Your responses will help them answer these and other questions, and you might learn something about yourself in the process. Please set aside 15-20 minutes, and click on this link to participate:

http://tinyurl.com/5ll9vr

Please forward this e-mail to your friends and family. It is hoped that thousands of people from all religions, ages and regions of the United States and Canada will complete the survey. It will continue through July 25. If you have any questions, feel free to e- mail Prof. Sarah Bunin Benor (mail to: sbenor@huc.edu) or Prof. Steven M. Cohen (mail to: Steve34nyc@aol.com).

My sense of social justice comes from my family. My grandfather, for whom I'm named, after settling in America in 1904, returned to Europe three times, helping to bring our family to the safety of these shores. Surely, many, if not all, would have perished in the Holocaust if not for his efforts. In the late teens and early 1920's, he sent my mother, a child, door to door in their neighborhood with the key to the little blue JNF boxes, which she emptied and brought the contents home. Through the years, family members held lay and professional leadership roles in Federation, Hadassah, ZOA, ORT, JNF, American Jewish Congress, World Jewish Congress and Kol Haneshama Synagogue in Jerusalem.

Here is one small story that I believed shaped my life: When I was a child, a cousin of my father's, who was a widow, called my mother, crying, because she could not afford the fee for Hebrew school for her children. The shul, which our family helped start, had my grandfather as the first education director, and his brother as the first president. The cousin and my mother finished their conversation and my mother got in her car and drove to the synagogue to confront the rabbi. A short while later, she returned home, reporting that the two cousins were now enrolled in Hebrew school, gratis of course. That memory has stayed with me - my mom's perseverance, persistence, and an incredible belief that her sense of social justice would prevail. From my mother I learned that one person can make a difference, and .... just as important .... she never in the world would have taken the call from my dad's cousin and NOT acted on her behalf. There was never a question.

Children learn what they live. I'm blessed to have had parents and grandparents who valued social justice, and also children who value the same. Some folks who had nothing develop a sense of social justice to compensate for the things they lacked. They feed the hungry because they knew hunger. Others, who grew up with everything, develop a sense of social justice out of a desire to share the good fortune they've been blessed with. They feed the hungry because they've never known hunger, and don't ever want to.

So, social justice runs in my family. I play a small part, but I'm proud to help continue the tradition which has been handed down to me. JSPAN interests me because of its focus on social justice from a Jewish perspective. I'm interested in church-state separation issues, and also issues relating to Israel and the peace process.

JSPAN has been closely monitoring the issue of redistricting reform in the Commonwealth for over two years. Redistricting is the method by which Pennsylvania legislative and congressional districts are redrawn every 10 years, to reapportion them based on the state's population figures obtained from the U.S. Census. The next reapportionment is slated for 2011.

Most recently, on June 17, 2008, president Jeff Pasek sent a letter to Rep. Babette Josephs, Majority Chair of the House State Government Committee, (click here to access letter), expressing the disappointment of the JSPAN Board about her cancellation of the scheduled vote on several redistricting bills. At that time, Rep. Josephs stated in a letter to the Philadelphia Inquirer that she was "willing to examine alternative proposals." This has now been followed up with the distribution of a news release by Rep. Josephs' office, describing new efforts by her and Rep. Steve Samuelson (D-Northampton) to develop legislation that they claim would adopt standards for the present redistricting process to take place in 2011, and also seek to change the process for 2021.

The 2011 redistricting process would remain the work of four party leaders and a fifth person they choose, the same committee that has brought Pennsylvania some of the worst gerrymandered districts to be found anywhere in this country.

Josephs argues that bringing a bill out of her State House committee now would be meaningless, because members of the State Senate say they will not take up redistricting legislation this year. If Josephs’ House committee never starts the ball rolling, we will never know what the Senate might actually do. (And vice versa, of course.)

The two legislators say they will design yet another bill (there are already several in the legislative hopper, including one with 80 signatures by House members) and seek a commitment from all four caucus leaders to help push a stronger measure through the General Assembly in time for the 2021 redistricting process.

Is this current effort by Rep. Josephs a serious rethinking on her part and a sincere willingness to come up with some significant structural changes that will impact the 2011 reapportionment cycle, or is it yet another tactic to divert blame for the failure of her committee and the Legislature to act this spring, when there was still time to really change the process for 2011? Pennsylvanians should not have to wait until 2021 to reform a system that mainly protects incumbents from the will of the voters.

Rep. Shapiro is confident that the bill will now move through the Senate quickly, but Rep. Babette Josephs, who introduced a key amendment stipulating that the legislation target both Sudan and Iran, has indicated that passage through the Senate may be difficult. The measure is similar to actions already taken by 18 other states.

