Fostering Black-Jewish Ties Among Young People
A leadership project launched in Baltimore brings together teens of color from the city with those in Israel.
Dear Reader,
I am happy to host this report by Neil Rubin, a friend and longtime colleague, going back to our days working together at the Baltimore Jewish Times. His piece sheds light on efforts to both strengthen bonds between young Blacks and Jews in American cities, and connect Black teens from the U.S. with Jews of Color in Israel.
I welcome your feedback and invite those of you interested in submitting a Guest Essay to contact me at rosenblattgary25@gmail.com to discuss.
Gary Rosenblatt
Lunch break in Zichron Yakov: American and Israeli teens enjoying falafel during their month-long stay in Israel.
By Neil Rubin
As the sun was setting at Mt. Carmel National Park in Israel’s north, dozens of teen upper torsos kept undulating to blaring traditional Amharic Ethiopian music. Nearby, other students chopped vegetables for a South African stew and stoked the fire. Some cautiously joked about the nearby jackals known to howl at night.
The group -- native speakers of Amharic, Hebrew, English, Russian, Ukrainian and French – were learning that words alone do not create a shared language.
Welcome to the fourth night of the Elijah Cummings Youth Project (ECYP), a partnership between Baltimore’s Black and Jewish communities now marking its 25th anniversary. The goal, agreed upon in the 1990s by local Jewish leaders and the late Maryland congressman, is to forge mutual understanding anew between communities that speak wistfully of a long-ago Civil Rights-era partnership.
Rep. Cummings served in Congress for 23 years, prior to his death in 2019. He mostly represented Baltimore City; many Jews called its northwest quadrant home from the 1920s through the 1970s. A well-known advocate for Black-Jewish ties, Cummings was no stranger to Israeli and/or Jewish concerns, often working with his colleague and friend Sen. Benjamin Cardin (D-Md.).
Each year, ECYP – which is administered by the Baltimore Jewish Council -- selects a dozen American teens from Maryland’s 7th congressional district for the program. That comes after rigorous interviews and essay submissions.
A parallel process takes place in Israel at the Yemin Orde Youth Village. The goal: to give students pegged as current and future American Black and Israeli Jewish leaders a safe space for new experiences and candid conversations while learning one another’s culture. The two-year leadership program for the Americans features a month-long trip to Israel in the summer prior to senior year of high school.
In America, once or twice a month in 11th and 12th grade, ECYPers meet at a local JCC in Baltimore to learn skills such as lobbying on the days’ issues, and about Jewish and Israeli concerns. Periodically, they join local Diller Fellowship teens, whom they also see during a home-hospitality weekend in Jewish Baltimore’s Israeli sister-city of Ashkelon.
After a quarter-century, the program takes pride in its efforts and alumni. The more than 200 graduates include CNN anchor Victor Blackwell, Peace Corps volunteers and a host of top non-profit and professional leaders. As Blackwell said, “[Prior to the program] if I had to describe a Jewish person, I could write out the list of physical characteristics and that would be who I’d see – until I met an Ethiopian Jew… A lot of our conversations on television are more heat than light, and having that experience in Israel enabled me to bring more light.”
Is he the exception that proves the rule? Not according to 2022 graduates. One participant, Grace, put it this way: “The Jewish community has always been foreign to me because I did not grow up in that environment. But being part of this program, I learned something new. I learned about [Jewish] culture, I learned about the religion.” Kamron, another participant, echoed those thoughts by adding, “It’s helped me not only recognize and build upon the importance of community and service, but also connected me with a community other than my own.”
This summer and the prior one, I was the American educator/staffer for the Israel trip. That included being a “cultural ambassador,” translating both language and nuance to the teens and their Israeli staff. The Americans -- 11 Black Christians and one Jew of Color – were relatively homogenous in outlook. The Israelis, reflecting the country’s diverse demography, were Ethiopian, French, Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian. Last year a large post-Covid group also included Argentinians, Indians and South Africans.
While in the Jewish state, the group lives at Yemin Orde in the Lower Galilee. During the academic year, its high school houses up to 500 students, including future Israeli ECYPers. A focus of the village is to help Ethiopian teens integrate into Israeli society.
ECYPers volunteering their time with youngsters in Askelon.
For me, a highlight is watching students learn about one another and share joint concerns and interests, from military service to music, and family dynamics to food. Note: the trip does not have an overt Zionist message. It’s designed to show the Americans that Jews, Judaism and the Jewish state are diverse and complex. For example, this past summer the group heard from an Israeli Arab high school principal, visited a home in a nearby Arab village and learned about Israel’s West Bank presence and its current political turmoil.
The hope is that in later years on campus and in careers, these alums will understand that such matters are not only important to America, but deserve more than dismissive knee-jerk reactions. Nurturing those sensitivities takes place not just during the Yemin Orde-housed leadership and educational workshops, but late into the night when the Israelis and Americans – often with Google translate at the ready – chat in their shared rooms. The positive results come quickly as the teens sit with each other on bus rides and relax together in free time.
Toss in the Ashkelon weekend, which included a workshop with the Israeli Lacrosse Association, a desert camel ride, hiking and an array of historical/cultural sites, and you get future American Black leaders with bonds to Israeli peers and a powerful frame of reference on Jewish issues.
Those who worry about sharp criticism of Israel expressed by some Black political leaders today can take a measure of comfort in knowing of efforts to improve ties with the next generation. That’s what ECYP does. It educates and inspires. And it works.
Neil Rubin chairs the Jewish History Department at the Beth Tfiloh Dahan High School in Baltimore. Information on the Elijah Cummings Youth Program is at www.ecyp.org .
From being on the ground I can tell you that the Israelis are learning that the American Black community -- unlike as is sometimes portrayed -- is not all hostile toward Israel and Jews. Also, the students -- American Blacks and Israeli Ethiopians -- have meaningful conversations about racism, military service, patriotism, etc. It's pretty fascinating to watch.
As an exchange, I am puzzled about what the Israelis are learning about the American black comminities. It presents as one-sided rather than a real exchange...what am I missing?