LEADERSHIP

David Messer has spent his career in the financial-services industry, with a focus on commodities markets. Formerly the head of Sempra Energy Trading Corp., Messer is now the CEO of Freepoint Commodities, which he founded in 2011.

Messer is highly involved in a variety of communal activities. He holds a B.A. from Yale University, where he is a Yale Sterling Fellow.

Alan Adler was chairman of the board and CEO of Oridion Systems Ltd., a global leader in patient monitoring systems, from 2004 until the company’s acquisition by the American healthcare conglomerate Medtronic in 2012. Prior to that, he served for more than 30 years as a partner and consultant at McKinsey & Company and as a partner at Evergreen, the Israel-based venture capital group. Adler has served as a director on the boards of numerous technology and life-science companies and currently serves as director on the board of the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem.

A Brooklyn native, Adler holds a B.Sc. in mathematics from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and an M.B.A. with honors from Stanford University. After having spent several decades in London, Copenhagen, and Amsterdam, he and his wife Valerie moved to Jerusalem’s Yemin Moshe neighborhood, where they have spent the last 25 years.

Yitz Applbaum is co-founder of MizMaa Ventures, a $200M fund that invests in Israeli startups, and is president of Health Connect Acquisitions Corporation (SNRHU). He is also co-founder of Secure Senior Connections, a digital platform for addressing loneliness and improving health among the elderly. Previously he was the founder and CEO of Concorde Solutions Inc., which he sold to Bank of America, and a partner at the global venture fund Lightspeed Venture Partners.

A longtime member of the Young Presidents Organization, Applbaum is on the board of directors of The Western Wall Heritage Foundation, the Asia Society, and the American Action Network. He is a trustee of the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and sits on its governance and nominating committees, and also serves on the board of directors of the Republican Jewish Coalition, for which he co-chairs its legislative affairs committee. Finally, Applbaum is a founding board member of Him for Her for Him (HHH), which assists in the placement of women in corporate boards.

Jed Arkin is engaged at the board, management, or advisory levels in ventures spanning optical design of progressive eyeglass lenses, semantic databases, truffle cultivation, reactive personal armor and real estate development. He previously served as chairman of MadahCom, a manufacturer of spread-spectrum public-alerting systems ultimately acquired by Cooper Industries (NYSE: CBE), and as vice president of the Israeli venture-capital firm Challenge Fund. He was also general manager of merchant banking for Oscar Gruss & Son, a New York-based investment bank, and has served as director for more than a dozen public and private Israeli tech companies.

Arkin holds a B.A. in classics from St. John’s College in Annapolis and J.D./M.B.A. degrees from Harvard University.

Trevor Asserson is senior partner and head of dispute resolution at Asserson Law, and is recognized as one of the United Kingdom’s leading litigation lawyers. In addition to representing numerous household names in the UK, Russia, and Israel, Asserson has run a number of public interest claims on behalf of various causes and also founded BBC Watch, which analyzes BBC media coverage of the Middle East.

Prior to establishing Asserson Law, Asserson worked at Herbert Smith, Europe’s leading litigation firm, and subsequently served as global head of international litigation at Bird & Bird, one of Europe’s largest multi-national firms with a premier reputation for IP, Telecoms, and IT law.

Harvey Beker is chairman of Millburn Ridgefield Corporation (“Millburn”), an alternative asset management firm specializing in the use of quantitative models to trade futures and currencies. He has been a principal of Millburn for more than forty years and is a member of its investment committee. He is also the president and treasurer of The Beker Foundation, a private foundation founded in 1984 to support initiatives in education and medicine, and serves as a board member of Combined Jewish Philanthropies, the Esplanade Association, and SAR Academy.

Beker is a member of Harvard Kennedy School’s Dean’s Council and of the Wiener Advisory Council, and previously served on the board of overseers of New York University’s Stern School of Business; on the advisory committee of the Corinne Goldsmith Dickinson Center for Multiple Sclerosis at Mt. Sinai Hospital; and on the board of directors of Wave Hill and the Riverdale YM-YWHA, among others.

