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2 Jewish teens harness the power of their peers to address social problems — and spark a movement
In mid-2021, as the COVID pandemic raged, high school student Lily Messing noticed that the social ills plaguing her native Tucson, Arizona — including domestic violence, drug abuse and homelessness — all seemed to be getting worse.
Meanwhile, Jake Hammerman, a teenager in Lafayette, California, a suburb in the San Francisco Bay area, saw firsthand how the pandemic exacerbated the challenges facing homebound seniors, many of whom were isolated to begin with.
Determined to do something to help, the two Jewish teens put their respective skills to use: Lily as a grassroots organizer, Jake as a tennis instructor.
Lily, 17, established 100+ Teens Who Care, a nonprofit network of “giving circles” comprised of like-minded high school students who collectively select and donate to a specific local charity. Her first chapter, in Tucson, started out with 100 members and now boasts at least 220 teens. While Lily’s project began in Arizona, her impact has expanded across the United States and internationally, with 23 chapters now operating in places ranging from Idaho to Islamabad, Pakistan.
“I began the organization because I felt like teens really wanted to make a difference but lacked the coordination and opportunity to do so,” Lily said. “I wanted to give them an outlet to make meaningful change in our community.”
Jake, 18, launched Impactful Tennis in May 2020 to fund a local Meals on Wheels chapter. Under the program, volunteers offered children tennis lessons and asked that in lieu of payment parents donate the fees to that charity. Since its founding, Impactful Tennis volunteers have given over 900 tennis lessons to some 400 students, generating $39,000 in donations — not only meals for the elderly, but also for companionship and mental health services.
“My project started from my passion for tennis and also from what I was seeing on the news,” Jake said. “My grandparents suffer from Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. The pandemic definitely aggravated the impact of these diseases, so I really wanted to help seniors during this time of need.”
In early August, the two extraordinary Jewish teens — along with 13 others from across the United States — were honored at a ceremony in San Francisco by the Helen Diller Family Foundation, which awarded each of the 15 teens a $36,000 prize in recognition of their outstanding work innovating and leading change in their communities and around the world.
Jake Hammerman of Lafayette, Calif., came up with a way to use tennis lessons to help fund a local Meals on Wheels chapter that worked with homebound seniors. (Diller Teen Tikkun Olam Awards)
The Diller Teen Tikkun Olam Awards, whose name is Hebrew for “repairing the world,” are given annually.
Among this year’s awardees: New Jersey resident Aron Goodman, who uses TikTok to fight antisemitism by sharing first-person video interviews with his grandmother, a Holocaust survivor; Meaza Light-Orr of Los Angeles, who spearheaded a $120,000 project to fund a primary school in her birth village of Kololo, Ethiopia; and Steven Hoffen, whose nonprofit boosts food security by installing and maintaining hydroponic gardens both in Israel and his native New York City.
Since its inception in 2007, the foundation’s Diller Teen Tikkun Olam Awards — established by Bay Area philanthropist Helen Diller — have given away nearly $7 million to 189 recipients. The awardees use the funds to help further their projects or contribute toward their education.
“Young people are striving to solve critical challenges in their communities with creativity, hard work, resourcefulness, and a commitment to tikkun olam,” said Phyllis Cook, the foundation’s philanthropic consultant. “We are inspired by their leadership and committed to recognizing them as role models for other teens by celebrating how young people can make an impact in communities across the country.”
For Jake, who has been playing tennis since age 7, it seemed obvious that the best way to raise funds for Meals on Wheels was to give local children tennis lessons. But instead of collecting money, he’d ask the kids’ parents to donate to Impactful Tennis through a GoFundMe account.
“It started off with just me and five of my closest friends, but I knew the organization had the potential to grow much bigger,” said Jake, a rising freshman who will attend Yale this fall. The group, which only gives lessons during the summer, now has 20 volunteer instructors and charges $40 per lesson. The concept is so popular that its online sign-up sheets generally fill up within minutes.
Even though COVID largely has receded from public concern, social isolation among the elderly still persists on a massive scale, Jake noted.
For her part, Lily realized that an individual teen donating $25 might feel insignificant, but that such a donation when combined with 100 other contributions could make a real difference.
