NCSJ  - 06.13.2006

Celebrating Mark Levin and Shoshana Cardin

All photos: Ron Sachs/CNP
(l.-r.) NCSJ President Joel Schindler applauds Executive Director Mark Levin, as Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR) pays tribute.		(l.-r.) Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) presents former Chair Shoshana Cardin with NCSJ's Torch of Liberty Award.

Tributes to Mark Levin
By Euro-Asian Jewish Congress leaders
By Natan Sharansky, Israeli Knesset member and former refusenik
By U.S. Senator Gordon Smith (R-Oregon) (pdf, 200K)
Read NCSJ news coverage of the event (pdf, .4 MB)
Download the evening's Program Book (pdf, 1.5 MB)
News coverage
JTA	Jun. 14	Group for FSU Jews honors leaders
Baltimore Jewish Times	Jun. 09	Mark Levin's Journey
NY Jewish Week	Jun. 09	Still On The Soviet Jewry Frontlines
Washington Jewish Week	Jun. 08	Silver anniversary honor for Levin
IT'S NOT TOO LATE TO CELEBRATE!....
Sen. Paul Sarbanes (D-MD), and (background, l.-r.) Dolores Beilenson, Mark Levin and NCSJ President Joel Schindler (l.-r.) NCSJ President Joel Schindler, Mark Levin, Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) and NCSJ Chairman Robert Meth Shoshana Cardin and House Democratic  Whip Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD) NCSJ Chairman Robert Meth and  Sen. George Voinovich (R-OH) (l.-r.) NCSJ President Joel Schindler; former Chairman  Harold Luks; Executive Director Mark Levin; former  Chairmen Shoshana Cardin, Rabbi Mark Staitman and  Denis Braham; current Chairman Robert Meth (also  attending, not pictured, former Chairman Richard Wexler). NCSJ Executive Director Mark Levin (center) with (l.-r.)  NCSJ President Joel Schindler, Vice-President Lesley  Israel, Chairman Robert Meth and Vice-President Rabbi  David Hill (all photos: Ron Sachs/CNP)

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Natan Sharansky, MK - 06.13.2006

Dear Mark,

Warm Congratulations on the occasion of marking the jubilee year – 25 years paved with devoted, persistent, professional work during which you succeeded beyond comprehension in keeping the work of the National Conference on the Jewish and Washington agendas.

I very much regret that my new obligations at the Knesset prevent me from being there with you and all our friends, but I do want to use this opportunity to greet you and all those who came.

No doubt the battle for Soviet Jewry and our victory was the most important event in modern Jewish history since the creation of the Jewish State. It was also the most important struggle for freedom which not only brought about the release of Soviet Jews and helped to reunite them with their brothers in Israel and around the globe but also brought the defeat of the most cruel empire. As a direct result the entire world was made more secure.

All this happened only because the Jewish people were united in a single purpose and faith so that our efforts could make a difference. All the political organizations which worked so tirelessly were only implementing the iron will of an army of students, housewives, and ordinary citizens. It was the Jews from Philadelphia, New York, L.A., Paris, London, and elsewhere who fought relentlessly who in the end were the engine of change.

This occasion must remind us how strong we can be when we are united.

The challenges and dangers we face today summon us all to unite and to work together in mutual respect.

Mark, chazak v’amatz.

In friendship,

Natan

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JTA - 06.14.2006

Group for FSU Jews honors leaders

(JTA) - A group that works with Jews in the former Soviet Union honored two of its leaders at a Capitol Hill reception. 

Shoshana Cardin, the group’s one-time national chairwoman, received NCSJ’s Torch of Liberty Award, which was presented Tuesday evening by Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.). 

The group — which advocates on behalf of Jews in Russia, Ukraine, the Baltic states and Eurasia — also honored its executive director, Mark Levin, for his 25 years of service. 

Cardin, whom Mikulski called a “national treasure,” has chaired many top national organizations, including the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, United Israel Appeal and the Council of Jewish Federations. 

She also is past president of JTA’s board of directors.

 

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Baltimore Jewish Times - 06.09.2006

Jewish Times

Mark Levin's Journey

From freeing refuseniks to today’s dimming democracy, NCSJ head sees renewed need for American Jewish activism. 

By James D. Besser - Washington Correspondent

WASHINGTON - In some ways it seems like a relic of a long-ago Cold War. But NCSJ -- once the National Conference on Soviet Jewry, with a streamlined name now that the Soviet Union no longer exists -- remains an active advocate for the estimated 1.5 million Jews left in the former Soviet republics.

And Mark Levin has been in the thick of the agency’s efforts for 25 years. Now, with anti-Semitism in the region on the rise and Russia seemingly headed back to autocratic rule, the Jews he and NCSJ have long fought for once again need outside help.

Mr. Levin, 51, will be honored next week at a Washington reception for his years with NCSJ, including the last 14 as executive director. 

“The good news is that state-sponsored anti-Semitism is virtually non-existent,” he told the Baltimore Jewish Times this week. “But more and more, we are again dealing with popular anti-Semitism -- especially in Russia and Ukraine.”

He was there during the desperate fight to free refuseniks and the opening of emigration floodgates in the 1980’s including the huge 1987 mass march on Washington, a major landmark of Jewish activism. Then came the stunning collapse of the Soviet empire, the heady days of democracies being born and now today’s frightening retreat from freedom.