Beker received his B.A. in economics and M.B.A. in finance from New York University. He is also a 2019 graduate of Harvard’s Advanced Leadership Initiative.

Sapir Bluzer is leading a new initiative to broaden consensus within the Zionist public in Israel and create a broad government.

She was recently elected to her village’s regional council and is the Co-founder and Chairperson of the Female Reservists Forum, who won the Rappaport prize for groundbreaking female innovation.

Previously, she was a senior consultant to the Ministry of Economy and Industry for the planning and implementation of large-scale economic reforms. She has consulted for organizations and CEOs in the midst of strategic-change processes.

She is the former CEO of Israel’s National Student Association; the co-founder of Israel 2050, a grassroots student movement that seeks to solve structural problems in the Israeli economy; and the co-founder of Israel’s National Teacher Day, among other national initiatives.

Having served in the IDF’s Air Force, first in the pilot training course and then as a distinguished officer in Air Force Intelligence, Bluzer was selected as one of Globes’ “30 Leading Women in Israel” in 2018 and The Marker’s 100 most influential people in the country.

Bluzer graduated from Shalem College in 2018 and is currently pursuing a master’s in political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She lives with her husband and daughter in Nataf, a village in the Judean Hills.

Eliezer Brender is co-founder and CEO of Exigent Capital Group, a boutique investment house that manages strategies across public markets, private and distressed debt, growth equity, venture capital and real estate. The firm’s primary sector focus is financials and banking, healthcare technology and energy/ESG, and makes investments on an international scale, including in Israel, EEMA, the Americas, and Europe.

Brender and his partners leverage their firm to focus and impact philanthropic enterprises with an emphasis on education, in particular the study of history, philosophy, and science, and on technological advancement with applications for the future of Israel. They are also involved in business and organizations that work in the areas of diplomacy, national security and Jewish identity.

Lorne M. Buchman is president of ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, California, and an international leader in art and design education. He is a theater director, dramatic literature professor, and the author of a book on creativity entitled Make to Know: From Spaces of Uncertainty to Creative Discovery (September, 2021). He is also the author of a book on filmic adaptations of Shakespeare’s plays. He hosts Change Lab: Conversations on Transformation and Creativity, a podcast in which he conducts interviews with leading artists, designers, and cultural innovators. Buchman previously served on the faculty of University of California, Berkeley. He left that position to become president of California College of the Arts and later Saybrook University. He holds a PhD from Stanford University in Drama and Humanities.

Mark Charendoff is president of the Maimonides Fund, a private grant-making organization dedicated to education and Jewish identity in both Israel and North America. He is the former president of the Jewish Funders Network (JFN), an umbrella body of over 900 Jewish family foundations and independent funders, and the former vice president of the Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies, where he helped to establish the Birthright Israel program. He also served as director of Jewish Educational Services for the JCC Association of North America. Charendoff currently serves on the board of the Birthright Israel Foundation and is the recipient of the Bernard Reisman Award for Professional Excellence from Brandeis University.

Sanford “Sandy” T. Colb is founder of Sanford T. Colb & Co., a patent and technology law firm based in Rehovot, Israel. As head of the firm, Sandy leads a team of lawyers engaged in highly sophisticated patent writing and prosecution, as well as intellectual-property counseling, licensing, and litigation in both Israel and the U.S. His clients include leading Israel companies, multinational corporations, universities, and governmental bodies.

Himself a farmer, Colb has for the last 25 years sponsored and managed a charity farm, HaTov V’HaMeitiv, in Rehovot, which grows almost 2 million kilos of 40 different crops each year. All produce is donated to 35 different agencies that assist nutritionally challenged populations throughout Israel. Schools and groups also visit the farm to enjoy a hands-on, back-to-the-land, fruit-and-vegetable picking experience.

Sandy holds a B.A. and M.Sc. in physics from the University of Pennsylvania, an M.A. from Cambridge University, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. He was awarded the Silver Medal of the Royal Society of Arts, London and was a Thouron Scholar at Cambridge University.

