Well stated. Often an organization gets attacked when it is successful at that which the accusing organization is not successful and thus feels threatened by this success.

For what its worth, it seems like the UJIA was the ones with the most to lose here. The Jewish Agency has been friends with the UJIA up until now and doesn’t want to lose them as a partner (thus they make statements like “the initiative of Nefesh B’Nefesh to expand to the U.K. has yet to be examined by the United Jewish Israel Appeal of Great Britain, the umbrella organization of the British Jewish community with which the Jewish Agency works to facilitate aliyah from the U.K.”, though if you read it carefully, they are the ones who actually made the statement about “British pride”)

Hmmm….this isn’t an “American” venture–it is a JEWISH venture, albeit it started in North America (that’s the US AND Canada). Like Emma S., my family is waiting for their NBN letter; our oldest adult daughter has already made aliyah with NBN assistance. NBN makes it easier to make aliyah because of the financial and moral support, and its determination to cut through the red-tape that so often impedes aliyah. Mr. Krikler needs to get off his high horse and see NBN as an ally, not a foreign invasion designed to undermine his ego.

Yaakov –

http://muqata.blogspot.com/2006/04/pesach-and-jewish-agency-uk.html

I linked to your posting…and I’ve already gotten a nasty phone call from someone who claims to “be in the know” and says the NBN came in totally uncoordinated.

We’ll see how this pans out…while I’m a big supproter of NBN, I certainly hope they didn’t come in unannounced.

Jameel
The Muqata, Inc.

I welcome myself back to the ‘aliyah blog’. The UJIA is an excellent organisation which goes about its business in very effective but yet unassuming way, yes how very British. No huge fanfare, and triumphalist and actually highly embarassing welcome ceremonies at Ben Gurion. If people want to move to the “West Bank” after moving here then so be it, according to the UJIA, but as far I remember they don’t actually go about promoting it.

Lets also look at the figures, 3,000 or so + from a 5 million strong community, 468 from a community of 290,000. Work out the ratios for yourselves.
If N’B'N came along and said ‘we’ve got some good ideas we want to share them with you’ then fair enough, but they didn’t they just charged in, and yes the two organisations do do the same work – the promoting and logistical work of Aliyah, its an affront. Furthermore besides the very different cultural outlook of Brits vis a vis Americans, there is a very very different relationship between the British Jewish Community and the United Kingdom and the American Jewish Community and the U.S.A. Something which N’B'N doesn’t understand.

Points taken, however it was you yourself who made the inital negative comments about the British reaction.
I think the ratios I put forward are fair. Just as 5 Million U.S Jews is not the true ‘target’ audience for Aliyah, neither is the 290,000 – 300,000 for British Jews.
I do agree that N’B'N has revitalised American Aliyah and created a ‘brand’ about the concept of Aliyah, and there are certainly ways in which it could help the UJIA way. Nevertheless, as stated before there are vast differences between the two communities, one of the major ones being size. N’B'N from what I understand has performed a kind or outreach to Jews in smaller communties who want to move to Israel but didn’t know who to ask or where to go.
British Jewry is essentially London now, and to a much lesser extent Manchester. Everybody who wants to make Aliyah knows who to ask and where to go. Similarly N’B'N if not a ‘religious’ organisation is certainly ‘religiously inspired’, and knowing the cultual differences between Brits and Americans I feel that many British Jews who aren’t religous but who still wish to make Aliyah could feel uncomfortable working with such an organisation. There are further cultural issues as stated prior. I know I wouldn’t have felt comfortable with an N’B'N arrival ceremony…I think that is an ‘American thing’.

Surely the best course of action would have been for N’B'N to approach the UJIA and say ‘we’ve got some good ideas as to how to improve your programme and increase Aliyah, we really feel you can benefit’. Its not a business, an issue of market share, but by steamrolling in there without ‘real’ consultation with the main UK bodies N’B'N have acted like it is.

So why, and for what we need, now the Jewish Agency in London?