TORONTO — Natan Sharansky fought against the Communist regime in his native Soviet Union in the 1970s. Now, as the new chair of the Jewish Agency for Israel, he’s fighting something different: Jewish apathy.
Natan Sharansky at the Jewish Federations of North America’s 2009 General Assembly in Washington, D.C. [David Karp photo]
“Jews in the free world have no interest in Israel… I [have been] on 70 different campuses. I can’t say that the situation here [in Toronto] is much worse, I also can’t say it’s much better,” he said in an exclusive interview over breakfast at a downtown Toronto hotel. “We’re facing many hostile demonstrations, and liberal Jews who believe that because they’re Jews, they have to be the first to condemn Israel.”
Sharansky, a human rights activist and former Israeli cabinet minister, visited Toronto last weekend to meet with Jewish organizations, including UJA Federation of Greater Toronto.
He said his goal as chair of the Jewish Agency, which has helped more than three million Jews immigrate to Israel since it was founded, is to help youth in the Diaspora strengthen their Jewish identity. This is being done through programs such as MASA Israel Journey, which Sharansky wants to expand. MASA enables young Jews from all over the world to spend a semester to a year in Israel on any of over 160 programs. He also hopes to increase the number of high school trips to Israel through the agency.
As an example of why he wants to focus on youth, Sharansky said he was asked a disturbing question when he spoke at York University a few years ago.
“The first question was, ‘Why do I need Israel?’”
For Sharansky, the answer is simple.
“You’re giving [students] the opportunity to belong,” he said. “We’re talking about their desire to be proud to belong to this path of history.”
The main battlefield for Jewish identity is usually university campuses, Sharansky said.
“[There’s] the idea that you’re now becoming part of the big world,” he said, adding that it’s harder for students without strong Jewish backgrounds to feel connected to Israel. “A lot of [people] are against Israel.”
Sharansky paraphrased a lyric from the song Imagine by John Lennon: “There is nothing to die for,” he said. “It is very important to prove that this is a false idea. In a world where there is nothing to die for, there is nothing to live for.”
In the late 1970s, Sharansky, who was born in the former Soviet Union, was sent to jail and convicted of treason and espionage while fighting for human rights.
As he embarks on a different fight for Jewish identity, Sharansky uses the same logic now as he did then.
“[Opinions] can be changed very quickly. The more you can succeed in bringing [students] the real [facts] of human rights, the rights of women, sexual minorities [in Israel], they are happy to hear it,” he said.
For Sharansky, identity is synonymous with freedom.
“Jewish influence is weakening… If you believe that it’s better to live in the world where people have no identity… we’re powerless to defend ourselves against our enemies,” he said.