Tal Eitan recently received a master's degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She is currently serving as a freelance researcher for several organizations in Israel and the Boston area, including CJP and Negotiation Strategies Institute. She is also co-founding a new NGO dedicated to supporting injured IDF veterans who reside outside of Israel.

Previously the director of the Jerusalem Municipality’s Al Bashair University Program for Arab high-school students and graduates in East Jerusalem, she also served as the director of an elite pre-army leadership academy for secular and religious youth in the Arava—one of the few women in the country to hold such a position. For her army service, Eitan served as a deputy company commander for Havat Hashomer, a training base for soldiers from troubled backgrounds that aims to integrate them successfully into the army and Israeli society.

While studying at Shalem, she co-founded Mered (“Revolution”), a national student movement within the Labor party that works to reinvent the Zionist left. She also spearheaded a student-wide conference on politics and policy ahead of the national elections. She plans to return to Israel with her family this coming June.

Jeffrey Farber is the chief executive officer of the Koret Foundation, a San Francisco-based foundation committed to nurturing the continuity of the Jewish people worldwide and to strengthening the Bay Area community. Farber has over 30 years of broad business experience, ranging from executive positions at Bank of America to vice chairman and chief operating officer of Shorenstein Realty Services and partner of a boutique financial services firm.

Farber holds numerous community and philanthropic leadership positions, locally, nationally and internationally, including member of the National Council and former chair of AIPAC of Northern California; member of the board of overseers of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University; member of the board of governors for the San Francisco Commonwealth Club; member of the board of American Friends of Koret Israel Economic Development Funds; member of the board of directors of Onward Israel; and trustee at the Center for Human Rights Leadership at his alma mater, Claremont McKenna College. He is also a former board member of the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco, Peninsula, Marin and Sonoma Counties and of the board of directors of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, as well as the director of the Exploratorium.

Louis Frenkel is an investment/portfolio manager and the lead trustee of the Joe and Rosa Frenkel Charitable Trust, a registered UK charity. He also runs, together with his colleague Andrew Branch, a company that invests in and renovates commercial properties in London and the south of England.

Born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa, Frenkel attended the University of the Wiwatersrand, where he earned his B.A. in sociology. After working for several years in his family’s business, Tiger Oats and the National Milling Company, he moved to London and took up a position at a stockbrokerage. Frenkel lives with his wife Averil outside of London.

Dr. Anita Friedman has a distinguished record of public service as a lay and professional leader both nationally and internationally. Professionally, she heads Jewish Family and Children’s Services (JFCS) of the San Francisco Bay Area, one of the largest and oldest family service institutions in the United States. She is also President of the Koret Foundation.

As a speaker, lecturer, and author, Friedman’s expertise includes social policy and programming for diverse populations—from children and youth to families and the aged; the financing of health and human services; and the development of innovative business social enterprise models. She is also an expert on the theory and practice of Jewish communal service, and on Holocaust and genocide education.

As a lay leader, Friedman has been appointed to various local, state, national, and international commissions, including the San Francisco Human Services Commission and as a commissioner for the State of California Board of Education. As a policy consultant to the State of Israel Ministry of Social Affairs, she has advised on effective policy strategies for human services and immigrant absorption. She also serves as a trustee on the national boards of AIPAC, the Polin Museum of Poland, the University of Southern California Shoah Foundation, and the Taube Foundation for Jewish Life & Culture. Friedman is also currently vice president of the International Board of Governors of Tel Aviv University.

Sapir Ganz Eldar is COO of ISRAEL-is, an NGO that works to improve Israel's image around the world primarily by developing and training social media ambassadors. During the war, her work has also included coordinating delegations abroad including hostage families and leading seminars with foreign correspondents.

