Reps with Jewish Community Relations Council connect with Sister City, Partnership2Gether region colleagues. Three reflections.

An honor to stand with Israelis by Jeff Blumer

On Feb. 18, I set off toward Israel for a journey that would include a significant amount of time in two areas with long-standing, important connections to Dayton. The first was the Dayton Sister City of Holon, known as the City of Children, just south of Tel Aviv; the second was the Western Galilee, Dayton’s Partnership2Gether region.

The Jewish Agency’s Partnership2Gether program connects Dayton and 16 other Jewish communities across the central United States with Budapest, Hungary and Israel’s Western Galilee.

As the Jewish Community Relations Council director for the Jewish Federation of Greater Dayton, I handle our P2G programming. Two Dayton JCRC Advisory Board members, Meryl Goldman and Jennifer Holman, joined me in Israel for 18 site visits and 44 meetings over 10 days.

Our hosts, guides, and travel companions from Holon, Lidor and Rachel, led us on a full day in the Gaza Envelope, visits to the Nova festival site, the city of Sderot, and several kibbutzim that suffered unimaginably on Oct. 7, 2023. We also visited Hostages Square in Tel Aviv the day following the return of the bodies of the Bibas children.

We learned about the cultural, business, educational, and philanthropic aspects of Holon — a city of nearly 200,000 people — with a visit to its amazing Children’s Museum, Media Force company, Holon Institute of Technology, and the Legacy Heritage Children’s Home.

We began our first full day in Holon with a meeting in Mayor Shay Keinan’s office, the 43-year-old who was elected in 2024 following a 30-year previous administration.

The instant connection and heartfelt welcome of everyone in the municipality set the tone for our entire time in Israel. Each person we met seemed thrilled to have us there; they were interested in our perspectives and excited to show us what they do, who they are, and mostly how they serve their citizens.

Shabbat dinner at the home of Deputy Mayor Haim Zabrello was a highlight of our time in Holon. We had toured and seen much of the area and shared our experiences about Save A Child’s Heart, which provides free, lifesaving heart surgery to children, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa.

The Dialogue in the Dark educational program taught us what it’s like to lose your eyesight. We learned about the technological innovations and challenges Holon’s 14 high schools navigate.

When we decided to make this trip happen, it was based around a highly subsidized, four-day P2G solidarity mission to the Western Galilee.

I knew then that we would need a transition between our experience in Holon and the South and our time in the North. Family friends Idit and Ofer Manosevitch provided this transition at their home, about halfway to our next destination of Nahariya, in the wonderful town of Zikhron Ya’akov, about 22 miles south of Haifa. We were able to process some of our experiences, do some laundry, and enjoy a home-cooked meal together.

Over our next few days in the North, we visited a community center that was hit in a deadly drone attack. We mourned with families who had lost loved ones from attacks near their homes. We experienced Shlomi’s Glasses, a virtual reality program to help us understand what it was like for the Nova festival attendees who were taken hostage.

One of the most impactful moments for me came after the mayor of Akko, Amichai Ben Shloosh, welcomed us as guests at the moving Bibas family memorial service on the steps of city hall. I tried once again — as I had many times during this trip — to express the honor I felt to be included along with all Israelis in this opportunity to stand with them in this meaningful moment.

My words were interrupted by the expression of gratitude that our delegation was willing to visit, to listen, and try to understand what Israelis are going through. The only request I heard was that we share our stories when we were back in Dayton, and that we return when we can and encourage others in our community to do the same.

P2G plans to host its next summit Oct. 21-24. I look forward to participating in this, and to bringing an even larger Dayton delegation.

Jeff Blumer is director of Dayton’s Jewish Community Relations Council. For the next PechaKucha Night, 7:30 p.m., Thursday, April 24 at the Dayton Art Institute, he’ll present Remembrance and Resilience. The date of this PechaKucha coincides with Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day.

An undeniable bond by Meryl Goldman

Israel felt just as much like home on this trip as it did on my first visit. I expected to feel a little scared this time, but I felt a deep sense of peace instead.

Even so, the pain and hope of the last 500 days could be felt in every conversation with Israelis, every meeting and every discussion, and reflected on the hostage posters seen on each corner.

Nothing embodied this more than the home where we ate Shabbat dinner, directly across from the landing spot of a recent rocket. The potential devastation was palpable, but still, the feeling of safety remained.

Another time on the way to a meeting, we saw Israelis standing silently to honor the Bibas family as they finally returned home out of one side of the vehicle and the beautiful rainbow over the sea that was seen all over social media on the other.

There is nothing you can do to steel yourself against the pain when the war permeates everything. There is no option to unplug from it as we can here in America.

The war is an ever-present reality that hangs in the air and washes over you relentlessly, even when you need a break.

But for as much as it hurts, there is also a silent comfort in knowing you are never alone with it. We mourned together as a people, Israelis and Diaspora Jews no more, but a big family, hand in hand in solidarity.

When I walked down the street crying on the day of the Bibas funeral, no one asked me what was wrong. No one needed to. Instead, I saw other people who looked and felt just the same. The bond was undeniable and that’s what family is to me. A group that knows that even in sadness, you’re in it together.

One united Jewish family By Jennifer Holman

If I were to sum up the trip to Israel in one word, it would be hope. From the moment you land at Ben Gurion to the moment you depart, you are reminded that our Jewish family members are in captivity.

The war and pain hang in the air in a palpable way.

But so does hope! Every day, there is hope of freedom for those held captive.

There is hope that peace is on the horizon. And in the words of Israel’s 2025 Eurovision song selection, hope that a New Day Will Rise.

In Holon, hope was at the Holon Institute of Technology. When the IDF didn’t have adequate armor, the students designed new lightweight armor for soldiers and their service dogs.

In the South, hope was in the people returning to their homes and the workers in their fields.

Hope was found in the beauty of the memorials left for those we lost.

In the North, hope was in the Galilee Medical Center. You can look into Lebanon from the windows, but this hospital developed the standard for practicing emergency medicine underground during missile strikes.

Hope was found in the Druze community, willing to give all to stand with Israel — and they have.

The widow of a soldier murdered on Oct. 7, 2023 displayed her hope when she started a nonprofit in her husband’s name to support those in need in their community.

The war and the captives were everywhere, but so was hope. Now, we all have the assignment to do something. Anything for tikvah, hope — our hope in Israel, our hope for tomorrow, and our hope as one united international Jewish family.

To read the complete April 2025 Dayton Jewish Observer, click here.