Part 4 – Monday, November 2 • Israeli Elections: Fear, Identity and Hope in a Polarized World
7 pm • Katz Auditorium, Robinson Building, JCC Squirrel Hill • $36/person
If you think Israel’s upcoming election is ONLY about October 7, Gaza and the war with Iran, no one would blame you. After all, those are the stories dominating the headlines.
But beyond the war, a deeper debate over Israel’s identity, democracy and future is unfolding, with implications for its relationship with the United States.
THAT will be at the heart of our next Come Curious. Leave Wiser. conversation.
Just days after Israelis head to the polls, three influential voices with deep ties to Israeli politics will travel from Israel to Pittsburgh and explore what’s at stake.
Three perspectives. One country. Questions that matter to all of us.
For tickets, click HERE
Dr. Dahlia Scheindlin is a political strategist and a public opinion researcher who has advised on nine national campaigns in Israel and worked on elections, referendums, and public affairs campaigns in 15 other countries for over 25 years.
She conducts extensive public opinion research for civil society organizations, including joint Israeli-Palestinian surveys.
Dahlia is a Senior Analyst and columnist for Haaretz (English) and a policy fellow at Century International. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, The Guardian and The Observer, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Financial Times, The New York Review of Books, The New Statesman, The New York Post, among other publications, and she provides regular commentary for international and Israeli media, appearing regularly on CNN, BBC, NPR, CBC, and is quoted widely in leading print media.
Her book, The Crooked Timber of Democracy in Israel: Promise Unfulfilled, was listed on Foreign Affairs’ Best Books of 2024. She is a board member of A Land for All.
Moshe Koppel is the founding director of Dicta, a research institute devoted to developing AI tools for the analysis and processing of modern and classical Hebrew texts, including the automated composition of halachic response.
Koppel is founding chairman of the Kohelet Policy Forum, which Haaretz calls “the most successful initiative of the right in the past decade” and which is widely regarded as Israel’s most influential pro-liberty Zionist think tank. The Wall Street Journal has called him one of the “three American immigrants who have left the biggest mark on Israel”. (The other two are Golda Meir and Meir Kahane.)
He is the author of three books on Jewish thought, most recently Judaism Straight Up: Why Real Religion Endures, published by Koren. He is professor (emeritus) of computer science at Bar-Ilan University and the author of over 100 articles in leading academic journals and proceedings in mathematics, computer science, linguistics, law, economics, political science and other disciplines.
JCCPGH ISRAEL ENGAGEMENT SERIES
This new series, developed by the JCC of Greater Pittsburgh, that invites participants to go beyond the
headlines through dialogue and multiple perspectives featuring leading voices and meaningful
community discussion. There were three sessions in the spring 2026 and three are planned for the fall.
FALL SESSIONS
Monday, November 2 • Part 4 – Israeli Elections: Fear, Identity and Hope in a Polarized World – REGISTER HERE
Wednesday, December 2 • Part 5 – The Wild West: What Should Israel do with the Territories in the West Bank?
Part 6 – Are we One People? Diaspora Jewry and Israel at a Crossroad
For more information, click HERE
Series Moderator – Yisrael Klitsner
The series will “cover everything under the sun related to Israel, including politics, culture and history,”
says Yisrael Klitsner, the moderator of the series. He is a fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute
(JPPI) with deep connections to our community. He and his family lived in Squirrel Hill but returned to
Israel after October 7 so he could rejoin his IDF unit. Klitsner, who has served as Diaspora Affairs Advisor
to Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, and worked for AIPAC in Israel, is passionate about educating and
building community around the state of Israel and its relationship with the United States.