Ganz Eldar grew up in Shaarei Tikvah, a settlement in central Israel. After graduating high school, she spent a year learning at Yeshivat Ein Hanatziv, where she studied philosophy and Jewish texts and volunteered for several organizations that help children with special needs. Ganz Eldar began her army service as a commander on a base for soldiers with criminal backgrounds, and later joined the educational staff of a unit for non-Jewish soldiers who seek to convert during their service. Eventually, she eventually became head of the course in Tel Aviv. Eldar finished her army service as the commander of a unit composed of 120 Arab soldiers.

While studying at Shalem, where she received her bachelor’s degree in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, Ganz Eldar also served as the chairwoman of the Central Election Committee's Speaker's Office and was one of the committee's campaign managers. After that, she coordinated information programs and missions abroad as part of the "Organization of Reservists on the Front."

Micah Goodman was named by The Jerusalem Post as one of the 50 most influential Jews in 2017 and by the Israeli magazine Liberal as one of the 100 most influential Israelis in 2019.

Goodman is the author of six bestselling books. His first three—Moses’s Final Speech, The Dream of the Kuzari, and The Secrets of the Guide for the Perplexed—explore classical Jewish thought. His next three—The Wondering Jew, Catch 67, and The Attention Revolution—explore contemporary Israeli issues and ideas.

Goodman is one of the founders of Beit Prat – Israeli Midrasha. He is a research fellow at the Kogod Research Center at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, and, along with Efrat Shapira Rosenberg, hosts the popular Israeli podcast Mifleget Hamachshavot (“The Party of Thoughts”), produced by Beit Avi Chai.

Roy Hatsor is a junior at Shalem College majoring in Strategy, Diplomacy, and Security. Before beginning his studies, he served for six years in an elite special-forces unit, first as a combat soldier and medic and later as a field commander.

During his service, when the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, Hatsor helped establish an emergency operations center in Hod HaSharon, coordinating hundreds of volunteers to provide medicine, food, and support to thousands of residents. He was then selected to join a joint task force of the Mossad, the Ministry of Health, and the IDF’s National Command Center for combating COVID-19, working to optimize testing labs nationwide and curb the spread of the virus. Hatsor completed his military service as an officer at Havat Hashomer where he trained at-risk youth, preparing them for meaningful military service and civilian life.

In his first year at Shalem, Hatsor worked with Ktav Ya’ad (“Writing the Future”), a student-led initiative that helps underprivileged children in Jerusalem develop communication skills and self-confidence through writing. He also volunteered weekly for an organization that supports former Haredim navigating the challenges of integrating into military service.

Following the outbreak of war on October 7, Hatsor spent six months in combat and continues to balance his studies at Shalem with regular reserve duty. Hatsor is also a musician who enjoys playing the guitar in his spare time, and is currently training to run a half marathon.

Daniel Herman, a program manager at the Ministry of Defense, grew up in Cleveland, Ohio until the age of 11, after which he and his family moved to Jerusalem. He served in the IDF in a small, elite intelligence unit for eight years, five more than the required period. Having risen to the rank of Major, he held various command positions and oversaw both combatant training and strategic development.

A major in the Department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at Shalem College, Herman  directed resource development and strategic development for 0202, a trilingual website that translates national news and social media posts from the Zionist, Haredi, and Arab communities of Jerusalem into Arabic, Hebrew, and English. He was also the recipient of a grant from the Bronfman Fellowship Alumni Venture Fund to continue developing the site’s English platform. Finally, Herman interned at Blue and White Human Rights, where he worked at the Tsur Baher community center in East Jerusalem to help Palestinian residents navigate the Israeli bureaucracy.

Shelly Kassen is the past president and chairman emeritus of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and serves on the board of trustees of Tikvah. She has extensive experience in community and nonprofit leadership, having served as a selectman of the Town of Westport, president of her synagogue, and chair of her local AIPAC council.

 A former CPA, Kassen holds a B.A. from Wellesley College and an M.B.A. from Harvard University.

Terri Kirshner-Herenstein is the lead principal at TK Interiors and had a career in advertising at the global brand and customer experience agency, VMLY&R (formerly Young and Rubicam).

