5 January 2017

Members of LJY-Netzer, the youth movement of Liberal Judaism, have chosen ‘Reclaiming Zionism’ as their Theme of the Year for 2017.

The theme was picked at LJY-Netzer’s annual decision-making event, Veidah, which sees the movement’s members, aged 15 upwards, decide the direction in which they want to see it go.

LJY-Netzer movement worker Hannah Stephenson said: “As a movement, we feel like we need to focus in on our pillar of Reform Zionism and remember why it is so important to us.”

Veidah included motions and discussions covering everything from feminism to sustainable living, with guest speakers from Keshet, UJIA and Liberal Judaism.

Other motions passed included one to improve hadracha (leadership) training and another – brought by Kinus, a similar event for 11-14 year-olds – to institute a PJ Day on camps. LJY-Netzer will also change the language used at camps and events after a successful motion.

Hannah added: “LJY-Netzer prides itself on being as inclusive as possible. We have found that using terms such as madrich/madricha (leader) means that those who do not identify as male or female are wrongly addressed.

“We are therefore adopting Habonim Dror North America’s new grammar rules in Hebrew of a gender neutral singular ‘ol’ and plural ‘imot’. We hope that by adopting these suffixes everyone on our event will feel better and that we are taking a step in the right direction.”
 
[Photo: Veidah catching up with current Shnat participants via Skype.]