in 2023.
■ AGE IS no longer a barrier to continue with one’s career. Landau herself is proof of that, having been born in Czechoslovakia in 1946.
But there is no shortage of octogenarians, nonagenarians, and even people who have passed the century mark, who are continuing with their work and are not only mentally spry but also physically, albeit at a slightly slower pace.
Among the bylines seen from time in The Jerusalem Post and its flagship magazine, The Jerusalem Report, are those of Walter Bingham, 101, who also hosts a radio show on Arutz 7; Dvora Waysman and Neville Teller, who are in their nineties; plus several who are in their eighties.
In the entertainment industry, Lea Koenig, at 95, continues to appear regularly in a variety of productions on the Hebrew and Yiddish stage. Yehoram Gaon, at 85, with a career that spans well over half a century, this month had his first ever concert at the Caesarea Amphitheater, and is planning a tour around the country. Gila Almagor, at 85, is still the queen of the Habima Theatre.
And, of course, there are many in their seventies who are still going strong – among them Hanan Yovel, Danny Sanderson, Margalt Tzan’ani, Yehuda Poliker, Chava Alberstein, Shlomo Artzi, Shlomit Aharon, Matti Caspi, and Yardena Arazi.
Academics also continue with research, theories, essays, and more, well after retirement age, Among them is game theorist, mathematician, and economist Nobel Prize laureate Prof. Robert Aumann, who on Thursday, May 22, will be the guest of the Tel Aviv International Salon at the Jabotinsky Institute in Tel Aviv, where he will talk about “Game Theory of Israel: Negotiating Hostages with Terrorists.”
Aumann, who will celebrate his 95th birthday next month, is a delightful speaker, so it should be an interesting and thought-provoking evening.
■ ANOTHER SENIOR citizen who is constantly on the move is child Holocaust survivor Rena Quint, 89, whose many activities include hosting Jewish, non-Jewish, and interfaith groups for Shabbat of a Lifetime Friday night dinners or Saturday lunches. Last week, she had them back-to-back, with a Christian group on Friday night and an Australian group, mainly representing the National Council of Jewish Women, for lunch on Saturday.
Quint never tires of hosting such groups, because doing so provides additional opportunities to talk about the Holocaust, the lessons to be learned from it, and the need to expand education against all forms of racism.
Beyond knowing the name of the group that Shabbat of a Lifetime organizers are sending to her home, Quint has no advance information about the people who will be coming. Over the years, she has hosted people of different faiths, nationalities, and ethnic backgrounds.
At every meal, she asks people to introduce themselves and say something about what they thought they would find in Israel, and the difference between their preconceptions and what they actually experienced. She also asks them what they know about the Holocaust. The discussions are often very emotional, and members of the various groups, who have been in each other’s company for several days, learn things about each other that did not emerge in any other setting.
On Friday night, one of the guests in a group that included media personalities was CNN political analyst Van Jones, a best-selling author, civil rights advocate, and activist in promoting black-Jewish relations.
On Saturday, some of her guests had converted, or were in the process of converting, to Judaism. But what was perhaps more interesting was that they had come to Israel expecting terrible tensions wherever they went, and had not encountered any.
Quint, for her part, had been reading about the terrible spike in antisemitism in Australia, and no one of the group whose members came from Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane had any personal experience of antisemitism. Fake news? Not really. It’s just that few reports of events cover a total situation, and often what is reported is not the norm but the exception to the rule.
What her guests did not realize was that Hetal Vanraj, the young Indian woman sitting next to Quint, is neither Jewish nor a member of Quint’s very large family. Quint treats her as she does her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and takes her to the many places to which Quint is invited.
Before coming to Quint, Hetal had worked for a totally secular family elsewhere in Israel, and had learned nothing of Jewish customs and traditions, let alone Jewish history. With Quint she is learning all the time. She is now familiar with the dietary laws, what is and is not permissible for Jews on the Sabbath, and she now knows a lot about the Holocaust, which she had never heard of before coming to live with Quint. Better still, she has learned to sing Sabbath songs in Hebrew, and sings them for Shabbat of a Lifetime guests.
■ THE UNIVERSITY of Haifa recently added another feather to its cap with an important appointment of one of its faculty members, Dr. Dana Margalith, head of the department of architecture at the university’s School of Design. She was appointed as a member of the international research committee of the PACT project – a European Union initiative focused on the future of port cities and sustainable energy transition.
PACT (Port City Territories in Action) is a large-scale research initiative under the EU’s COST framework (European Cooperation in Science and Technology). It brings together researchers, professionals, and policy-makers from approximately 35 countries, including Israel.
The project aims to explore how port cities – which are major economic, social, and environmental hubs – can play an active role in the global transition to renewable energy and in promoting sustainable urban development.
PACT encourages interdisciplinary collaboration, cross-national knowledge exchange, and the implementation of innovative solutions to help secure the future of port cities amid evolving climate, economic, and societal conditions.
Margalith is expected to contribute her academic and practical expertise in integrating urban planning with environmental considerations, as well as a distinctive Israeli perspective.
In acknowledging the honor which she received, Margalith said: “I believe the PACT project will allow us to develop innovative approaches to sustainable planning that will benefit the environment, the economy, and society – and contribute to improving the quality of life in urban spaces.”
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