An experienced lay leader, she has served on a number of boards, including American Friends of Yeshivot Bnei Akiva, BINA Stroke and Brain Injury Assistance, Blythdale's Children's Hospital, The Jewish Communal Fund, Miklat (where she served as President), and she currently serves on the Rabbi Sacks Legacy Boards, both in London and the USA.

She graduated from New York School of Interior Design and also earned a BA from NIU with degrees in Marketing and Communications. Most recently, Kirshner-Herenstein, along with her husband Andrew, have been focused on the creation of a Sacks-Herenstein Center for Values and Leadership at Yeshiva University, named in memory of Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks.

Originally from Chicago, she and her husband now split their time between New York and Jerusalem.

Martin Kramer is a historian of the Middle East at Tel Aviv University and the Walter P. Stern Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. The founding president of Shalem College and first chair of its Middle East and Islamic Studies Program, he has been a visiting professor or fellow at Brandeis University, the University of Chicago, Cornell University, Georgetown University, Harvard’s Olin Institute, and more. His authored and edited books include Islam Assembled; Shi'ism: Resistance and Revolution; Middle Eastern Lives; Arab Awakening and Islamic Revival; The Islamism Debate; The Jewish Discovery of Islam; Ivory Towers on Sand; and The War on Error.

Kramer earned his undergraduate and doctoral degrees from Princeton, where he wrote his thesis under the supervision of Prof. Bernard Lewis.

Adv. Yudi Levy is co-chairman and managing partner of Goldfarb Seligman & Co., one of Israel’s most renowned law firms. Often called upon to assist corporate directors in critical situations, Levy is consistently ranked by Chambers and Partners as one of the top corporate lawyers in Israel.

Levy is a member of the boards of directors of Knafaim Holding, Global Knafaim Leasing, and Dori Media Group, and a member of the management of the Cegla Center for Interdisciplinary Research of the Law at the Faculty of Law, Tel Aviv University. Between 2008-2020, Levy served as vice chairman and chairman of the board of directors of El Al Israel Airlines and as a member of the board of directors of Maman Cargo Terminals. Levy holds a law degree from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and is a member of both the Israel and New York Bar Associations.

Polina Liberman is active in numerous communal and philanthropic projects related to education and Jewish identity and sits on the board of directors of SAR Academy in Riverdale. A longtime advocate for Israel, she is also a member of the boards of the Mazel Day School and RAJE, organizations aimed at revitalizing Jewish life in the Russian American community.

Liberman holds a B.A. in mathematics from the University of California, Berkeley and an M.S. in operations research from Stanford University. She began her career at the Fair Isaac Corporation, for which she built mathematical models.

Pini Lozowick is a hi-tech entrepreneur and investor with more than three decades’ experience. He was previously a co-founding partner and CIO of OurCrowd, an innovative crowdsourcing investment vehicle for startups in Israel. He was also founder and CEO of Verisense, a Jerusalem-based hi-tech company, and a partner at Alta Berkeley, a London-based venture capital fund. Lozowick has also held marketing, engineering, and management positions with Provigent, Chiaro, Broadcom, and Digital Equipment Corporation.

Lozowick was one of the founding members and is on the board of New Spirit, an organization that works to retain young professionals in Jerusalem. He also sits on the board of MadeinJLM, which works to grow the Jerusalem’s hi-tech community.

Lozowick completed his engineering degree at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology.

Noam Orion is currently a senior at Shalem College majoring in the Department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies.

In addition to his studies, Orion works on the side as a research assistant at the Jerusalem Institute for Policy Research, where he analyzes social and cultural trends among East Jerusalem’s Palestinian population. He is an active volunteer and former director for Shiputz Shalem, a Shalem College initiative that renovates the homes of disadvantaged families in Jerusalem, and previously worked as a counselor at a pre-military leadership academy for juvenile delinquents in Beit Yanai. After high school, Orion volunteered for a year as a mentor to at-risk youth in Yavne, a town in Israel’s socio-economic periphery, and was selected for the elite sniper course as part of his IDF service in the Nahal brigade. He was discharged after four years with the rank of officer, and now serves as a platoon commander with the rank of captain in the reserves.

