About Us | Executive Committee

Inter-Agency Task Force on Israeli Arab Issues Executive Committee

Co-Chairs
  • Brian Lurie - President, The Alfred and Hanna Fromm Fund
  • Steve Schwager - Chief Executive Officer, The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee
Executive Committee
  • Abraham Foxman - National Director, The Anti-Defamation League
  • Larry Garber - Chief Executive Officer, The New Israel Fund
  • Malcolm Hoenlein - Executive Vice Chairman, The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations
  • Harriet Mouchly-Weiss - Chair - Commission on the Jewish People, UJA/Federation of New York
  • Jeffrey Solomon - President, The Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies
Executive Director

Bios
  • Brian Lurie
    President
    Alfred and Hanna Fromm Fund

    Rabbi Brian Lurie served for seventeen years as Executive Director of the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco, the Peninsula, Marin and Sonoma Counties and for five years as President of the San Francisco Jewish Museum. He has worked in Israel and America to promote equality for Israeli Arabs and as Executive Vice President of the United Jewish Appeal (UJA), he was instrumental in launching the second phase of Operation Exodus and provided the vision and strategic direction under which UJA has begun to broaden its mandate. Rabbi Lurie developed the concept of "The Living Bridge", a metaphor which is redefining the broad range of relationships and the partnerships, as equals, of American Jews and Israelis. Both the Israel Experience for teens and Partnership 2000 were created as pillars of the Living Bridge.

    Rabbi Lurie received his B.A. from Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania and a Masters in Hebrew Letters from Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati. He has been granted honorary degrees from both Lafayette College and Hebrew Union College.

  • Steve Schwager
    Chief Executive Officer
    JDC – American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee

    Steve Schwager directs the organized American Jewish Community’s overseas agency for Rescue, Relief and Renewal of Jews in distress throughout the world. The JDC is the major instrument of American Jewry for meeting Jewish needs globally, providing major services in Arab lands, Latin America, Israel, and Eastern Europe, and playing an important role in welfare and rebuilding Jewish life in the former Soviet Union. Mr. Schwager joined the JDC sixteen years ago as its Deputy Director and was responsible for monitoring all operations of the organization from the Former Soviet Union to Ethiopia. He also supervised JDC’s operations in Israel and the Former Soviet Union – the two areas of the Jewish world in which JDC spends two-thirds of its annual budget. The Joint Distribution Committee is currently focusing its attention towards Jews in need in Argentina, Israel, the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and elsewhere throughout the world as new situations develop.

  • Abraham Foxman
    National Director
    Anti-Defamation League

    Mr. Foxman regularly confers with elected officials and community leaders domestically and abroad and has had consultations in Europe, Russia, Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, China, Japan, South Africa and Argentina. He has met with Palestinian leaders on problems of ethnic hatred, violence, terrorism and promoting democracy and had six audiences with Pope John Paul II. A Holocaust survivor, Mr. Foxman was a member of the President’s United States Holocaust Memorial Council, appointed by Presidents Reagan, Bush and Clinton. He remains a passionate supporter of the State of Israel and a voice for peace in the Middle East.

    Mr. Foxman holds degrees from the City College of the City University of New York, the Yeshiva of Flatbush, New York University School of Law, Clark University, Iona College, Florida International University and has completed graduate work in advanced Judaic studies at the Jewish Theological Seminary, and in international economics at The New School for Social Research. Mr. Foxman is the author of Never Again?: The Threat of the New Anti-Semitism and The Deadliest Lies, and is the recipient of the Raoul Wallenberg Humanitarian Leadership Award, the State of New York at Albany University Medallion and Austria’s Grand Decoration of Honor in Gold, among others.

  • Larry Garber
    Chief Executive Officer
    New Israel Fund

    Larry Garber is a former senior official with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and served as its Director of West Bank and Gaza missions from 1999-2004. He held a number of supervisory positions in USAID’s Bureau of Public and Program Coordination Office, where he developed policies associated with democracy, human rights, and post-conflict programs. He was a former Senior Associate with the National Democratic Institute, Legal Director with the International Human Rights Law Group, and an associate with the Steptoe and Johnson law firm. He has served as consultant on election-related matters for the Organization of American States, United Nations, and Organization of Security and Cooperation in Europe and taught at the Washington College of Law at American University as an Adjunct Professor.