As part of 100+ Teens Who Care, each member donates $100 per year ($25 at every quarterly meeting), with 100% of the collected funds going to a selected charity. At each meeting, three vetted local charities are randomly selected for consideration. Following brief presentations by those who nominated them, members vote anonymously. The charity with the most votes receives all the funds.
Since its inception, the Tucson chapter of 100+ Teens Who Care has raised more than $30,000 to provide essential supplies to homeless youth, support mental health services for children and fund housing for those transitioning out of the foster care system. Together, the impact of her service-minded peers is far stronger than if each teen helped individually, Lily said.
“I realized I could use the Tucson chapter as a template to create other chapters, so I developed information videos to help other teens start their own chapters,” Lily said. “We’re expanding at the rate of two new chapters every month, and every chapter puts its own spin on it.”
So, for example, the 100+ Teens Who Care chapter in Palm Beach, Florida, does monthly beach cleanups, while the chapter in Portland, Oregon, hosts food drives for that city’s homeless population.
“I feel like there’s real power in getting a group of like-minded teens to come together to make the world a better place and instill the values of philanthropy at such a young age,” Lily said. “I truly hope this will carry with them for the rest of their lives.”
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Elite Universities Deliver Ultimatum to Anti-Israel Demonstrators as School Year Draws to a Close
A drone view shows a pro-Hamas encampment at Harvard University where students protest in support of Palestinians, during the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, April 25, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Brian Snyder
The presidents of Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have formally told anti-Israel protesters that they will be suspended from school if they refuse to end unauthorized demonstrations in which sections of campus have been commandeered and occupied for the past two weeks, according to statements issued on Monday.
“The continuation of the encampment presents a significant risk to the educational environment of the university,” interim Harvard president Alan Garber said in a note to the school community. “Those who participate or perpetuate its continuation will be referred for involuntary leave from their schools. Among other implications, students placed on involuntary leave may not be able to sit for exams, may not continue to reside in Harvard housing, and must cease to be present on campus until reinstated.”
Garber noted that students residing in tents on Harvard Yard — a collection of structures that has been described as an “encampment” — has forced the rescheduling of exams and disrupted the academic lives of those who have continued doing their homework and studying for final exams, responsibilities that the protesters have seemingly abdicated.
“There are many ways for our community to engage constructively in reasoned discussion of complex issues, but initiating these difficult and crucial conversations does not require, or justify, interfering with the educational environment and Harvard’s academic mission,” Garber continued. “Our disagreements are most effectively addressed through candid, constructive dialogue, building not on disruption, but on facts and reason.”
MIT delivered a similar ultimatum to anti-Zionist protesters there, even promising not to severely discipline students against whom the school has already filed disciplinary charges if they leave by 2:30 pm. That deadline expired and, according to the Daily Wire, the protesters formed a human chain and resolved to continue on.
“You must swipe you ID as you leave the encampment, and we will keep on file the stamp from your exit swipe showing you departed by 2:30 pm,” MIT chancellor Melissa Nobles said in a school-wide notice. “For those who do not leave the encampment voluntarily by 2:30 pm … if you either have been sanctioned by COD [the Committee on Discipline] or have a pending COD case related to events since Oct. 7 but choose to stay in the encampment past the deadline, you will be placed on an immediate interim full suspension lasting at least through [MIT] commencement activities, and you will be referred to the COD.”
Nobles continued, “This means you will be prohibited from participating in any academic activities — including classes, exams, or research — for the remainder of the semester. You will also not be permitted to reside in your assigned residence hall or use MIT dining halls.”
As the deadline approached, the pro-Hamas activists shouted “We are intifada,” according to numerous reports, while officers reportedly dressed in riot gear arrived at the scene. Further reports indicated that the encampment was later dissolved without issue.
“Looks like this worked! Encampment being cleared out as we speak!” MIT student Talia Khan tweeted. “These folks will be suspended according to MIT.”
Khan later told The Algemeiner: “I hope MIT goes through with their promised suspensions.”
At Harvard, some faculty have encouraged students to remain non-compliant with Garber’s directive. Remarks of Professor Walter Johnson — whose anti-Zionist faculty group posted an antisemitic cartoon on social media in February — surfaced on X/Twitter after its publishing in which he accused the university of deception.
