Metro

Redefining Activism

B'nai B'rith International incoming and outgoing presidents ponder the future.

Harry Kirsbaum
Staff Writer

Newly elected B'nai B'rith
International president Moishe
Smith of Ottawa, Canada

M

oishe Smith, a food
service owner in
Ottawa, Ontario,
Canada, broke a 163-year tradi-
tion and became the first non-
U.S. citizen to hold the position
of B'nai B'rith International
president. He took office at the
annual meeting held in New
Orleans on Dec. 4.
Smith and outgoing preident,
Joel S. Kaplan of New York City,
held a teleconference Dec. 5 with
reporters outlining their views of
the future and addressing current
topics. The Detroit Jewish News
took part from its Southfield
offices. Excerpts follow.

B'nai Writh has a large
national role and standing
in Canada. In the United
States, B'nai B'rith is one of
many organizations. How
can the organization grow
its national base in the
United States?

-

Moishe Smith: "B'nai B'rith in
the United States is best suited
to mobilize, become active and
deliver an activist agenda on
behalf of the people we service.
There's need for activism in
every corner in the United States
today. After 163 years, B'nai B'rith
is well suited and well positioned
... to place ourselves as the orga-
nization for the next generation
of participation from the Jewish
community in the United States"

Joel S. Kaplan: "The key thing
that differentiates us from other
organizations is that our policy
is made by and comprised of
volunteers as opposed to organi-
zations who really have profes-
sional heads and use their vol-
unteers for fundraising purposes
only. Our volunteers are actively
involved in their own communi-
ties in any number of humani-
tarian and political causes based

doornails to the younger gen-
eration today. What they need
to know is that the minimal
amount of time they have beyond
their jobs and beyond their fami-
lies [can be spent] in a quality
fashion. In Encino Calif., every.
day a B'nai B'rith lodge feeds 150
homeless people — these are the
things that draw young people."

Outgoing leader Joel S. Kaplan

upon the culture of that particu-
lar community.
•
"Our difficulty has been the
same as many other organiza-
tions. We are learning how to sing
the songs and dance the dances
of the younger generation. We've
learned that you cannot force
upon younger people ages 25 to
40 the traditional structures that
their fathers and grandfathers
have used. But you have to pro-
vide them ... with a number of
different avenues and allow them
to choose to participate.
"In today's world, fraternal
organizations are as dead as

Tell us your reaction to
jimmy Carter's book
Palestine: Peace Not
Apartheid.

Smith: "Jimmy Carter has done
so much good, really he has.
When you look at Habitat for
Humanity, when you look at his
monitoring of elections in places
that really needed monitoring,
when you look at all the good
that Jimmy Carter has done, I
just don't understand what his
motivation would be for wanting
to do this.
"It just doesn't seem to be logi-
cal for a man of Jimmy Carter's
stature to engage in such lop-
sided rhetoric and discussion
and promotion of what clearly is
Israel-bashing and hatred against
Israel. I just don't understand it:"

Kaplan: "Most people say
Jimmy Carter is a decent guy,
he's got a good record; he's been
the president of the United
States and he tried hard. I do
not believe that, despite all that,
he's entitled to a pass for the
egregious errors, the intentional
erroneous statements he's made
in this book because of the harm
he has done.
"I really am concerned about
his motivation and, quite frankly,
as a human being, I'm concerned
that he's passed his prime in
speaking to issues that need
careful analysis, and I'm sorry
to have to say this as the former
president of my nation, but he's
25 years older than he was and
he's far less than perfect when he
says what he just said:"

What is the best way for a
Jewish person to help the
cause for Israel besides writ-
ing a check?

Smith: "It's very clear. The gen-
eration of the Jewish community
that grew up in our time were
very much activists. We under-
stood our responsibility to be
activists; we came from a differ-

ent time and a different environ-
ment. Frankly speaking, the next
generation of Jewish leaders has
not necessarily grown up in an
activist environment.
"The responsibility of B'nai
B'rith and other Jewish organiza-
tions is to invigorate the next
generation to become active. We
have issues today when it comes
to Israel, when it comes to anti-
Semitism, that need every Jew to
stand up and be counted.
"I think B'nai B'rith can play a
huge role in developing activists
and engaging them in the work
we do at the United Nations,
engaging them in our public
policy work and engaging them
in general in our Israel activism
agenda.
"If we can do that, we can help
develop a future generation into
being activists and understand-
ing the issues:"

Kaplan: "Educate our children
to the true facts towards the
Israeli-Palestinian situation.
That is not to say by any means
that Israel is perfect, that their
score is 100 percent because the
human beings there are not.
"But our kids remain unedu-
cated, and they go out into the
world; they go to college without
a real knowledge of what the his-
tory of Israel really is.
"At the same time, our parents
teach our children to stand up for
the underdog, to promote Jewish
values by being fair to all. So our
kids enter college campuses and
see highly sophisticated pro-
Palestinian, sometimes viciously
anti-Israel and anti-Jewish pro-
grams and hear those programs
sometimes from professors; and
they are not equipped to stand
up to them.
"And we do our children an
injustice, Jews an injustice and
Israel an injustice by failing to
educate our children and substi-
tuting too often material success
for that responsibility" ❑

December 7 • 2006

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