This year’s Limmud festival has just concluded, with well-attended programmes in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Durban.

A number of other positive community events have taken place over the past week, amongst them the annual SA Jewish Achievers Awards, Cycalive and various functions involving Rabbi David Rosen, who as explained last week was brought to South Africa to participate in the 50th anniversary commemoration of the Catholic Church's ground-breaking Nostra Aetate declaration. 

This coming Monday at Beyachad, the Gauteng Council will have the honour of hosting Rabbi David Rosen, one of the foremost Jewish leaders in the field of interfaith dialogue. He will be speaking to the Gauteng Jewish community on the topic “From Foe to Friend-Catholic Jewish relations”.

175 years of Jewish life in South Africa, from the first-ever prayer service in Cape Town in 1841 through to the vibrant, diverse community we have today, was celebrated at Monday’s SAJBD Gauteng Council conference.

Final preparations are underway for the Board's Gauteng Council conference,‎ to take place on Monday evening at the Sandton shul hall.

After so many months of negativity, bad-news stories and general disillusionment over the direction our country appeared to be taking, last week's local government elections were a welcome demonstration of the essential robustness of democracy in South Africa. 

Last week, the SAJBD Cape Council reached an agreement with those parties who had instituted legal proceedings against it based on  the absence  of women solo singers at Yom Hashoah ceremonies.

As previously reported, the Board’s Gauteng Council has introduced a special award in recognition of Jewish community members who have made significant contributions to social upliftment in the wider society.

South Africa’s much anticipated local government elections are now just a few days away. As in previous years, the Board has run a multifaceted ‘Make Us Count’ awareness and educational project to involve our Jewish community in the process. 

This Thursday evening at Beyachad, representatives of the various Jewish communal organisations will be coming together for a security briefing, taking place under the auspices of the Board and the CSO. Both the chairman of the CSO and I will be speaking, followed by a question and answer session.