WJC US Annual Meeting

The World Jewish Congress, United States held its Annual Meeting on March 6, 2014. The American Section elected new officers to serve on its Executive Committee for the new term:  Rabbi Joel Meyers, Chair; Jan Schechter, Vice Chair; Gloria Landy, Secretary; Jeff Wiesenfeld, Treasurer; and Judy Menikoff, Associate Treasurer. We congratulate the new officers and wish them a successful tenure.

Robert Singer, WJC CEO, provided an in-depth briefing on the current situation in the Ukraine, and the Ukrainian Jewish community, a member community of the WJC. He described the complicated political aspects of the situation that involve Russia, the Ukraine, and the West, emphasizing that WJC has representation on the ground that can assist and serve the Ukrainian Jewish community. Singer said, “WJC is monitoring the situation carefully and will be ever ready to assist the Jewish community there.”

Edwin Shuker, former Executive Director of the American Sephardi Federation, is an Iraqi Jew deeply involved in the events surrounding the Iraqi artifacts that were rescued by the United States during the war with Iraq. These Jewish archives, which were exhibited at the US National Archives and Records Administration and are now on exhibition at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City, comprise only a part of Jewish artifacts and possessions that were stolen from them as the Jewish community was forcibly exiled from Iraq in the early 1970s. Shuker described with great emotion his visit to the exhibit in Washington which featured recovered and restored holy books, letters, and personal items, but among them, to his astonishment, was his own school report card. He told how the entire Jewish community of Baghdad was forced to flee in a matter of only three months and had to forsake their property including papers, diplomas and school report cards. Shuker added that it is important to do our utmost to see that the United States reaffirm its commitment to cultural property in international law to help ensure justice for the Jewish community who were victims of ethnic and religious persecution in Iraq. The WJC will support the new legislation introduced in the Senate by Senator Pat Toomey (R-PA) and in the House by Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) which strongly recommends that the United States renegotiate the return of the Iraqi Jewish archives to Iraq.