RUTHFULLY YOURS

The tiny State of Israel can accurately be described as a nation born in battle. Surrounded by blood-thirsty enemies from all sides, Israel has endured countless attacks and threats to its survival from various quarters and successfully weathered them all.

Historian, former ambassador to the United States and current member of the Israeli parliament Dr. Michael Oren noted that attacks and threats against Israel have evolved over the years and have gone through three very distinct phases. During Israel’s formative years, the threats against the Jewish State were largely symmetrical and conventional. In 1948, 1956, 1967 and 1973, the Arab armies who massed menacingly along Israel’s borders or invaded were repelled and soundly defeated.

Having failed in destroying Israel by conventional means, the Arabs began to rely on international terrorism as a strategy of weakening the Jewish State. Here too they failed miserably as Israel quickly developed effective counter-measures.

In the mid-2000s, anti-Israel groups shifted gears once again, adopting new tactics involving false and malicious propaganda designed to de-legitimize and demonize Israel in efforts to isolate the Jewish State. Anti-Semitic hate groups like Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) sprang up throughout college campuses across the United State and Europe and a pernicious movement known as Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) was inaugurated. The advent and proliferation of social media magnified several fold the effect of propaganda and the importance of the battle for the hearts and minds.

Efforts to combat these malevolent forces were slow off the mark but gained traction in recent years with the formation of groups and organizations dedicated to combating anti-Israel canards with truth and fact. One such group is the Western Civilization Heritage Israel Program known by its acronym as CHIP. I had the opportunity to interview CHIP’s founder and president, Nurit Greenger, and asked her some pointed questions about her organization and what it hopes to accomplish.

Ari Lieberman: What is CHIP’s mission?

Nurit Greenger: Our mission is to forge long-lasting friendships between the youth and the State of Israel. The journey of making friends for Israel will begin with middle-school-age students who will visit Israel for a twelve-day experience, and will make acquaintance with the lively, energetic and innovative people of the modern Jewish state, rebuilt on the ruins of 4,000 years of Jewish history and the cradle of Western Civilization.

CHIP’s hope is that the positive Israel experience it offers to young students, from all walks of life, with no political or religious affiliation, will be everlasting. When the program’s young participants grow up and take their place in society to become leaders, teachers, business owners, media members or the man and woman on the street, their firsthand experience and interaction with Israel will influence their attitude and decisions toward the nation state of the Jewish people. The students will grow up to know that the unfortunate ubiquitous discrimination and troubling malevolent behavior toward Israel – or Jews – is simply unjust and unfair.

The memories of the experiences the participants in the Western Civilization Heritage Israel Program will have during their tour of the land of Israel will be everlasting and some of the friendships formed with Israelis their age will cement their positive experience.

AL: Who is/are CHIP’s founder/s and how did he/she/they determine that there was a need for such an organization?

NG: I am the founding president of Western Civilization Heritage Israel Program, a non-profit educational foundation. As an experienced managerial and administrative business executive and a freelance journalist, who greatly supports the nexus between the nation state of the Jewish people, Israel, and the non-Jewish world, I saw a need to strengthen and forge bonds between Christian and non-affiliated youth and the State of Israel. CHIP fulfills that need.

AL: Is CHIP modeled after Taglit-Birthright?

NG: The purpose of CHIP Program is to become somewhat of a mirror image of the highly successful ‘Birthright Israel’ Program. But our program is tailored to non-Jewish youths with strong emphasis on 21st Century educational interests through the eyes of modern Israel.

AL: What age group are you targeting?

NG: We are targeting middle school-age children, mainly 13-, 14- and 15-year-olds.

AL: Why are you gearing your efforts to this age group?

NG: These are a youth’s formative, impressionable years when they begin to develop a sense of identity and form life-long opinions. There are other organizations that focus on college-age groups.

AL: Are there plans to expand the age group and offer tours to older students?

NG: We may expand to high school-age students at some point in the future when we are up and running.

AL: Does CHIP have a staff and board of directors?

NG: Right now we are relying on volunteers, but we will ultimately require a paid staff.  We have a Board of Directors whose members include Dr. Mordechai Kedar, Bat-Zion Susskind Sacks, author, Diane Zinn, and Rabbi Baruch Cohon. We are planning to expand the Board.

AL: Have you received positive feedback from the pro-Israel community?

NG: We are in the nascent stages, but judging by the feedback from the very many people to whom the program has been introduced, it is clear that the support for CHIP will be most significant, a world changer.

AL: Have you applied for 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status and if so, is the IRS impeding that effort as it has with other pro-Israel organizations like Z-Street?

NG: We are registered as a non-profit and the 501(c)(3) is in the making. Our lawyer sees no problem and the IRS has changed attitude since the debacle with pro-Israel organizations.

AL: Have you organized your first group tour to Israel yet and if not, when do you anticipate a future launch date?

NG: We have all in place; the first participating school will be ready to go in March 2016. We have the film crew, the tour operator, the support staff and the 12-day program all set. We are now working on the funds to execute it. So here is our message:

Over the past thirty years Western principles of honesty, honor, loyalty, family values, patriotism and religious faith have all been eroded while negative values, such as the acceptance of betrayal, duplicity and deceit, have flourished and some elements within the mainstream media are chiefly culpable in advancing these detrimental behaviors. This negative and self-destructive Western civilization transformation is the basis for the growth of discriminatory, anti-Israel, anti-Zionism and anti-Jewish perspectives.

Does Western Civilization have a replacement? No! It is by no mean perfect, but it is the best there is and could be even better. It is all up to us!

Education is the key to a better future, and the remedy to achieving a better world, the paramount goal behind the establishment of Western Civilization Heritage Israel Program. Our intent is to bridge humanity’s hearts, minds and souls.

The name, “Western Civilization Heritage Israel Program” was chosen because the State of Israel and the Jewish people are at the heart of Western thoughts and civilization and Israel is the birth place of the Judeo-Christian heritage.

The CHIP Educational Program is aimed at defusing preconceived ideas and misguided information about Israel, Jews and Western civilization heritage, as a whole, in order to create better citizens of the world. CHIP’s full intent is to make its program one of the best tools to combat and help bring an end to intolerance, well expressed in anti-Israel and anti-Semitic sentiments.

AL: How do you envision CHIP evolving in the short, intermediate and long term?

NG: After we film the first tour, the film will be used to market the program internationally. We also plan on taking the project to the states’ education departments with the aim of issuing educational credits for participating in the trip.

AL: Does CHIP have a website?

NG: Our website address is http://chipeducationaltours.org and we can be reached at Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/C.H.I.P.4Israel.

AL: Nurit Greenger, thank you for speaking with FrontPage. FrontPage wishes you all the best.