The Makor Rishon Conference took place last Sunday at the International Conference Center in Jerusalem. Present were journalists, politicians, and influential public figures, among them Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and KKL Chairman Danny Atar. Be’Artzeinu, the Mechina Alumni Community-Building Project, is in ongoing touch with KKL and an active partner in KKL–JNF 2040: Moving to the Land of Tomorrow, which was first publicized at the News 12 Influencers Conference.
During that conference, which took place last week, there was a panel entitled “How Do We Get a Million-and-a-Half Israelis to Move to the Negev and the Galilee,” with participants including KKL Education and Community Division Head Sar-Shalom Jerbi, Kinneret Innovation Center CEO Elad Shamir, Shaar HaNegev Regional Council Head Ofir Libstein, KKL–JNF 2040: Moving to the Land of Tomorrow innovation and strategy consultant Eliran Keren, and Be’Artzeinu CEO Tali Arnolf.
When Arnolf was asked about the difficulty of finding employment in the periphery, she responded by telling about graduates of Mechinat Lachish and the change they brought to Kibbutz Cholit. “What we are doing,” she added, “is aimed at a certain segment of the population that talks about mission. It’s true that young people today talk less about mission and Zionism and more about self-actualization and careers. We’re leading in a different direction. Here, we’re creating an alternative that says there is space both for self-actualization and for life with value and a sense of meaning and mission—and that these two things aren’t contradictory.”
Ofir Libstein, Yair Krauss, Elad Shamir, Tali Arnolf, Eliran Keren, and Sar-Shalom Jerbi
