BETWEEN TWO WORLDS

Directed by: Alan Snitow and Deborah Kaufman

Showings: 

Wednesday, November 30 - 5:30 pm (at Baruch College's Englman Hall)

Thursday, December 1 - 7:30 pm (Cinima Arts Center, 423 Park Ave. Hungtington, NY)

Thursday, December 8 - 8:00 pm (Columbia University, 501 Schermerhorn) 

NR, 70 Minutes, In English and Hebrew with English subtitles

For the fourth year running, Partners for Progressive Israel / Meretz USA is proud to partner with the Other Israel Film Festival and its mission, to educate through film and discussion about the minority populations in Israel with a focus on the Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel, who make up more than twenty percent of Israel's population.

This year, we are delighted to co-sponsor the screening of "77 Steps" - a film by Ibtisam Mara'ana (Israel, 2010, 56 minutes - View trailer for 77 Steps).

Monday, November 14, 8:45pm
Cinema Village at 22 East 12th Street (betw. University Place & 5th Ave.) in Manhattan

To purchase tickets, click here
For general ticket information, click here
For directions to Cinema Village, click here

About "77 Steps"

The personal journey of the director who leaves her Arab-Muslim village and moves to Tel-Aviv.

In an attempt to find an apartment in the city, she encounters discrimination and rejection by most landlords because of her Arab origins. She finally finds an apartment, and meets her neighbor Jonathan, a Jewish-Canadian man who immigrated to Israel. A love story evolves. 

Shortly after Ibtisam joins a left-wing political party (Meretz) and runs for the Knesset, Israel invades Gaza. Hundreds are killed. Ibtisam resigns from her party because of its support of the war. Ibtisam struggles over her Palestinian identity in the shadow of war and hatred, but does not relinquish her relationship with Jonathan. Yet something has gone sour.

Jonathan's family refuses to meet his girlfriend. Jonathan says: They can't forgo their image of their future daughter-in-law - Jewish, white and English-speaking. Ibtisam is also unable to reveal her relationship to her mother and keeps it a secret. 

When Jonathan's grandfather comes from Canada on a nostalgic trip to Kibbutz Ein-Dor, which he helped found in 1948, Ibtisam and Jonathan join him. It becomes an individual journey for each one of them one that takes them backwards in time and forward into the unknown, to memories and dreams, Nakba and Independence, Love and Hate, Longing and Loss. After this journey nothing can be the way it was before. There is no turning back.

Partners for Progressive Israel (formerly Meretz USA) is delighted to co-sponsor the following event:

Gershom Gorenberg: The Unmaking of Israel -
book reading and discussion

Thursday, November 10th, 7:30 PM
Congregation Beth Elohim in Park Slope, Brooklyn
Cost: $10

Location: 274 Garfield Place (corner of Garfield & 8th Avenue),
Park Slope, Brooklyn
For directions by mass transit or car, and a map, click here.

Israeli journalist and historian Gershom Gorenberg has just released his new book, The Unmaking of Israel, which offers a penetrating and provocative argument on how the balance of power in Israel has shifted toward extremism, threatening the prospects for peace and democracy as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict intensifies. Informing his examination using interviews in Israel and the West Bank and with access to previously classified Israeli documents, Gorenberg delivers an incisive discussion of the causes and trends of extremism in Israel’s government and society. Join us for a book reading and discussion.

Presented by Congregation Beth Elohim.
Additional co-sponors: J Street NYC and Americans for Peace Now.

Partners for Progressive Israel (formerly Meretz USA) is proud to co-sponsor the annual memorial ceremony, commemorating the life and path of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, z"l

Remembering Yitzhak Rabin - 16 years after his assassination

Continuing his path of peace and social justice

Sunday, November 6th at 6:00 pm

The Manhattan JCC
334 Amsterdam Avenue (at 76th St.), New York City

(By Subway: 1, 2, 3, B or C to 72nd Street | By Bus: M7 or M11 to 75th Street)

Sponsored by the Hashomer Hatzair & Habonim Dror Zionist youth movements

Also co-sponsored by: Givat Haviva Educational Foundation and Ameinu

 Lunch & Learn

And intimate lunchtime event with a speaker. Bring your own lunch. Cosponsored with Rabbis for Human Rights - North America

Date: Tuesday, October 18, 2011 At 01:00 PM

RSVP: mail@meretzusa.org or 212-242-4500

Meretz USA / Partners for Progressive Israel
is delighted to announce the following event in the Washington DC area:

Rent, Cottage Cheese and Peace -
What's making Israel tick these days?

A discussion with Ron Skolnik
Executive Director of Meretz USA / Partners for Progressive Israel

Monday, October 17, at 7:30 PM
Kol Ami - The Northern Virginia Reconstructionist Community
(at The Unitarian Universalist Church of Arlington)
4444 Arlington Boulevard in Arlington, VA
(for directions, click here)

Because of events planned for this Friday at the UN, we are moving this week's demonstration from Thursday to Friday!  (The demonstration originally planned for Thursday the 22nd at Washington Sq. Park is being canceled and replaced with the Friday demo)  We want to be out on the street the same day that Abbas and Netanyahu address the UN!