“There’s no room for reasoned discussion about this action!” Johnson bellowed while amplifying his voice with a megaphone. “If Harvard will not disclose its investments in the occupied territories, in the Israeli military, and in Gaza it does not make sense to repeat the words ‘civil discourse and reasoned interchange.’ It does not make sense to repeat the word ‘veritas!’”
For nearly three weeks, college students have been amassing in the hundreds at a growing number of schools, taking over sections of campuses by setting up “Gaza Solidarity Encampments” and refusing to leave unless administrators condemn and boycott Israel. Footage of the protests has shown demonstrators chanting in support of Hamas, calling for the destruction of Israel, and even threatening to harm members of the Jewish community on campus. In many cases, activists have also lambasted the US and Western civilization more broadly.
On many campuses — including George Washington University in Washington, DC, New York University, University of Texas at Austin, University of Michigan, and University of Southern California, among others — members of the faculty have attached themselves to demonstrations, encouraging students to support terrorism, antisemitism, and further violent convulsions aimed at overthrowing the US government.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Elite Universities Deliver Ultimatum to Anti-Israel Demonstrators as School Year Draws to a Close first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel Approves Rafah Operation to Pressure Hamas as Ceasefire Talks Continue
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Jerusalem, Feb. 18, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday said that his war cabinet approved continuing a military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah in order to pressure Hamas to release Israeli hostages kidnapped by the Palestinian terrorist group last fall.
“The war cabinet unanimously decided that Israel continue the operation in Rafah to exert military pressure on Hamas in order to advance the release of our hostages and the other goals of the war,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.
Hamas terrorists invaded southern Israel from Gaza, the neighboring Palestinian enclave ruled by Hamas, on Oct. 7, murdering 1,200 people and kidnapping over 250 others as hostages. Israel responded with an ongoing military campaign aimed at freeing the hostages and incapacitating Hamas to the point that it can no longer pose a major threat to the Israeli people.
White House spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on Monday that US President Joe Biden spoke on the phone with Netanyahu for 30 minutes about Rafah and other matters, reiterating his position that the Biden administration does “not support ground operations in Rafah.”
The US has sought to pressure Israel to forgo a significant military operation in Rafah, citing the potential for civilian casualties; Jerusalem has countered that a ground offensive is necessary to eliminate Hamas’ remaining battalions in the southern Gaza city.
Experts have told The Algemeiner that Israel must operate in Rafah, which Israeli officials have described as Hamas’ last bastion in Gaza, if the Jewish state wishes to achieve its war objective of eliminating the threat posed by the Palestinian terrorist group.
Amid the conflict in Gaza, mediators from Egypt, Qatar, and the US have been seeking to broker a ceasefire in Gaza that would involve the release of the hostages.
The US State Department has chided Hamas for rejecting several truce proposals and being a “the barrier and the obstacle” to a ceasefire in Gaza, while noting that Israel has moved in a “significant way” to try and make a deal possible.
Israel has said any ceasefire must include the release of all remaining hostages and be temporary, warning that a long-term truce would allow Hamas to regroup and strengthen its position to continue attacking the Jewish state. Hamas leaders have pledged to carry out massacres against Israel like the one on Oct. 7 “again and again.”
Meanwhile, Hamas has demanded that any truce must include a permanent ceasefire and full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza.
On Monday, however, Hamas said in a brief statement that its chief, Ismail Haniyeh, had told Qatari and Egyptian mediators that the terrorist group accepted their proposal for a ceasefire. The exact details of the truce were not immediately available.
US officials have said they are reviewing Hamas’ response.
“We want to get these hostages out, we want to get a ceasefire in place for six weeks, we want to increase humanitarian assistance,” Kirby said, adding that reaching an agreement would be the “absolute best outcome.”
CIA Director Williams Burns was in the Middle East meeting with officials to discuss the proposal.
Israeli officials are also reviewing the proposal, although Jerusalem views some of the terms as unacceptable, according to media reports.
“This would appear to be a ruse intended to make Israel look like the side refusing a deal,” an anonymous Israeli official told Reuters.