Elisa Palter was co-founder of a specialty directory business for children’s services in Toronto that she sold in 2009 and another one for travel and tourism that she sold in 2019. She now assists on a volunteer basis with marketing for the Jewish Future Pledge and writes articles for a business that targets the startup community.

Palter holds a B.A. in economics and international relations from the University of Toronto and an M.B.A. with a focus in marketing from York University. Her many volunteer activities on behalf of the Toronto Jewish community include positions as founding publisher of “inTO,” a monthly UJA Federation of Greater Toronto magazine for youth; founding member of the Federation’s Young Business Network and ATID divisions; founding chair of the PJ Library for Toronto; and founder of a non-denominational Hebrew school for children.

George Rohr is co-founder and president of NCH Capital Inc., a New York-based private equity firm that has been investing across asset classes in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union since shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union. NCH was among the earliest Western participants in the region’s privatization opportunities. More recently, NCH extended its operations to Latin America.

In tandem with his business in the FSU, Rohr has had a long-time philanthropic focus on the rebuilding of Jewish life there, including ongoing support of Chabad emissaries throughout the region, the construction and renovation of Jewish communal institutions, and the publication of Jewish texts in Russian translation. In North America, his principal philanthropic focus has been on Jewish literacy, particularly through initiatives such as the Rohr Jewish Learning Institute and support for the establishment of Chabad Houses on over 160 college campuses.

Alan Rubenstein is Hanson Scholar of Ethics at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, where he teaches ethical thought through the close reading of great texts. Previously a senior consultant for the President’s Council on Bioethics, he is currently the director of university programs for the Tikvah Fund. His published essays have focused on the philosopher Hans Jonas, the Hebrew Bible, and Judaism in middle America.

A graduate of St. John’s College in Annapolis and Georgetown University, Rubenstein is married and the father of three children.

Yair Shamir is a managing partner at Catalyst Fund and is the chairman and director of the boards of many private and listed companies in Israel and around the world. He has also served as the chairman of four Israeli governmental companies: El Al Airlines, the National Road Company of Israel, the Metropolitan Mass Transit System, and the Israeli National Road Safety Authority.

A pilot and an engineer in the Israeli Air Force, Shamir served as chairman of Israel Aerospace Industries from 2005-2011. He went on to serve as a member of Knesset and as Israel’s minister of agriculture and rural development.

Shamir is the chairman and co-founder of Gvahim, a nonprofit that helps qualified new immigrants accomplish their professional goals in Israel.

Douglas Silverman is Managing Partner and Co-Chief Investment Officer of Senator Investment Group, a leading cross capital structure investment firm he co-founded in 2008. Silverman is active in a wide range of philanthropic and community activities, both individually and through The Senator Foundation. In 2021, Silverman co-launched The Secure Future Project (TSFP), whose mission is to research, develop and implement innovative, data-driven social policy efforts to combat the opioid epidemic. Silverman sits on the Board of Directors of Center for a New American Security (CNAS), an independent, bipartisan, nonprofit organization that develops strong, pragmatic, and principled national security and defense policies, where he also chairs the Middle East Security Advisory Board.

Silverman received a B.A. in Economics, cum laude, from Princeton University. He lives in New York City with his wife, Fabienne and their three daughters.

Itamar Turiski is special advisor to Minister of Jewish Diaspora and Social Equality Amichai Chikli, in which role he works to combat antisemitism, strengthen Jewish communities’ identities, and assist in economic development plan for Arab society in Israel. He previously worked as a product manager at Phenom, a leading HR-tech company, and co-founded a Canadian consulting firm that worked with climate investors and startups.

The founder of a music program for youth at risk, Turiski served in the IDF in a secret operations unit, earning the rank of commander. Turiski graduated from Shalem in 2024 with a degree in Philosophy and Jewish Thought.