Strasbourg , France

13-14 October 2002

"Jewish Communities in a Changing Europe"

The regional Conference for Europe of Jewish Communal Service gathered some 60 participants from 8 European countries (France, Spain, the United Kingdom, Germany, Hungary, Romania, Sweden and Belgium). Israel and the United States were represented as well, through the active presence of Ted Comet and Dorit Rom. Most sessions took place at the Strasbourg Congress Hall, but the closing Plenary was symbolically held at the Council of Europe building where the participants were welcomed, in the name of the Council, by the D irector of External Relations, Hans de Jonge. A simultaneous translation (to English and French) was provided.

The Conference was set in the perspective of the next WCJCS Quadrennial meeting (Jerusalem, November 2003). It e specially focused on topics at the core of a planned plenary session at the Quadrennial, which will be devoted to a changing Europe, the new challenges of an accelerated mutation and the role of community workers in that context.

At the opening session, chaired by Guy Seniak, Anthony Lerman (director of the UK Hanadiv Charitable Foundation) and David Saada (Director of the French Fonds Social Juif Unifié) gave two different – and hence stimulating – insights on the relations between Jews and their Jewish and non-Jewish environment. Lerman's presentation posed the effort towards more networking between Jewish communities and institutions as a need that should and could be answered with determination, whereas Saada expressed his concern as to the relations between Jews and their non-Jewish environment (new anti-Semitism, suspicions of communitarianism, etc.).

The participants then split into three workshops in order to get more into the depth of specific questions. The presentations and debates in the workshops focused on three main topics:

•  The development of relations and common programs of the Jewish communities in Europe in the fields of aging, health, education, teaching and the potential open ed by the new technologies;

•  The demographic and sociological changes within the different communities , particularly those linked to migrations inside Europe ;

•  Shared experiences and new perspectives in the domains of training, education, culture and heritage.

Reports were given at the closing Plenary where Dorit Rom also presented the next Quadrennial in Jerusalem . The Conference took place in an especially warm and friendly climate; the mobilization of the management of the ORT school in Strasbourg for the organization of the Conference highly contributed to the success of the meeting, not to mention the brilliant presentation by Ted Comet on “how the Americans see the European Jews” where Ted gave the demonstration of his incredible capacity of mixing English, Hebrew and French and be fully understood by all his listeners.