Currently, state pension funds and the state treasurer invest over $100 billion collectively each year, an estimated 7% of which goes to foreign companies doing business in terror-sponsoring nations. H.B. 1086 requires all state pension funds to divest from any foreign companies that have $20 million or more invested in the two countries. It would affect the pension funds held by the Public School Employees Retirement System, the State Employees Retirement System and the Office of the State Treasurer.

To read "Divestment Bill Surmounts a Major Hurdle in Harrisburg" by Bryan Schwartzman of The Jewish Exponent, click here.

To read H.B. 1086 in its entirety, click here.

You may know that China is a close ally of Sudan, but did you know:

• China is Sudan's largest trading partner, importing about two-thirds of all Sudanese exports and providing one-fifth of Sudan's imports.
• China is the largest investor in Sudan's oil industry. China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), a state-owned oil company, is the biggest stakeholder in Sudan's largest oil consortium and has invested $5 billion in Sudan's oil industry overall.
• China has provided 90 percent of all small arms purchased by Sudan since 2004 - the kind of weapons being used by the Sudanese military and Janjaweed militia in Darfur.
• China has consistently protected Sudan in the U.N. Security Council. In 2005, China abstained from voting on a resolution imposing sanctions on individuals impeding the peace process and in 2006, China abstained from voting on the first resolution to authorize a U.N. peacekeeping force for Darfur. While president of the Council in July 2007, China voted in favor of deploying the hybrid U.N.-African Union peacekeeping mission, but only after helping to weaken the mission's mandate.
• Last year, China provided the government of Sudan with a $12 million interest-free loan to build a new presidential palace and pledged to write off $80 million of Sudanese debt.

The government of China can clearly do much more to stop the violence in Darfur by ending its support for the corrupt government in Khartoum.

China is using the occasion of the Olympic Games to prove that it is a player on the international stage. The Olympic slogan, "One World, One Dream," is meaningless if China does not take action to stop the genocide in Darfur.

AJWS is calling on the government of China to end the sale of arms to Sudan, publicly condemn the violence in Darfur, and ask the president of Sudan to immediately facilitate the full deployment of peacekeeping forces.

His latest piece on the genocide that is ongoing in that country appeared in the July 10, 2008 issue. In it, Mr. Kristof states that he cannot understand how President Bush and the Group of 8 leaders meeting in Japan could "again shun their responsibilities in Darfur (and) implicitly accept th(e) argument .... (that) genocide is horrific, but that doesn't make it a priority."

Mr. Kristof lays particular blame for the slaughter of the Darfuris at the hands of President Bush, who, "after five years of genocide, .... still hasn't taken as simple a step as imposing a no-fly zone or even giving a prime-time speech about it." He also blames the Islamic world, which "has been even more myopic, particularly since the victims in Darfur are all Muslim. Do dead Muslims count only when Israel is the culprit?"

In summing up the tragedy, Mr. Kristof predicts that "the G-8's collective shrug today about the Darfur genocide - because the victims are black, impoverished and hidden from television cameras - will be a lingering stain."

To read "The Pain of the G-8's Big Shrug" by Nicholas Kristof in its entirety, click here.

The dramatic shift may be a matter of wording, explain pollsters Ephraim Yaar and Tamar Hermann. Last month's poll asked: "For a full peace treaty with Syria, would you support or oppose a full withdrawal from the Golan Heights?"

The new poll, explain Yaar and Hermann, was more explicit about Syrian commitments: "We asked about support or opposition to an Israeli-Syrian peace agreement that would include transferring sovereignty over the Golan to Syria under these conditions: 'appropriate security arrangements, demilitarization, allowing most of the Israeli settlements and enterprises on the Golan to continue to exist for many years, Israeli control over the Sea of Galilee, Syria breaking off relations with Iran and clamping down on Hezbollah and Hamas'."

Yaar and Hermann conclude: "The question is whether the public perceives these hypothetical conditions .... as acceptable to both sides - in other words, whether the interviewees see such an agreement as realistic. It turns out that at least to the majority of the Jewish public both Israel and Syria would agree to sign such an agreement: 59% (vs. 29%) believe the Israeli government would agree, and 50% (vs. 37%) think Syria would."

Please remember that JSPAN welcomes your donations to help us continue our important and effective work in Tikkun Olam. You may send gifts via PayPal on www.jspan.org. or to JSPAN, 1735 Market Street, Suite #A417, Philadelphia, PA 19103