D&A

Sarah Hurwitz is a political speechwriter and currently serves as Special Assistant to the President of the United States, Senior Policy and Strategy Advisor to the White House Council on Women and Girls (CWG), and Senior Presidential Speechwriter. In her speechwriter role, Sarah has written speeches for both President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama, and in her work on CWG, Sarah focuses on issues affecting young women and girls.

Before working at the White House, Sarah worked as a Senior Speechwriter on the Obama Campaign; as Chief Speechwriter on Senator Hillary Clinton’s Presidential Campaign; as Deputy Chief Speechwriter on the Presidential campaigns of General Wesley Clark and Senator John Kerry; and as a speechwriter for Senator Tom Harkin. Prior to working on the Clinton and Obama campaigns, Sarah was an attorney at the Washington, DC office of WilmerHale. Sarah is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School.

Inbar Amir is an artist and an educator. Inbar uses theater as a medium in workshops she leads on conflict resolution, communication skills and public speaking. She leads workshops in a variety of different arenas, from academia, to corporations, to educational programs. Her artistic work ranges from script writing to acting and directing, and she spoke at TEDxJaffa2014, where her lecture was entitled “Trapped by Choice.” Her most recent play, 10th Grade, was chosen by the Fund for the Development of Israeli Plays for 2015. Inbar also writes for Israeli television, and is the writer, director, and actor of the play “Just Be You.” The play has been performed at numerous festivals and theaters and was broadcast on national radio. Inbar also teaches at Eshkol Nevo and Orit Gidalis’ writing studio.

Tikva Sendeke is 27 years old, from Israel. Tikva is currently doing a voluntary service at “Action Reconciliation Service for Peace” in Germany. She holds a B.A in Middle Eastern History from Tel Aviv University and is a social activist and a blogger involved in the fields of minorities rights, multiculturalism, Jewish life and preserving Jewish Ethiopian heritage. Tikva’s first children’s book, “Almaz’s Journey Through Her Childhood Pathways” about the life of a little Jewish girl in Ethiopia, was recently published in Israel.

Zvi Bekerman Ph. D., teaches anthropology of education at the School of Education and The Melton Center, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, faculty at the Mandel Leadership Institute in Jerusalem and a former Research Fellow at the Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace at the same university. His research interests are in the study of cultural, ethnic and national identity, including identity processes and negotiation during intercultural encounters as these are reflected in inter/multicultural, peace and citizenship education and in formal/informal learning contexts. He has published numerous academic papers and books in these fields of study. His most recent book: The Promise of Integrated and Multicultural Bilingual Education: Inclusive Palestinian-Arab and Jewish Schools in Israel (Oxford University press, 2016)

After more than 25 years in the music industry as a composer and music producer focused on jazz, soul, latin, hip hop, afro, reggae and electronic music, Alain Granat has launched in 2011 Jewpop.com, the first French-speaking web medium dedicated to modern Jewish cultures. Jewpop is a brand new way to enter the Jewish world, a mirror of current and past cultures and a space for the creation and expression of actual Jewish ways of life and stories, designed primarily for an audience between 18 and 35. Today, Jewpop is the main French-speaking media dedicated to non-affiliated young French Jews, reaching more than 100 000 unique visitors monthly. He is also journalist for the French magazine “Pop Story” and the author of the best seller humor book “Comment savoir si vous êtes juif” (“How to know if you are Jewish”) published in 2015.

Stephen “Steve” Rabin is a creative communications strategist, specializing in speechwriting, message development, executive communications and strategic communications. Steve currently serves as Senior Advisor at NASA (America’s space program), where he is an Obama Administration appointee. Prior to joining NASA, Steve served as Director of Speechwriting at the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. Prior to joining the Obama Administration, Steve served for nearly six years as Chief Speechwriter to Governor Martin O’Malley of Maryland.

Steve’s freelance writing projects have included TV spots, flash animation scripts, and speeches for clients in the public, private, and non-profit sector alike. A Harry S Truman Scholar and REALITY Scholar, Steve received a Master in Public Policy from Harvard University and a BA from Brandeis University. In his free time, Steve enjoys writing and performing sketch comedy, and he is a founding member of Frankie, a DC-based sketch troupe. Raised in Marblehead, MA, he is an avid fan of the Boston Celtics and New England Patriots.

Founder of the web-based publication eJewishPhilanthropy.com, Dan Brown is an experienced marketing professional in both the public and private sectors. He has long been active in the Jewish communal world, in Israel and the US. He is a past Board Chair of the American Friends of the WUJS Institute, a mentor for the PresenTense Global Fellowship Program and a member of the international steering committee of Limmud FSU.

Dan holds graduate certificates in Nonprofit Program Administration and in Fundraising from the University of Pennsylvania.

Toby Axelrod is a longtime correspondent for JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency) and the London Jewish Chronicle, based in Berlin. She moved to Germany from New York in 1997 as a Fulbright journalism scholar. She was involved in the tri-lingual Jewish literary magazine GOLEM in Berlin for several years, and is working on a collection of stories about her paternal grandfather. Toby is also a professional translator, and academic director of the Leo Baeck Summer University in Jewish Studies, at the Humboldt University in Berlin.

Dor Glick is Israel’s Channel 10 News correspondent in Europe.
He is Stipendiat in the International Parliamentary Scholarship of the German Bundestag, where he served as the parliamentary assistant of MdB Volker Beck (the head of the German-Israeli parliamentary group in the Bundestag and speaker of the Green party).

Glick has written articles and commentaries for major Israeli media outlets, namely Haaretz newspaper and Ynet news portal. Among Glick’s journalistic achievements is an investigative project which exposed systematic discrimination against Israeli Arab citizens at an Israeli coffee chain, which led to a boycott, an official investigation by Israel’s Ministry of Economy, as well as to a discussion in the Israeli parliament (Knesset) regarding discrimination in work places. Third generation to Holocaust survivors, he also conducted a rare interview in Berlin with Professor Ricardo Eichmann, the son of Adolf Eichmann (“Coffee with Eichmann”, YNET).

Glick speaks fluent Hebrew, English and German and understands Literary Arabic. He does half-marathons and practices yoga in his free time.