Board and Staff

ISRAEL BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Anat Hoffman (chairwoman)

Anat Hoffman (chairwoman) is the executive director of the Israel Religious Action Center, the legal and advocacy arm of the Reform Movement in Israel. Previously, she held a seat on the Jerusalem City Council, where for fourteen years she stood in opposition to the policies of the city’s right-wing and ultra-Orthodox administration. She has dedicated her adult life to the Jewish principle of tikkun olam, which literally means repairing the world.

Batya Kallus (vice chair)

Batya Kallus (vice chair) has been involved with WOW since she moved to Israel in 1991. She is the Israel Advisor to the Fohs Foundation, a private American foundation that funds organizations which advance shared society and equality between Arab and Jewish citizens in Israel, and Program Officer for the Moriah Fund. Kallus has a B.A. from the University of Massachusetts-Boston in community planning, and a Master’s in Human Service Management from the Heller School at Brandeis University.

Aliza Berger

Aliza Berger holds a PhD in educational statistics from Columbia University and an MS in Bible from Yeshiva University. She works as an academic editor and statistics consultant. She also authored the chapter “Wrapped Attention: May Women Wear Tefillin?” in the 1998 book Jewish Legal Writings by Women.

Rachel Cohen-Yeshurun

Peggy Cidor (Journalist)

Peggy Cidor is a journalist in Jerusalem.

Cheryl Birkner Mack

Cheryl Birkner Mack is a teacher of Judaics and English as a Foreign Language. She received her Bachelor’s degree from Washington University in St. Louis and a Masters in Jewish Education from Jewish Theological Seminary. Cheryl is also a little league baseball coach.

Bonnie Riva Ras

Bonnie Riva Ras is the assistant director of communications for the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism where she is the editor of the Leadership News newsletter and she writes for and is the advertising director of CJ: Voices of Conservative/Masorti Judaism magazine. In the US, she was an educator in synagogue schools for 26 years and she previously worked as a journalist and editor of a Jewish newspaper.

Tammy Gottleib

Tammy Gottleib is 29 and lives in Jerusalem, originally from Rehovot. She was raised and educated in a Conservative home, long time member and current board member in Asath Shalom Emanual in Rehovot. Gottleib works in the management of Noam, Masorti Youth  in Israel, as regional coordinator and assistant director.

STAFF

Lesley Sachs (director) was one of the founding members of “Isha L’isha – Haifa’s Feminist Center” and worked for 10 years in the Israel Women’s Network. Lesley served as Executive Director of the Israel Religious Action Center (IRAC) and then as Vice President of the World Union For Progressive Judaism. She is currently working as an Interim Director of “Project Kesher-Israel” and as the director of “Women of the Wall.”

Shira Pruce (director of public relations) has worked to advance social change in Israel at MASLAN- the Negev’s Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence Support Center, the Jerusalem Open House for Pride and Tolerance, MEET and the World Union for Progressive Judaism. She received her BA in Women and Gender Studies at Rutgers University in New Jersey before making aliyah in 2004.