    Mr. Garber graduated from Queens College with a Bachelor’s degree and received both a Master’s degree in International Affairs and a law degree from Columbia University. He has written many articles on election monitoring, human rights and democracy promotion and is the co-editor of The New Democratic Frontier: a Country by Country Assessment to the 1990 Elections in East and Central Europe, published in 1992 by National Democratic Institute, and is the author of Guidelines for International Election Observation, published in 1984 by the International Human Rights Law Group.

  • Malcolm Hoenlein
    Executive Vice Chairman
    Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations

    Malcolm Hoenlein has written and lectured domestically and abroad on international relations, Israel and Middle East affairs, Soviet and World Jewry, terrorism, the American Jewish community, and intergroup relations. He served as the founding Executive Director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater New York and was the founding Executive Director of the Greater New York Conference on Soviet Jewry.

    Mr. Hoenlein received his B.A. in Political Science from Temple University and his Masters degree from the University of Pennsylvania’s Department of International Relations, where he completed his doctoral course work. A National Defense Fellow in the University’s Near East Center, Mr. Hoenlein taught International Relations in the Political Science Department and served as a Middle East specialist at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and on the editorial staff of ORBIS, the Journal of International Affairs. He was conferred a Doctorate of Humane Letters Honoria Causa by Yeshiva University in 2002, and has received the Private Sector Initiative Award from President Ronald Reagan, American ORT "Man of the Millennium" Tribute and the first Quittman Award for Jewish Professional Excellence. The Forward listed him as the most influential Jewish leader.

  • Harriet Mouchly-Weiss
    Chair, Commission on the Jewish People
    UJA-Federation of New York

    Harriet Mouchly-Weiss is the managing partner of Strategy XXI in New York. Her experience in the communications field includes development of corporate planning and marketing strategies, as well as issues management and corporate social responsibility efforts for leading multinational companies and institutions. She has previously owned and operated a public relations firm in Israel, where she worked with the Prime Minister's office, the Ministry of Commerce & Industry, the Ministry of Finance and private corporations. Mrs. Mouchly-Weiss is a member of the Committee of 200, a professional organization of preeminent businesswomen and serves on the boards of The Abraham Fund, the Israel Policy Forum, the former Chair of UJC's Committee on Israeli Arabs and the Women’s Executive Circle of the UJA-Federation of New York. She also is on the advisory board of the New Israel Fund and chairs the Israel Anti-Drug Abuse Foundation in the United States.

    Mrs. Mouchly-Weiss holds a B.A. from Muhlenburg University and a M.A. in psychology from Hebrew University.

  • Jeffrey Solomon
    President
    The Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies

    Dr. Jeffrey Solomon is author of over 70 publications and serves as adjunct associate professor at New York University. In his capacity as President of the Bronfman Philanthropies, he provides professional leadership to its philanthropic efforts primarily in the Jewish community, focusing on projects and initiatives in Canada, Israel and the United States such as birthright israel and Reboot, two initiatives aimed at connecting young, assimilated Jews to their tradition. Dr. Solomon previously served as the Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of UJA-Federation of New York, as well as executive positions at Altro Health & Rehabilitation Services, Miami Jewish Home and Hospital for the Aged and Jewish Family and Children's Services in Miami. Dr. Solomon also served with the City, State and Federal Governments and sits on numerous nonprofit and foundation boards including the Council of Foundations and the Foundation for the Jewish Community.

  • Jessica Balaban
    Executive Director
    Inter-Agency Task Force on Israeli Arab Issues

    Jessica Balaban comes to the Task Force from UJA-Federation of New York, where she managed Israeli Arab, Argentina Jewry and non-sectarian portfolios. Jessica concentrated on strategic planning for economic/leadership development in Israeli Arab communities, as well as programming education for the New York Jewish community on these issues. She also worked on special projects focused on fostering a sense of collective Jewish responsibility in New York and Israel. Prior to joining UJA-Federation of New York, Jessica worked at Ketchum Public Relations, New York City. Here, she focused on public affairs, crisis communications and media relations on behalf of Fortune 500 companies and non-governmental organizations.

    In her role as Executive Director of the Task Force, Jessica focuses on Task Force efforts to keep the American Jewish community informed on majority/minority relations in Israel; to escalate awareness of economic, educational and social service weaknesses facing Israeli Arab communities; to support Task Force members with an advocacy mandate and to work with Israeli organizations to strengthen civil society.

    Jessica holds a Masters degree in the Management of International Public Service Organizations from New York University.