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Phylisa Wisdom to head New York Jewish Agenda, 3-year-old progressive advocacy group
(New York Jewish Week) — New York Jewish Agenda, a progressive Jewish advocacy organization, has named a successor to its founding executive director.
Phylisa Wisdom, 37, joins the organization after a year as director of development and government affairs at Yaffed, whose mission is to improve the quality of secular education in New York’s Hasidic and haredi yeshivas. She is taking over the position from Matt Nosanchuk, NYJA’s founding president and executive director, who will continue to be involved with the organization as a member of its board of directors, as per a press release.
Joining NYJA is a “long-term dream come true,” Wisdom, 37, told the New York Jewish Week.
Wisdom, whose first day on the job was Monday, has experience in advocacy through political campaigns, nonprofits and government agencies. She has held roles at the Brooklyn Democratic County Committee, Literacy Trust and the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services.
Founded in 2020 by Rabbis Rachel Timoner and Sharon Kleinbaum along with Nosanchuk, the New York Jewish Agenda works to support and amplify the voices of Jewish community leaders “whose shared values motivate them to promote social justice, combat antisemitism, and support a democratic vision of Israel,” according to its website. “We engage on critical issues across New York City and State through advocacy, education, and collaboration.”
The organization has been involved with a wide range of issues and topics such as health, criminal justice reform, antisemitism, and advocating for Israel’s democracy. Most recently, NYJA has advocated for better representation of New York City’s Jewish community in Mayor Eric Adams’ Jewish Advisory Council.
“Phylisa Wisdom is exactly the right leader for this moment,” Timoner, NYJA co-founder and board member, said in the press release. “She’ll bring an inspiring and incisive voice to ensure that the majority of New York’s Jews are represented and heard.”
Wisdom said she hopes as executive director to build upon NYJA’s work of engaging the city and state on these issues. She’s also hoping to widen the group’s purview.
“I’m excited to build out our portfolio in other areas of interest,” Wisdom said. “So that’s really in public health, in immigration, in education, both public and private, and in supporting the climate. So really looking at state and city budget priorities, engaging our Leaders Network in those practices related to the budget, and making sure that our Leaders Network and founders, and the entire Jewish community’s voices are heard on these issues as well.”
A native of San Diego, Wisdom “came of age doing Jewish activism,” she said, describing her connection to Judaism as “largely through activism and engagement, community engagement and really a deep commitment to tikkun olam that was nurtured from a very young age, both by my parents and family and also my extended community.”
Wisdom’s years of activism began with registering voters as a teen; while in high school, she also joined the Union for Reform Judaism’s Religious Action Center in lobbying for reproductive justice.
Professionally, Wisdom, who has a masters in public policy, has worked with children with special needs for many years, including at the Executive Office of Health and Human Services in Massachusetts. There, as a public policy fellow, she worked on teen antiviolence programming.
Wisdom arrived in Brooklyn in 2017, fulfilling what she said was a long-held dream to live in New York. “My grandmother is from here and I’ve always loved the city,” she wrote in an email. She said she’s an avid consumer of the city’s restaurants, museums and arts and that while she does not belong to a synagogue, she has many Israeli friends and aims to become more involved with Brooklyn Jews, the young-adult division of Timoner’s Congregation Beth Elohim.
Wisdom’s path to Yaffed followed a stint working at the literacy nonprofit. There, she collaborated with the city’s Department of Education to ensure that students who needed literacy support had access to it. That led her to Yaffed, where she advocated for the needs of yeshiva studentsFrom there, she joined Yaffed to advocate for the needs of yeshiva students.
“I was really looking for a way to combine the love of education and making sure that kids got what they needed in their educational lives, and the public sector,” she said. Likewise, she said, she believes her new role offers opportunities to blend her passions.
“I am really excited that I can take all of those experiences and circle back to a Jewish community and be able to do that work and combine these passions,” Wisdom said.
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The post Phylisa Wisdom to head New York Jewish Agenda, 3-year-old progressive advocacy group appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.