Avner Shalev
- Chairman, Directorate of Yad Vashem.
Avner Shalev is the chairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate of The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority. From 1956 through 1980, Shalev served in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), eventually retiring as a Brigadier General. He served as Head of the Bureau of the then Chief of Staff, Major General David Elazar. Following the Yom Kippur War, Shalev served in the IDF's Education Corps, becoming Israel's Chief Education Office. Following his retirement from military service, Shalev assumed the position of Director of the Culture Authority in the Ministry of Education and Culture, as well as Chairman of the National Council of Culture and Art. He also served on the boards of a wide range of Israeli museums and cultural institutions. He also ensured the stability and integrity of archaeological endeavors in Israel by transforming the Antiquities Department into a national authority. Shalev help found the Sam Spiegel Film and Television School in Jerusalem. In 1993 Avner Shalev accepted the position of Chairman of the Directorate of Yad Vashem. Five years after he took the helm of the institution, Shalev accepted on its behalf the coveted Israel Prize, for Special Service to Society and Country. In 2007, he once again received a nation's supreme honor, this time Spain's Prince of Asturias Prize for Concord (the Hispanic world's Nobel Prize equivalent), in the name of Yad Vashem. He also received the French Legion of Honor by President Sarkozy, at the Elysee Palace in Paris.
Wladyslaw Bartoszewski
- Secretary of state and plenipotentiary of the prime minister for international dialogue, Poland.
Wladyslaw Bartoszewski is a historian, author and diplomat. At the beginning of World War II, he took part in the civilian defense of Warsaw following the German invasion. From September 1940-May 1941, Bartoszewski was imprisoned in Auschwitz concentration camp as a political convict. From August 1942 he was a soldier of the Polish underground Home Army (Armia Krajowa), and also co-founded the Polish underground Council for Aid to Jews “Zegota“ and authored and edited numerous underground publications. He took part in the Warsaw Uprising (August 1-October 1944). In 1946 Bartoszewski was arrested several times by the communist authorities and sentenced to 8 years of imprisonment. He was released in 1954. From 1955 on he served as a journalist and staff-member of the catholic weekly magazine "Tygodnik Powszechny“and wrote several books. In 1966 Bartoszewski was awarded the medal, the "Righteous Among the Nations. “. From 1972-1988, Bartoszewski served as Secretary General – and since 2001, as President – of the Polish PEN-center. From September 1990-March 1995 he served as the Polish Ambassador to Austria, and from March-December 1995 and again from July 2000-October 2001 he served as Foreign Minister of the Republic of Poland. Since November 2007 Bartoszewski has served as secretary of state and plenipotentiary of the prime minister for international dialogue. Bartoszewski was Chairman of the International Council of the State Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau from 1990-2000 and, since 2000, has been the Chairman of the International Auschwitz Council. He is also the Chairman of the Council for Preserving the Memory of Polish Warfare and Martyrdom (Rada Ochrony Pamięci Walk i Męczeństwa).
Bartoszewski was received several awards including, the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade (1986), honorary citizen of the Country of Israel (1991), decorated with The Polish Order of the White Eagle (1995), Medal of Merit to the Austrian Republic (1995), and the Grand Cross of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (2001). Bartoszewski is the author of about 50 books and over 1500 articles on history, Europe and politics.
Prof. Dina Porat
- Director, Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism, Tel Aviv University.
Dina Porat is a Professor of Modern Jewish History at Tel Aviv University, where she holds the Alfred P. Slainer Chair in Contemporary Antisetism and Racism. She also serves as Head of The Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Racism and Anti-Semitism in TAU, and is a member of Yad Vashem Advisory Committee. She is the author of numerous scholarly works on Zionist history, anti-Semitism, and the Holocaust including The Blue and Yellow Stars of David: The Zionist Leadership and the Holocaust, 1939-1945 ( Hebrew, Am Oved, 1986; English, Harvard UP, 1990; Spanish, Yad Vashem &TAU, 2008), the biography of Abba Kovner (Hebrew, Am Oved and Yad Vashem, 2000; English, Stanford UP, 2009) and of Israeli Society, the Holocaust and it Survivors, (Vallentine Mithchell, 2008). Porat is the editor of Avraham Tory, Ghetto Every day – the Kovno Ghetto Diary (Hebrew, Mossad Bialik & TAU, 1988; English, with Martin Gilbert, Harvard UP, 1990), and other publications. She serves as the academic advisor of the Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Research and Remembrance.
