Waiting for IC

It's blustery here in Orlando. The clouds are steel-gray and moving fast, the palm trees are blowing around in a cold wind as if they were traffic lights. It's about to storm back home in New York -- a blizzard, if were are to believe its advance team, which I don't.

We're all waiting for the start of the 2010 USY international convention, its 60th, and the kickoff of its 60th anniversary year celebration.

The hotel is vast. Huge hallways with acres of brightly colored carpet lead to scores of rooms, each with dozens of chairs. The displays for the convention are set up and many of them are staffed. One of them, for Nativ, is behind a Christmas tree -- the hotel's, obviously -- and Israeli flags are draped around it.

There are other groups here too -- football players, someone said basketball players too, all very large people -- families here for Disney, little girls in princess acrylics over their regular clothes, with sparkly tiaras (is there such a thing as an unsparkly tiara?) grown-ups unsmiling in mouse ears.

And there are clumps of USY staffers, and the USYers themselves are just starting to come in. The truly amazing part is the way the energy vibrates. You can feel it. There aren't nearly as many kids here yet as there will be, just a small fraction, but already it vibrates.

I think that when they're all here the building is likely to levitate.

Itzik Speaks

This afternoon, MK Dalia Itzik, who was Israel's first female Knesset speaker, talked to us, a rich full voice in richly accented English. She praised the Conservative movement, including of course its Masorti branch in Israel, as a deeply necessary bridge over the chasm that separates haredim from secular Jews in Israel. She praised the movement in ways that were specific and therefore seemed entirely real. But, she said, neither we nor the Reform movement have political power in Israel, and therefore we will continue to be powerless.

"If Israel wants to remain a lighthouse and anchor for the Jewish world, we must find a way for all the major streams in Jewish life to be represented," she said. "I fully believe that we must find a way to mend the rift and unite the Jewish world, as we have done in the past."

The main threat to Israel's continued existence, she said, is Iran, which has been responsible for arming Israel's enemies and feeding its terrorists the poison on which they thrive. Israel must find moderates among the Palestinians, in Jordan and in Egypt, with whom they can make common cause against the danger Iran poses to everyone, in the region and outside it. "You must find a way to raise your voices against Iran," she said. "The biggest threat to us is Iran, Iran, and again Iran."

To add to the inherent gloom of her description was how closely it echoed what we were told by Sallai Meridor, then Israel's ambassador to the United States, at our 2007 convention.

Still, she said, "I remain optimistic. Israel is a true miracle, a Jewish democratic island in a sea of Arab lands, a country rich in achivement, in high tech, biotech, medicine, science, agriculture, industrial research, and so many other fields. All this has been built with your help and your support. Thank you so much for this, for all of us who created this amazing living Zionist dream."

Joanne Palmer

Welcome to Cherry Hill

So here we are in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, getting ready for the convention. Yesterday it snowed here on the east coast, huge fat white snowflakes that fluttered down from a silver sky. But today it's dry and warm. It's a good day to travel.

Lots of people, it seems, have taken the opportunity to get here. I don't know how many people are here, but the lines snaking from the reception counter seem to go on for miles. No one seems to mind, though; people are standing there talking to each other. There's none of the fumes that generally steam off lines are there. Just lots and lots of talking.

The convention starts at four o'clock, and you will be able to read about it here, on this blog. We will be looking seriously at the issues that affect the Conservative movement in general and United Synagogue in particular. The convention will open with performances, many of them by children and teenagers; the first formal talk with by from Rabbi Steven Wernick as he is formally installed (and no, installation does not entail standing with your hands above your head as you are twisted into the socket in the ceiling). Instead, Steve, who is our new executive vice president and CEO, will talk about his dreams for the movement. He will not short-shrift the problems we face, either. That is not his style.

The hotel lobby is pulsing with kids now. They're ready to go.

Joanne Palmer