At Moishe House Birthright Moves In

Residents and guests at the Moishe House in Orange County, Calif., celebrate their first joint Shabbat dinner.

Birthright Goes To Hebron —Controversially?

Participants on a Birthright trip last week discussed their stop at the Cave of Patriarchs in Hebron on a webcast.

An Australian Birthright trip made what is believed to be an unprecedented stop in Hebron last week complete with a post-visit webcast, raising questions about whether the program has shifted policy on visits to the West Bank.

The group, led by trip provider Israel Express in conjunction with Chabad on Campus in Melbourne and the Zionist Federation of Australia Israel Programs, toured Hebron’s Cave of Patriarchs, the second holiest site in Judaism after the Temple Mount and a site that is also holy to Muslims. Recently deemed a National Heritage Site by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Cave of Patriarchs is believed to house the graves of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their wives, according to all three major monotheistic religions.

“Be’ezrat Hashem [with the help of God], all the Birthright [trips] will come to Hebron, connect with ‘the mamas and the papas,’” said tour guide Daniel Gutman on the webcast, referring to Judaism’s matriarchs and patriarchs. The webcast still appears on video host WeJew.com but has since been taken down from YouTube.

Prior to the Hebron visit, trips to West Bank towns — as well as Gaza and most parts of east Jerusalem — have been consistently prohibited by Birthright, which sends young diaspora Jews on free 10-day trips to Israel. “Our tours do not travel to or through areas of the West Bank of Gaza,” reads a Birthright web page detailing its security measures. Similar stipulations appear on Israel Express’s Web site, which guarantees that tours do not travel in such places that they deem “unsafe.”  Continue reading…

Birthright’s First Book

The new Birthright-Nextbook book: Tourist info and then some.

by Sharon Udasin

This winter, Taglit-Birthright trip participants left Israel with a little something extra.

In a joint venture between Birthright and Nextbook, these Israel first-timers are receiving a new book, “Traveling Companion,” a colorful hardback filled with history lessons, personal essays and travel guides — written and edited by Wayne Hoffman, the managing director of special projects at Tablet Magazine. For Hoffman, who worked closely with Barry Chazan from Birthright and Len Small at Nextbook, the goal was to include a sampling of places typically visited on Birthright trips as well as supplemental sites that might pique interests on future visits, and of essays and short literary pieces from Israeli authors.

“I don’t think any other book offers such a broad introduction to Israeli iterature in such a compact space — all the while tying it directly to things that the readers have seen with their own eyes,” Hoffman said. (Not surprisingly, a number of the authors represented have Nextbook connections.)

The project was funded entirely by Birthright, and over 10,000 copies have been printed thus far, according to Ada Spitzer, Taglit-Birthright Israel’s vice president for marketing.

“The idea is that it will become part of our permanent educational material,” she said. Spitzer would not provide a figure about how much money Birthright has invested in this project.

Hoffman went along on a Birthright trip last winter to get a taste of the participants’ experiences. Rather than providing logistical data like hotel names or restaurants, Hoffman focused on making the book an interactive tool for use during the trip.

“The traveling companion is intended to give people a bit of context to understand what they’re seeing, and to help them remember what they saw,” Hoffman said. “I figure that people are ready to learn a bit about Masada when they’re actually at Masada.”  Continue reading…

Funding In-Marriage Out Of His Own Pocket

“You have to try to find Jewish love,” Momo Lifshitz, inset, told his Oranim trip participants, pictured here near the Syrian border. LEFT CREDIT: Sharon Udasin

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Tel Aviv — Tucked into the rocky thickets of Mount Carmel in northern Israel, 43 American 20-somethings gathered in a hotel conference room to play a simple game — using their bodies as place markers, they lined up across the room according to how important they found dating Jews, and Jews alone.

At first, only four people stood on the “date Jews” side of the room. But when the question changed to marriage, four soon grew to 15. And when marriage changed to raising children Jewish, a good 15 more shuffled over.

“If I were going to raise my kids with a religion, I would want it to be Judaism,” said Matt Lakind, 29, from Hoboken, N.J., who had joined the trip with his girlfriend, Erica Roth. “Otherwise, I wouldn’t want them to have any religion, that’s all.”

A week later, after touring Israel from top to bottom, east to west and back again, his opinion changed. “Now coming here I can see there’s actually a whole ethnic culture to Judaism that has been harder to find in the past,” he said. “Now I understand why when people ask where I’m from, I will tell them: ‘I’m Jewish.’”

Lakind and Roth were participating in an inaugural free 10-day trip to Israel, sponsored by Oranim Educational Initiatives, and funded personally by the owner of the organization, Shlomo “Momo” Lifshitz. Though their trip followed an itinerary quite similar to that of the better-known Taglit-Birthright Israel, this 10-day journey was under the auspices of Oranim alone.  Continue reading…

Pink Slips At Birthright

by Sharon Udasin

In an attempt to redirect the organization’s focus on local Birthright alumni communities, Birthright Israel NEXT — the post-trip programming wing of Birthright Israel — has laid off six of its employees, several of whom held high-ranking managerial positions, The Jewish Week has learned.

