UJIA admits Olmert got event invite

Israel’s ex-UN ambassador Dan Gillerman was centre stage at UJIA’s annual dinner on Monday night.

What most of the 700 guests present at London’s Hilton Hotel in Mayfair might not have known was that he was a late replacement for former Israeli premier Ehud Olmert.

UJIA admitted this week that Mr Olmert had been booked to appear as guest of honour for its biggest fundraising event of the year.

Chief executive Doug Krikler said he had been invited — and had accepted the invitation — to speak in London “some months ago”.

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Students told: Lead Now and reap rewards

A UJIA programme offering graduates the opportunity to combine a year of leadership work with classes in topics such as networking and conflict resolution was launched before an audience of communal and corporate representatives at BDO Stoy Hayward’s West End offices. The Lead Now scheme will also give participants the prospect of an internship in a major firm at the end of their year.

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UJIA’s Sunday best

The telephone lines were buzzing at Balfour House in Finchley for UJIA’s Super Sunday, where over 150 volunteers solicited support for the charity’s 2009 campaign, focusing on welfare and educational activities in northern Israel.

More than £54,000 was raised, including contributions towards UJIA’s domestic educational activities, such as work with youth movements and day schools and the training of teachers.

A number of youth movement members were among those manning the phones.

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UJIA caps cost of 2009 youth tours

British youth group tours to Israel next year will cost the same as this year — after UJIA stepped in to cap the costs of the trips in response to the recession.

Some groups said this week that they would have had to increase their prices by anything up to 25 per cent, which they acknowledge would have taken the Israel Experience tour out of reach of many families.

The trips next year will remain at around £2,400-£2,500, the same as those of 2008. However, all the groups have cut their trips by up to three days, though none will be less than 25 days long.

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Brits party with Ethiopian twins

UJIA marked the the tenth year of its British and Ethiopian bar and batmitzvah programme with its largest-ever celebration in Jerusalem.

Forty Ethiopian immigrant children from a Jewish Agency absorption centre joined their British "twins". Eight families made the trip from London, four from Manchester and four from Scotland.

The ceremony was held at Jerusalem's Great Synagogue and Israel's Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger blessed the celebrants.

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Miliband tells UJIA that Britain ‘won’t duck’ Iran’s nuclear threat

Foreign Secretary David Miliband paid a warm and emotional tribute to the Anglo-Jewish community on Wednesday, along with a trenchant warning that Iran’s nuclear ambitions were “a challenge that Britain will not duck” for the sake of stability for Israel and the whole of the Middle East.

The Foreign Secretary was the guest of honour at UJIA’s annual patrons’ dinner, held in the Foreign Office’s Locarno Rooms, where, he reminded guests, the seven Locarno Treaties had been signed in December 1925.

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UJIA’s dinner dilemma

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Lessons of Shalit’s story

Activities about captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit have been a feature of a visit this week by teachers from the Kerner Primary in Meona, Northern Israel, to the Clore Tikva Primary in Redbridge under the aegis of the UJIA Schools to Schools project.

During his time as a Kerner pupil, Gilad Shalit wrote a story about the morality of friendship and peace which was discovered at the school after his capture.

The story has since been published in Israel with illustrations by Israeli artists.

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