HALIFAX — Shaul Landa, who passed away in Arad, Israel, on Aug. 13, is being remembered as a driving force behind the formation and growth of the Atlantic Jewish Council and as a well-loved director of Camp Kadimah in Nova Scotia.
The 68-year-old native of Poland, who emigrated to Edmonton from Russia with his family in the late 1940s, was recruited to Halifax from Israel in 1975 to lead the Atlantic regional co-ordinating body of Jewish communities by its then president, the late Ben Prossin.
“He was a bright light, an enjoyable person to be around, and injected a lot of youthful energy into AJC and the community in general,” recalled Halifax lawyer and businessman Frank Medjuck.
Halifax businessman Zack Rubin met Landa at a Young Judea national conference in 1959 when both were teenagers. “He was full of enthusiasm then, and that excitement for life and learning and spreading the word of Israel and everything Jewish stayed with him forever.”
Rubin and Landa remained in contact for decades – as young men spending a year in Israel at the Institute for Youth Leaders from Abroad, then as staff at Camp Biluim, and when Rubin and his family lived in Israel for several years in the 1980s.
“Shaul was executive director of AJC from 1975 to 1978, when he returned to Israel for the remainder of his life,” Rubin said. “When my family made aliyah for several years, we remained strong friends, our families spending much time together.”
In Halifax, Shalom Magazine, the regular connection between Maritime communities, also read avidly by ex-Maritimers living around the world, was his pet project, says Shaul’s wife of 42 years, Elana Landa, speaking by telephone from Israel.
“He loved the region and the people,” she said. “He travelled extensively in the region, encouraging people to participate [in Jewish activities], to grow and be involved.”
She said she and Shaul loved Camp Kadimah.
“This is where Shaul bloomed, flourished and became energized, if he wasn’t enough already,” she said with a chuckle. “It was an atmosphere he believed in. He was there heart and soul, ensuring young people should know about Israel. He tried to inspire that feeling, and pass it on to the campers.”
She called Shaul a “people person” who was involved in programming, education and even journalism.
Medjuck and Rubin both recalled Landa’s weekly Halifax radio show on Israeli issues, intermingled with music and culture. “He made sure the wider community knew about the Jewish people living here,” Rubin said.
When the Landas returned to Israel in 1978, Shaul became program director of the World Union of Jewish Students, a program for university graduates who came to Israel from abroad to learn Hebrew and experience the country before starting their own careers.
“It was right up his alley,” said Elana, who met Shaul when both were students at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. “It was similar to the Kadimah situation. Shaul was always the educator, always the promoter.”
His strengths, she said, were his optimism, his undying belief in the State of Israel, a belief in human values and a thirst for knowledge in world politics.
Landa, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1997, died in his sleep from a stroke. He leaves Elana, four children (including one living in Israel) and three grandchildren.
