B’Lev Echad: one people, one heart

Historic event will commemorate yartzeit of Mercaz HaRav victims

By Yaffi Spodek

Issue of Dec. 12, 2008 / 15 Kislev 5769

Rosh Chodesh Adar, Feb. 24, 2009, will mark the first yartzeit of the eight young men who were murdered in the Mercaz HaRav massacre last year.

To commemorate this tragedy, a new project, B’Lev Echad, hopes to unite the global Jewish community through a program of learning Torah and doing mitzvot in memory of those who died and devoted their lives to these causes. The project will culminate with a siyum and the dedication of eight Sifrei Torah at Yeshivat Mercaz HaRav in Jerusalem, Israel on Rosh Chodesh, with a program to be broadcast live to all corners of the world.

“The purpose of this is to create an unprecedented celebration of unity to commemorate these students and the Torah to which they were so committed,” explained Jeremy Joszef of Woodmere, one of the project’s organizers. “It is our hope that people will put politics aside and unite in an event that will be a true kiddush Hashem.”

By design, the B’Lev Echad project is not being funded by any specific organization, in the hopes that it will attract Jews from all across the religious spectrum.

“We could have easily gotten any organization to back us, but we specifically did not want to attach ourselves to any organization and bring in any politics,” Joszef emphasized. “We didn’t want to turn off any types of people from any community.”

With that goal in mind, the project has been funded by an anonymous family from the New York area, which also is donating the eight sifrei Torah to the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva.

All the initial work is being performed by a seven-person committee comprised of Joszef and several other young lay leaders from the Five Towns and elsewhere, who are now working to recruit additional volunteers. Joszef has been in contact with administrators at Mercaz HaRav, as well as at Yashlatz, the high school where five out of the eight boys were students.

Since the public launch last Friday, B’Lev Echad has recruited over 30 additional volunteers to help schools and shuls register for the learning program, a worldwide effort to complete the Talmud and Torah eight times over. Participants can also take part in the 8-for-8 mitzvah project, in which they will focus on performing a specific mitzvah in memory of one boy, on each of the eight days leading up to the yahrtzeit.

J.Z. Spier, a student at the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary of Yeshiva University, has already contacted several schools as part of his role on the B’Lev Echad committee. He hopes to reach every Jewish institution, including yeshivas, colleges, shuls, Hillels and community centers and work with them to coordinate details for the project’s siyum.

“We are thrilled to see the amount of people all over the world who signed up already to volunteer and look forward to seeing the list grow,” said Joszef. “We have already had over 20 schools sign up, with 2,000 students participating.”

Regional participants so far include HANC, SAR, TABC, YCQ and the Yeshivah of Flatbush. Schools have also registered from across the country in Ohio, Oregon and California.

Participants will receive specific instructions regarding what to learn, with content geared toward both young people and adults. Schools will receive resource material, including signage, preparatory learning packets, an introductory DVD and details about the 8-for-8 mitzvah campaign including suggested projects.

To sign up your school or community, to volunteer, and for more information, go to the project’s web site at http://blevechad.com/live/ or e-mail contact@blevechad.com.