According to Netanyahu’s office, Israel will continue working to reach a ceasefire while targeting Hamas in Rafah.
“In parallel, even though the Hamas proposal is far from Israel’s necessary demands, Israel will send a working delegation to the mediators in order to exhaust the possibility of reaching an agreement under conditions acceptable to Israel,” the office said in its statement.
Reuters contributed to this report.
The post Israel Approves Rafah Operation to Pressure Hamas as Ceasefire Talks Continue first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Anti-Israel Protesters Disrupt Holocaust Remembrance Day Event at Auschwitz
People with Israeli flags attend the International March of the Living at the former Auschwitz Nazi German death camp, in Brzezinka near Oswiecim, Poland, May 6, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Kuba Stezycki
Anti-Israel protesters on Monday disrupted an event at Auschwitz, the infamous Nazi concentration camp in Poland, commemorating the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust by the Nazis.
The International March of the Living, an annual Holocaust education program founded in 1988, brings people from around the world to Poland each year for Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day — known as Yom HaShoah — to march on the path leading from Auschwitz I to Auschwitz II-Birkenau, the Nazis’ largest death camp where 1 million Jews were murdered during World War II.
Survivors of the Hamas terror group’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel joined 55 Holocaust survivors in this year’s march. However, amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and the coinciding record surge in global antisemitism, anti-Israel protesters gathered near the grounds of Auschwitz, sparking outrage.
Local police put up a barricade to prevent dozens of demonstrators from approaching the marchers, who passed by as the protesters shouted slogans including “stop the genocide.”
Anti-Israel protesters hold flags on the route of the annual International March of the Living, outside former Auschwitz Nazi German death camp, in Oswiecim, Poland, May 6, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Kuba Stezycki
Marchers, many of whom carried Israeli flags, responded by changing, “Free Gaza from Hamas!” and singing “Am Yisrael Chai.”
If you would have told me a year ago, that there would be protesters outside Auschwitz while Holocaust survivors are commemorating the Holocaust Memorial Day I would say you’re crazy.
pic.twitter.com/vASGX7llxE
— Elad Simchayoff (@Elad_Si) May 6, 2024
Danit Ben David, 87, said she was “outraged” at the scene.
“How dare they come here, on this day,” she told The Algemeiner.
For many of the thousands of marchers this year, the annual Holocaust Remembrance Day has taken on less of a historic tone and more of a current one, in light of the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel that launched the war in Gaza.
“I have always feared for Jewish existence in the face of antisemitism,” Phylis Greenberg Heiderman, president of the International March of the Living, told The Algemeiner. “But never has the fear and dread of the Holocaust been more palpable in our times.”
On Oct. 7, Hamas terrorists murdered 1,200 people and kidnapped 253 others during their invasion of Israel in what was the biggest single-day massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. Following the onslaught, amid the ensuing war in Gaza, antisemitism incidents skyrocketed to record highs in the US and several other countries, especially in Europe.
Doron Almog, chairman of the Jewish Agency, noted in a briefing with media from Israel that the scenes the Jewish state witnessed on Oct. 7 amounted to nothing less than a “pogrom.”
Others were more reluctant to draw direct comparisons.
Israel’s President Isaac Herzog told the crowd in a video message: “Although the Holocaust stands alone in the history of human crimes, we have been grieving deep tragedy over the past months. The sickness of blind hatred has been unleashed once again, in our own world and time.”
Hershel Greenblat, an 83-year-old survivor from Atlanta, GA who accompanies students and highschoolers on the march, said he would not visit Auschwitz if it wasn’t for a sense of duty to educate the next generation.
“I don’t come to relive the past. The only reason I come is to be here with the students. To try to educate.”
Greenblat’s parents — from Poland and Ukraine, respectively — were both in the resistance against the Nazis. The octogenarian found his grandmother, for whom he was named, listed in Auschwitz.
Beyond survivors of the Holocaust and Oct. 7, several Arab and Muslim delegations from Israel and around the world also joined the march. Among them was a delegation organized by Sharaka (“Partnership” in Arabic), a nonprofit organization founded by leaders from Israel and the Gulf following the signing of the Abraham Accords, a series of historic peace agreements between Israel and Arab states brokered with the help of the United States.
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