How has antisemitism evolved over time and space?
How is increased antisemitism directly related to the rise of other forms of hate and extremism?
What does it look like to fight antisemitism and keep our community safe?
In light of recent antisemitic events, many of us are trying to wrap our heads around antisemitism and what it means for the Jewish community today. In this roundtable discussion we will break down what antisemitism is, how it functions, and how we can respond here in LA. To better understand antisemitism and how it is showing up in our communities, join SIJCC and our co-host Bend the Arc: Jewish Action Southern California for a discussion and Q & A featuring leading LA Jewish voices.
Whether you're looking to deepen an already thorough understanding, wanting clarity on the confusion and conflation of antisemitism in politics and the media, or just hoping to get a firm grasp on the basics and contemporary climate -- this is discussion is for you!
Co-sponsored by our friends at Nefesh, Shtibl Minyan, & Temple Isaiah.
What to expect:
An opportunity to learn and more deeply understand antisemitism, beyond what you may (or may not) have been taught in history class or hebrew school.
Advanced registration required.
Proof of vaccination required.
We have moved this event indoors! Masks will be required.
ADA accessible
Gender Neutral Bathrooms
If you have questions or requests about accessibility please reach out to rachelleider@sijcc.net
see below for Registration
About the Speakers:
Dov Waxman is the Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation Professor of Israel Studies and the director of the Y&S Nazarian Center for Israel Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Before joining UCLA, he was the Stotsky Professor of Jewish Historical and Cultural Studies at Northeastern University, and he has also been a professor at the City University of New York and Bowdoin College. He has had visiting fellowships at Oxford University, Tel Aviv University, Bar-Ilan University, and the Hebrew University. He received his Ph.D. and M.A. degrees from Johns Hopkins University, and his B.A. from Oxford University. He is the author of four books: The Pursuit of Peace and The Crisis of Israeli Identity: Defending / Defining the Nation (2006), Israel’s Palestinians: The Conflict Within (2011), Trouble in the Tribe: The American Jewish Conflict over Israel (2016), and most recently, The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: What Everyone Needs to Know (2019). His writing has also been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times and The Atlantic, among other publications. He is currently working on a book about contemporary antisemitism and the Israel-Palestine issue.
Rabbi Aryeh Cohen PhD is Professor of Rabbinic Literature and a former chair of the Rabbinics Department in the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies. His research and scholarship sit at the intersection of Talmud, Jewish ethics, and social justice activism. His latest book Justice in the City: An Argument from the Sources of Rabbinic Judaism emerges from and articulates the same concerns. In addition to his many scholarly articles and opinion pieces, Cohen has appeared on NPR (Madeline Brand Show, Greater LA), and on the Dr. Phil Show speaking about community safety and antisemitism. Dr. Cohen is a co-convener of the Black Jewish Justice Alliance (BJJA) and a member of Clergy for Black Lives. Dr. Cohen has a weekly Talmud podcast called Daf Shvui / Weekly Daf: Give me forty minutes or so and I'll give you a daf or so.
Michal David is a multiethnic Mizrahi organizer and lawyer-in-training with roots in Baghdad, Poland, Jerusalem, and the Bay Area. Michal is currently a third year law student at UCLA where she studies Critical Race Studies, and plans to work as a public defender following graduation. Prior to law school Michal worked as a community organizer at Bend the Arc where she supported young Jews across the country fighting for immigration and racial justice. Michal was also one of the founding members of IfNotNow Los Angeles, where she worked to engage the Jewish community in calling for an end to the Occupation in Israel/Palestine. These days Michal spends much of her time playing on the floor with her four month-old son and dreaming of a more liberated future for us all.
Elad Nehorai is an outspoken essayist, journalist, and activist specializing in extremism, antisemitism, tech, and how all three intersect. He is an ex-Hasidic Jew who before leaving Orthodoxy led a creative Jewish community in Brooklyn called Hevria as well as the largest politically progressive Orthodox Jewish advocacy group, Torah Trumps Hate. You can find his writing in the Daily Beast, Huffpost, the Forward, Haartez, and beyond.
Beth Ribet (PhD, JD), completed her dissertation based on interviews with Jewish daughters of Holocaust survivors, and now teaches several courses at UCLA on white nationalism, Nazism, and right-wing populism in the United States. She is the director of Repair, a health and disability justice non-profit organization, and is currently building a participatory action research project with abolitionist-survivors of the global sex trade. She also teaches in Disability Studies, Law, Gender Studies, and Sociology, with course offerings including Reproductive Justice, Sociology of Deviance, Social Psychology, and Disability Rights Law. She is a member of Jewish Voice for Peace, an adoring godmother, and an avowed "crazy cat lady"