Father Patrick Desbois
- President, Yahad–In Unum Association; Director, Commission for Relations with Judaism of the French Bishops' Conference.
Father Patrick Desbois is a catholic priest and serves as President of the Yahad–In Unum Association, an organization that aims to promote common projects founded on ethics based on the Gift of the Law on Mount Sinai. He has devoted his life to confronting antisemitism and furthering Catholic-Jewish understanding. Working closely with the United States Holocaust Museum (USHMM) staff and using the Museum’s archives to aid his search, he and his team have crisscrossed the countryside in Ukraine in an effort to locate every mass grave and site at which Jews were killed during the Holocaust. To date, they have identified 800 of an estimated 2,000 such locations. They are also collecting artifacts and, most significantly, recording video testimonies from eyewitnesses—many of whom are speaking publicly for the first time. These invaluable testimonies will become part of USHMM's permanent collection. Father Desbois’ extraordinary work to preserve the memory of Ukraine’s former Jewish community and to advance understanding of the crimes committed there during the Holocaust has received international media attention, including coverage in Le Monde, The New York Times, TIME Magazine, and NBC Nightly News. His new book, The Holocaust by Bullets: A Priest’s Journey to Uncover the Truth behind the Murder of 1.5 Million Jews, was published with the Museum’s support.
Dr. Mark Frieman
- President, Canadian Jewish Congress.
Mark J. Freiman practices law in Toronto, with an emphasis on Public Law and Defamation matters. He is currently the Lead Commission Counsel for the Government of Canada’s Commission of Inquiry into the Investigation of the Bombing of Air India Flight 182, whose Report on lessons from this terrorist bombing will be forthcoming shortly. From 2000 to 2004, Mr. Freiman was Deputy Attorney General for Ontario. He had previously served as Law Clerk to then Chief Justice of Canada, Brian Dickson and as Senior Policy Advisor to then Attorney General Ian G. Scott, Q.C. He is co-author of The Litigator’s Guide to Expert Witnesses, and frequently writes, teaches and speaks on topics related to human rights, as well as to law and the media. He has been the recipient of numerous academic awards and has also taught extensively at the university level in both Canada and the United States. Mr. Freiman acted as lead counsel for the Canadian Human Rights Commission in the successful proceedings against the notorious Holocaust Denier, Ernst Zundel with respect to the content of his Internet site. On May 31, 2009 he became National President of Canadian Jewish Congress.
Prof. Arieh Kochavi
- Director, Strochlitz Institute of Holocaust Studies, Haifa University; Director, Elizabeth and Tony Comper Interdisciplinary Center for the Study of Antisemitism and Racism, Haifa University.
Professor Kochavi is head of the School of History at the University of Haifa and directs the Universty's Institute of Holocaust Studies and the Elizabeth and Tony Comper Indisciplinary Center for the Study of Antisemitism and Racism. Among his books in English are: Prelude to Nuremberg: Allied War Crimes Policy and the Question of Punishment; Post-Holocaust Politics: Britain, the United States and Jewish Refugees, 1945-1948; and Confronting Captivity: Britain, the United States, and their POWs in Nazi Germany.
Rabbi Michael Melchior
- Former Member of Knesset, Israel.
Rabbi Michael Melchior comes from Denmark where for seven generations his family members have served as Chief Rabbis. He received his rabbinic ordination at Yeshivat HaKotel in Jerusalem in 1980 and returned to Scandinavia to serve as Rabbi of the Norwegian Jewish Community. In 1999, he was elected to the Knesset as the Meimad Party's representative and appointed to Ehud Barak’s Cabinet as Minister for Israeli Society and the World Jewish Community. He served in successive governments as Deputy Foreign Minister, Deputy Minister of Education, and Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister's office. From 2006 to 2009, he served as Chairman of the Knesset committee for Education, Culture and Sports and the Knesset Caucus on the Environment. Rabbi Melchior became been one of Israel’s leading legislators initiating and completing major legislative reforms in the areas of education, children’s rights, environment, and social justice. Today, Rabbi Melchior has turned his focus to leading the civil society movements that he helped build over the last decade. Rabbi Melchior launched Moe'tzet Yachad, Meitarim The Citizen's Accord Forum and the Mosaica Center for Interreligious Cooperation. Rabbi Melchior was the founding chairman of the Birthright/Taglit steering committee. He also serves as the Rabbi of a dynamic Orthodox synagogue in Jerusalem and is actively involved in the Norwegian Jewish Community, where he still holds the honorary position of Chief Rabbi.