JOIN US!!!   

Friday, September 23     

from 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm

meet at the northwest corner of  

2nd Ave. & 41st St.

Meretz USA (Partners for Progressive Israel) is delighted to co-sponsor an event with Jeremy Ben-Ami, Founder and President of J Street.  The event is hosted by Congregation Beth Elohim in Park Slope, Brooklyn.  Jeremy Ben-Ami will be reading from and discussing his recently released book, A New Voice for Israel.

Additional co-sponsors: Americans for Peace Now

  Sunday, September 18, 2011 - 1:30 pm
  Congregation Beth Elohim
  274 Garfield Place in Park Slope
  Brooklyn, NY
  (718) 768-3814
  Directions

  $10 admission fee

  To register for the event by credit card or PayPal, please click here

 -----------------

On September 15, Meretz USA (Partners for Progressive Israel) Executive Director, Ron Skolnik, will be part of a panel examining calls for a cultural boycott of Israeli settlements, and of Israel itself.  Ron will be representing the position adopted by the Meretz USA board in February 2011.

The event, entitled, "An Open Conversation on Cultural Boycott of Israel" will take place on:

Thursday, September 15, 2011; starting promptly at 7:30 p.m.

Kolot Chayeinu/Voices of Our Lives: Building a Progressive Jewish Community in Brooklyn
1012 Eighth Avenue @ 10th Street in Park Slope

The discussion is designed as a respectful conversation among Jews with many different perspectives about cultural boycott of Israel. The evening will provide an opportunity to hear from people with different points of view about whether or not cultural boycott is an appropriate and effective strategy for supporting movements for peace and justice in Israel and Palestine.

The UN debate on Palestine is approaching and we'll be out again with our 2-state message.

September 15 you can find us at Union Square. 

Do you feel Netanyahu and his policies are leading Israel off a cliff?  Are you frustrated that the right in Israel and the US has hijacked what it means to love and support Israel?  Do you feel the need to stand up and send a message?

Well we do, too.  That's why we're asking you to

JOIN US!!!

September 15, from 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
at Union Square (south side) in New York
(14th Street, on the steps between Broadway and Park Ave.)
(Rain or Shine!)

Meretz USA (Partners for Progressive Israel) 

Invites you to a very special opportunity to hear

Leah Shakdiel

Recently named Chair of Israel's "Tent Protest" Vision Committee

Wednesday, September 14, 2011 - 6:30pm
Location: Upper West Side of Manhattan
(exact address to be provided upon RSVP)

We're taking our message around the city!

September 8th is 116th St. & Broadway
(outside Columbia University)

Do you feel Netanyahu and his policies are leading Israel off a cliff?  Are you frustrated that the right in Israel and the US has hijacked what it means to love and support Israel?  Do you feel the need to stand up and send a message?

Well we do, too.  That's why we're asking you to

JOIN US!!!

September 8, from 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
116th St. & Broadway in New York
(outside entrance to Columbia University on Broadway)
(Rain or Shine!)

We're taking our message around the city!

September 1 is Broadway & 72nd Street. 

Do you feel Netanyahu and his policies are leading Israel off a cliff?  Are you frustrated that the right in Israel and the US has hijacked what it means to love and support Israel?  Do you feel the need to stand up and send a message?

Well we do, too.  That's why we're asking you to

JOIN US!!!

September 1, from 5 pm - 6 pm
at Broadway & 72nd Street in New York
(north side of 72nd, in the square outside the subway station)
(Rain or Shine!)

We are proud to co-sponsor the following event, in conjunction with Americans for Peace Now (Southern California):

Wednesday, August 31, 2011, 8:00 a.m., Factor's Deli, Back Patio

David Myers is Chair of the UCLA History Department and was previously director of the UCLA Center for Jewish Studies  (see bio below). He has just returned from a trip to Israel, and penned the opinion piece Where Hope is to be Found published in The Jewish Journal.

Bagel Breakfast Buffet - $12 (pay at door)

Factor's Deli (Back Patio) - 9420 West Pico Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90035 (1/2 block East of Beverly Drive)

Street Parking on Pico or Rexford begins at 8am - READ SIGNS (Valet parking available but usually starts after 8am)

RSVP to meretzusa.la@gmail.com

We're taking our message around the city!

August 25 is Union Square. 

Do you feel Netanyahu and his policies are leading Israel off a cliff?  Are you frustrated that the right in Israel and the US has hijacked what it means to love and support Israel?  Do you feel the need to stand up and send a message?

Well we do, too.  That's why we're asking you to

JOIN US!!!

August 25, from 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
at Union Square (south side) in New York
(14th Street, between Broadway and Park Ave.)
(Rain or Shine!)