SJMAP Leadership
Executive Committee
Bob Gordon
Former & current leadership: Union of Councils for Soviet Jews, Boston Action for Soviet Jewry, Social Venture Fund for Jewish-Arab Equality and Shared Society. Entrepreneur: The Store 24 Inc. and City North Development, LLC.
Debbie Kardon
Executive Director, Action for Post-Soviet Jewry; Chair, Action for Ukraine. Leadership roles at Jewish non-profits as a change agent and organizational leader.
Miriam Rosenblum
Career in nonprofit leadership. Former: Union of Councils for Soviet Jews, Cincinnati Council for Soviet Jews, Cleveland Council on Soviet Anti-Semitism, MIT Hillel, JCRC (Cincinnati). Current: Brain Educators. Co-creator: First U.S. historical marker recognizing Soviet Jewry movement.
Morey Schapira
Former leadership: Union of Councils for Soviet Jews, Student Struggle for Soviet Jews, Boston Action for Soviet Jewry, Medical Mobilization for Soviet Jews. Co-creator: Let My People Go website https://en.nativ-education.org.il/home. High Tech Executive.
Board of Directors
Harvey J. Barnett
A legal career spanning 55 years in commercial litigation, class actions, and appellate practice cases. Former: Chicago Action for Soviet Jewry, Union of Councils for Soviet Jews; Jewish Federation of Metro Chicago, Jewish Federations of North America.
Doug Cahn
Principal, The Cahn Group, LLC. Former: Vice President, Human Right Programs, Reebok International Ltd.; Senior Congressional staff member, Human Rights Information Center of the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews (Madrid).
Pamela Braun Cohen
Author, Hidden Heroes, One Woman’s Story of Resistance and Rescue in the Soviet Union. Former: Union of Councils for Soviet Jews (President), Chicago Action for Soviet Jewry.
Ronald L. Daniels
Commercial real estate development and management, Buyers Realty. Longtime activist with Des Moines Action Committee for Soviet Jews and Union of Councils for Soviet Jews.
Eti Ganin
Jewish communal leader. Former: Materials Scientist and Engineer. IBM & GE. Activist & refusenik in Kishinev & Leningrad; Proud beneficiary of movement for Soviet Jewish liberation that started in Cleveland.
Elianna Kan
Literary agent, writer, and translator. Daughter and granddaughter of Soviet-Jewish refugees and dissidents who were involved in the Soviet Jewry movement upon immigrating to the United States in the 1970s.
Jessica Katz
Columbia Univ School of Architecture & Planning. Former: City of New York Chief Housing Officer; Citizens Housing & Planning Council. Once called "The Littlest Refusenik" she emigrated from the USSR in 1977.
Leo Slepak
An investment banker, investor, and business developer with more than 30 years of experience in global entrepreneurship. In his youth was at the center of Moscow’s refusenik activism; in subsequent years led efforts in the West on behalf of his parents in Soviet exile.
Reuben Slone
Independent Board Director, Operations & Supply Chain Executive, Fortune 500 Leadership (30 years). Non-profit Leadership (15 years). Grew up as a volunteer with the Cleveland Council on Soviet Anti-Semitism.
David Waksberg
Former: Union of Councils for Soviet Jews (VP), Center for Jewish Renewal of UCSJ (Dir), Bay Area Council for Soviet Jews, Jewish LearningWorks (CEO).
Zev Yaroslavsky
Director, Los Angeles Initiative, UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs. Former: County Supervisor, County of Los Angeles; Council Member, City of Los Angeles; CA Students for Soviet Jews, Southern CA Council for Soviet Jews; Union of Council for Soviet Jews.
Board of Advisors
Gal Beckerman
Senior Editor for Books, The Atlantic. When They Come for Us We’ll Be Gone (2010), his book documenting the Soviet Jewry movement, chosen as a book of the year by The New Yorker and the Washington Post.
Dina Beilin
A leading Moscow refusenik leader, coordinator of refusenik records.
Laura Bialis
Documentary filmmaker; Founder, Foundation for Documentary Projects; Director & Producer, Refusenik (2008).
The Honourable Irwin Cotler
International Chair, Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights; Former Member, Canadian Parliament, Minister of Justice, and Attorney General. Represented Natan Sharansky.
Rita Eker
Leader: The 35’s - Women’s Campaign for Soviet Jewry (United Kingdom). Co-founder: One-to-One Project. MBE honors in 1999.
John Grabowski
Senior Vice President, Western Reserve Historical Society; Krieger-Mueller Associate Professor of Applied History, Case Western Reserve University.
Rabbi Irving Greenberg
Lifetime of service to the Jewish people: Leading Jewish thinker, scholar, professor, author, and innovator. Pioneer in Holocaust education and commemoration; supporter of intra-faith dialogue in Jewish leadership; a founder of Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry.
Danny Grossman
Former Diplomat, Entrepreneur, and Foundation Leader. Jewish Community Federation of S.F. & Bay Area (2015-21); Wild Planet (1993-2011), US Dept of State Foreign Service Officer with focus on human rights (1983-89).
Shaul Kelner
Associate Professor of Sociology and Jewish Studies, Vanderbilt University; Author, numerous papers and chapters about Soviet Jewry movement, Teaches annual seminar “The Cold War Struggle to Free Soviet Jews.”
Glenn Richter
National Director, Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry (SSSJ), 1964-1991.
Adele Sandberg
South Florida Council for Soviet Jewry leadership; Jewish communal leader.
Joel Sandberg
Former Vice President, Union of Councils for Soviet Jews; South Florida Council for Soviet Jewry; Jewish communal leader.
Natan Sharansky
Refusenik; Prisoner of Zion; Deputy Prime Minister of Israel, 2001-2003; Chairman of the Executive Board of the Jewish Agency, 2009-2018; Author.
Barry Shrage
President of Combined Jewish Philanthropies (CJP) of Greater Boston, 1987-2018; Professor, Hornstein Jewish Professional Leadership Program, Brandeis University, 2018-present.
Sylva Zalmanson
Refusenik, Participant in the 1970 “Leningrad Hijacking”; Human rights activist; Artist.
Anat Zalmanson-Kuznetzov
Filmmaker. Director of “Operation Wedding,” 2016, documentary of the 1970 "Leningrad Hijacking;” Winner of 21 awards at film festivals around the world. Creator, "Let My People Go” educational program.
Consultants
Lisa Frankel, Project Manager
More than 25 years in the archives and education field with a focus on development of websites designed to preserve and give access to archival collections, including full catalog development and digitization. Lisa has an M.A. in Education from Hebrew Union College.
Joe Weber, Project Archivist
Has served in various archival positions including work collection accession, processing and digitization as well as catalog development and catalog entry. Joe has Master’s of Library and Information Science from Wayne State University.