These days, he and NCSJ are eyeing life for Jews in the many former soviet republics, which could again get precarious for a community that in total remains the third-largest Jewish population in the world. Mr. Levin’s activism on the issue began as a teenager in the Washington area. After a stint at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, “NCSJ offered me an opportunity to revamp their congressional operation,” he said. “I was very young and very sure of myself. I didn’t entirely understand the difference between working with a big national organization like AIPAC and working in a tiny office like NCSJ.” 

At the same time, the small NCSJ offices were next to a ventilator from a fast-food restaurant, he said. 

The Soviet Jewry movement had its roots in the mid-1960’s and NCSJ was founded in 1971; the rise in U.S. Soviet tensions in the earl 1980’s and the plight of countless refuseniks spurred a new wave of activism during Mr. Levin’s early years with the group.

The landmark “Freedom Sunday” rally on Washington’s mall in December 1987 drew some 250,000 activists, giving the movement added visibility on the national scene. But just as important were the quiet, incessant efforts of NCSJ and other groups to put the issue on the U.S. diplomatic agenda. 

In response to the pleas of Jewish leaders, then-President Ronald Reagan and then-Secretary of state George Schultz established human rights as “one of the four cornerstones of U.S. policy toward the Soviet Union,” Mr. Levin said. “They made a promise this would become part of every diplomatic contact with Moscow --- and they kept it.”

That provided a template for U.S. involvement in other human rights crises, he said.

The movement also changed the American Jewish Community, he said, creating “a new generation of Jewish leadership that saw what a galvanized, committed community could do. Many of today’s top Jewish leaders had strong ties to the Soviet Jewry movement in their early days.”

Shoshana Cardin - a former NCSJ president who worked closely with Levin and who will be honored with him next week --- said that the movement “took us out of thinking that it was just American Jewry and Israel and not thinking about Jews in other countries. American Jews, as a community, became globally minded as a result.”

Mr. Levin acknowledged the since the great upsurge in Jewish emigration in the late 1980’s and the end of the Soviet Union itself in 1991, it has sometimes been difficult to explain the need for NCSJ.

“It’s not letter writing, marching, sign waving; it’s a much more subtle but no less significant form of activism,” he said.

Today’s activism, he said, involves working closely with the U.S. State Department, representatives of the former Soviet republics, and international human rights monitoring groups. It also involves myriad relations with the Jewish groups that are re-establishing a vibrant Jewish life in those countries.

The group even works on related issues, such as Russian-Iranian nuclear cooperation, he said.

Above all, NCSJ remains an active promoter of democracy in the former Soviet Union — the best guarantor, he said, of Jewish security in the region.

As democracy in the region teeters and repression looms, “the only entity I know of that will take the time and trouble to help the Jews, and which already has the mechanisms and the political contact, is NCSJ,” added Mrs. Cardin. Maintaining this careful watching mechanism is very important for or community.

[as printed]

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New York Jewish Week - 06.09.2006

The Jewish Week

Still On The Soviet Jewry Frontlines

By James D. Besser - Washington Correspondent

In some ways it seems like a relic of a long-ago Cold War. But NCSJ, which once upon a time ago was known as the National Conference on Soviet Jewry, remains an active advocate on behalf of the estimated 1.5 million Jews left in the former Soviet republics.

Mark Levin has been there for numerous chapters in the Soviet Jewry saga. Next week Levin will be honored at a Washington reception for 25 years of service with the group. In an interview, he said events in the former Soviet Union point to the continuing need for organizations such as NCSJ.

“The good news is that state-sponsored anti-Semitism is virtually non-existent,” he said. “But more and more, we are again dealing with popular anti-Semitism, especially in Russia and Ukraine.”

And with the light of democracy getting dimmer in many former Soviet republics, life could again get precarious for those Jews, who represent the third-largest Jewish population in the world.

The Soviet Jewry movement had a major impact on the effort to win freedom for those Jews, but the movement also changed U.S. politics and diplomacy, Levin said. The successful efforts of NCSJ and other groups to put the issue on the U.S. diplomatic agenda provided a template for official involvement in other human rights crises.

The movement also changed the American Jewish community, he said, creating “a new generation of Jewish leadership that saw what a galvanized, committed community could do. Many of today’s top Jewish leaders had strong ties to the Soviet Jewry movement in their early days.”

Shoshana Cardin, a former NCSJ president who worked closely with Levin and who will be honored with him next week, said that the movement “took us out of thinking that it was just American Jewry and Israel and not thinking about Jews in other countries. American Jews, as a community, became globally minded as a result.”

NCSJ remains relevant, Levin said, although its mode of activism has changed in the post-Soviet world.

“It’s not letter writing, marching, sign waving; it’s a much more subtle but no less significant form of activism,” he said.

That activism, he said, involves working closely with the U.S. State Department and with representatives of the former Soviet republics, as well as international human rights monitoring groups. It also involves myriad relations with the Jewish groups that are reestablishing a vibrant Jewish life in those countries.

Above all, NCSJ remains an active promoter of democracy in the former Soviet Union, he said — the best guarantor of Jewish security in the region.

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Washington Jewish Week - 06.08.2006

Washington Jewish Week

Silver anniversary honor for Levin

NCSJ: Advocates on behalf of Jews in Russia, Ukraine, the Baltic States & Eurasia is scheduled to honor executive director Mark Levin for his 25 years of leadership next Tuesday.

The Senate Russell Caucus Room event in slated to include tributes from Sens. Barbara Mikulski and Paul Sarbanes (both D-Md.) and House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), among others, and include a song-and-story session with actor Theodore Bikel on American Jewry’s efforts to free Soviet Jews.

Former NCSJ Chair Shoshana Cardin also will be honored at the reception, which has as honorary co-chair five former secretaries of state.