This past March, NCSY friends and supporters gathered at the Sheraton New York to attend the Seventeenth Annual Ben Zakkai Dinner. At the dinner, The Jewish Center of Teaneck, Teaneck’s first synagogue, was formally welcomed into Orthodox Union membership. In recognition of more than thirty years of Jewish communal service, the OU honored the Jewish Center’s Rabbi Lawrence S. and Rebbetzin Berni (nee Breen) Zierler with the Ezra Ben Zion Lightman Memorial Award.
At the event, Martin Nachimson of Los Angeles was installed as OU president.
Inductees into the Ben Zakkai Honor Society included Stuart Boyarsky, Rabbi Barry Goldfischer, Joshua Gottesman, Rabbi David Twersky and Devorah Becker.
The Ben Zakkai Honor Society is NCSY alumni’s “Hall of Fame,” whose new members are nominated by and voted on by its current members based on the nominees’ service to NCSY and the Jewish community. Its main function is to raise funds for scholarships for high school NCSYers for summer programs in North America and Israel, and for teens to continue their Jewish education after high school.
From left: Isabelle Novak, Chair of the Ben Zakkai Honor Society; Vivian Luchins, Dinner Chair; Rebbetzin Bernie Breen Zierler, honored with the Ezra Ben Zion Lightman Memorial Award; David Luchins, Dinner Chair; Rabbi Lawrence Zierler, honored with the Ezra Ben Zion Lightman Memorial Award and Martin Nachimson, OU President.
From left: David Luchins; Martin Nachimson; Rabbi Micah Greenland, Interim NCSY National Director; Rabbi Barry Goldfischer, Ben Zakkai Inductee; Stuart Boyarsky,
Ben Zakkai Inductee; Joshua Gottesman, Ben Zakkai Inductee; Isabelle Novak and Vivian Luchins.
David and Isabelle Novak; Elizabeth and Martin Nachimson; Irwin Nachimson, son of OU President Martin Nachimson and an OU board member; Rabbi Alan Kalinsky, OU West Coast Director; Paul Glasser, OU Senior Director for Institutional
Advancement.
Photos: Richard Lobell