Shaharit is a thinktank, leadership incubator, and community organizing hub that promotes a new take on Israeli liberalism and its role in Israeli society.
We’re a thinktank.
We seek to forge a politics that unites, and breaks out of the tired dichotomies that for too long have defined the Israeli politic: “a Jewish state” versus “a state of all its citizens,” “religion” and “tradition” as opposed to “liberalism,” the “security camp” opposite the “peace camp,” and “market economics” versus the “welfare state.” Our task is to articulate a new political language, to create new social networks, and to encourage new initiatives, for the benefit of all of Israel’s communities, and for the benefit of Israeli society as a whole. We call this “a politics of the common good”.
We’re a leadership incubator.
Our flagship “120” program recruits and trains the political leaders of tomorrow in the theory and practice of the politics of the common good. How can they become a different kind of politician – one who, no matter which party they find themselves in, sees their role not as winning a zero-sum game, but as creating win-win situations. We also run leadership groups in many of Israel’s sub-communities: religious Zionist, Chareidi (Ultra-Orthodox), Mizrachi, Arab-Israeli, and others.
We’re a community organizing hub.
We think national and act local. On the ground, in the towns and cities that make up the fabric of Israeli society, we find people who are willing to transcend their boundaries, to work across communities, to seek the face of the other, and create a brand of local activism of the common good. We’re making great investments in community organizing as a discipline that can unleash the positive energy of the common good where it really counts: in people’s neighborhoods, communities, and homes.