Press Conference - 10.03.2000

 

 

Domestic Violence in Russia

(Read Washington Jewish Week story) Announcing a U.S. State Department, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Exchanges, grant for women’s leadership training project on domestic violence in Russia.

Contact: Diane Gardsbane Jewish Women International (202) 857-1300                       Lesley Weiss NCSJ (202) 898-2500

Event Information:
Tuesday, October 3
12:00 – 1:00 pm
National Press Club (Zenger Room)
Washington, DC 

Sponsors:
Jewish Women International (JWI)
NCSJ: Advocates on behalf of Jews in Russia, Ukraine, the Baltic States & Eurasia 

Briefers:
Barbara Rabkin, President, JWI
Diane Gardsbane, JWI Director of Programs
Lesley Weiss, NCSJ Director of Community Services 
        & Cultural Affairs
Sarah Tisch, Project Kesher
Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, Chief Rabbi of Moscow 

In coordination with National Domestic Violence Awareness Month and Jewish Women International’s "Light a Fire - Share a Vision" Family Violence Awareness campaign, JWI and NCSJ announce a major new initiative.  JWI and NCSJ are collaborating with Project Kesher and the Russian Jewish Congress, two Russian non-governmental organizations, to engage ethnic and religious communities in addressing the serious issue of domestic violence in Russia.  The project will focus on the Jewish communities in Tula and Voronezh. The initial phase will commence October 16, 2000, and the project will run for 15 months. 

Additional collaborating U.S. organizations include the Jewish Community Development Fund of the American Jewish World Service, the Center for the Prevention of Sexual and Domestic Violence based in Seattle, Washington, the House of Ruth, a comprehensive program for battered women in Baltimore, Maryland and CHANA – Counseling, Helpline and Network for Abused Women serving Jewish women in Baltimore, the Shalom Bayit program of Jewish Family Services, Columbus, Ohio, and Safe Harbor, a shelter in Richmond, Virginia.

The project’s objectives include:

·  developing an awareness of domestic violence within ethnic and religious women’s groups and religious leaders, initially focusing on the Jewish community;

· establishing educational exchanges that will pair U.S. experts in the field of domestic violence with Russian interest groups;

· training community and religious leaders to become organizers within their own communities;

·developing appropriate local responses to the needs of women who are abused.

Once trainers have been identified, they will be brought to the U.S. for a two and a half week intensive training program on domestic violence and community organizing. The trainers will then return to their communities to develop appropriate local responses to domestic violence. The communities of  Baltimore, MD, Columbus, OH, and Richmond, VA, will host participants in the U.S. training component.

Jewish Women International (JWI) strives to break the cycle of violence through education, advocacy and action.  The organization is guided by the vision of a safe world for women, children and families.   For more than a decade, JWI has been a leading Jewish women’s organization working towards breaking the cycle of  violence in  both Jewish and non-Jewish communities in the United States.

NCSJ, a non-for-profit agency created in 1971, is the mandated central coordinating agency in the United States on behalf of the 1.5 million Jews in the successor states. Today, NCSJ continues its commitment to safeguard the religious and political freedoms of Jews living in the successor states, protect their right to emigrate without impediment, monitor and combat anti-Semitism, and ensure that Jews have full access to Jewish education, culture, and heritage. 

JWI:      
1828 L Street, NW, Suite 250, Washington, DC 20036. 
Tel: 202/857-1300. Fax: 857-1380. 
Email: jwi@jwi.org.  Web: www.jewishwomen.org.

NCSJ:   
1640 Rhode Island Ave., NW, Suite 501, Washington, DC 20036. 
Tel: 202/898-2500. Fax: 898-0822. 
Email: ncsj@ncsj.org.  Web: www.ncsj.org.