The layoffs in the New York-based national office included two individuals from the communications department, one person from programming and three from the community initiatives sector, said Rabbi Daniel Brenner, executive director of NEXT.

Last year, only 24 percent of NEXT’s budget was allocated for local programs in its five pilot cities, but this year, 33 percent of the budget will go to its seven smaller branches, according to Rabbi Brenner.

“The restructuring is being done in an effort to create a more efficient structure for us to meet our goals in the coming year,” he said. “Generally, we’re reducing the size of our national staff. We’re going to put more resources into local offices.”  Continue reading…

Momo Returns

by Sharon Udasin

After splitting from Birthright Israel two months ago, he’s back.

Shlomo Lifshitz — more commonly known as “Momo” — is president and founder of Oranim Educational Initiatives, formerly the largest Birthright Israel trip provider. Personally greeting each one of his nearly 50,000 travelers at Ben Gurion Airport, Lifshitz was a visible presence on each trip, where he eagerly promoted personal messages like “make Jewish babies” — messages that clashed with the more low-key approach of the program that is committed to offering free 10-day trips for young diaspora Jews.

Now, as the winter trip season approaches, Momo is launching his own remake of the famously free trips, going after the same population that Birthright targets — and even courting some of the same funders. This is the first time in Birthright’s 10-year history that a provider has broken away and launched its own free trip.

He’ll formally introduce Oranim’s revamped agenda during a live Webcast on Sunday.
Though Oranim’s free trips will largely resemble those provided by Birthright, Lifshitz has decided to make a few key changes. He’s opening up registration to Jews up to the age of 30 (Birthright’s age limit is 26), with priority given to those over 23 and a focus on networking young professionals within similar careers.  Continue reading…

This morning, I woke up to find myself in the subject of a Google News Alert without having written the corresponding story — that, I must say, is always rather exciting. The lede story in today’s ”Anglo File” section of Haaretz picks up on my original story that spoke about Momo Lifshitz and Oranim’s decision to separate from Birthright. The author, Cnaan Liphshiz, also included a paragraph on the drama surrounded my “dis-invitation” to a Birthright Israel NEXT follow-up trip. While I have personally already clarified any previous misunderstandings with the Birthright staff, I do understand why Haaretz felt that it was important to mention the incident regardless.

Anyway, to read Cnaan’s article, click here.

Meanwhile, also check out some awesome Anglo File articles by my friend Raphael Ahren — one on an aliyah incentive program for physicians, and another on Jewish geneaology.

Momo and Birthright Israel: Splitsville?

Well, thanks to an article in the New York Jewish Week, the cat’s finally out of the bag so I can freely write about what many of us have known for weeks: the relationship between Taglit Birthright Israeland Oranim’s “Momo” Lifshitz is in jeopardy. Last week, Oranim officially informed Birthright Israel that it was not planning on participating in this winter’s session, calling into question the future of their relationship. 

Why is this relevant? Because Oranim is the largest trip provider that recruits participants and runs trips for Birthright Israel. In the 10 years that Birthright has been in operation, Oranim has brought in nearly 50,000 of the 200,000 young Jews who have come to Israel – and Momo, in his trademark style, has greeted nearly every single one of them. So what transpired that would cause such a rift?

Continue reading Jewlicious’s post...

Or read Sharon’s original article...

A Divorce In The Birthright Family

Oranim’s “Momo” Lifshitz: Agenda at odds with Birthright?

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

“Momo” Lifshitz is a legendary figure among Birthright Israel participants, a larger-than-life symbol of the free 10-day trip that more than 200,000 diaspora Jews have used to jumpstart their Jewish identities.

In the decade since the Birthright trips began, nearly 50,000 teens and 20-somethings have wandered through the gates of Ben-Gurion International Airport — and into the open arms of this balding, middle-aged teddy bear of a man. The president and founder of Oranim Educational Initiatives, the largest Birthright trip provider, Shlomo Lifshitz (“Momo,” as he is commonly called) prides himself on greeting each of his Oranim Birthright trip participants with a personal “Shalom and Welcome Home.”

But Lifshitz’s “message” — alumni say he routinely pushes aliyah, pressures participants to date only Jews and stresses that they should “make Jewish babies” — has drawn criticism over the years. And this week, citing new restrictions forced on him by Birthright officials, Lifshitz, 53, a secular, nationalist former Israeli army officer whose office is based in Kfar Saba, cut his ties with the popular trips, formally withdrawing from the winter ‘09-’10 trip season.

In an e-mail sent to thousands of Oranim alumni Monday, Lifshitz cited an ideological reason for his move.Due to new rules and regulations within the project, I have been instructed that there were certain things I was simply not allowed to talk about,” Lifshitz wrote. He noted that Birthright had prohibited him from using the phrase “raise your children Jewish” or encouraging aliyah to Israel. And he said he could no longer promise his free Israel honeymoon gift to brides and grooms who had met during their Oranim Birthright trips.

“I cannot continue to allow my messages to be muted,” Lifshitz continued in the letter. Continue reading…