One month after Israel’s remaining living hostages returned home from Gaza and a cease-fire took tenuous hold, the Z3 Project will present its annual conference on Nov. 9 at the Oshman Family JCC in Palo Alto, where the state of Jewish peoplehood in Israel and around the world will be explored in panels, plenaries, lectures and and workshops.
Since 2015, the Z3 Conference has invited local, national and global figures from politics, academia, nonprofits and the arts to address current events. Highlights this year include a keynote from Rachel Goldberg-Polin and Jon Polin, parents of former hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin (z”l), and an expanded teen summit.
Coming at a time of challenge and soul-searching for the global Jewish community, sessions are organized around the theme “Why We Persist, How We Thrive” and will ask how Jews can rebuild trust, connection and shared purpose.
“That sense of our oneness is fading,” said Z3 founding director Rabbi Amitai Fraiman. “The Z3 Conference has always been a space to wrestle with hard questions while celebrating what binds us. This year, perhaps more than ever, we need both — the courage to confront fractures with honesty and the creativity to imagine new frameworks of resilience and belonging.”
Each year, the conference aims to respond to the current moment. Given the fluidity of world events, organizers say planning this iteration was particularly challenging.
“We didn’t know what the situation in Israel would be with the war and the hostages,” Fraiman told J. “We don’t know how long the cease-fire will last. But we’re thinking about how we look internally and figure out how to work toward a renewal of sorts.”
Throughout the day, participants will take part in two rounds of breakout sessions featuring scholars, journalists, diplomats and community leaders tackling some of the most pressing questions facing world Jewry. From antisemitism and American Jewish identity to the social contract within Israeli society and the future of peace in the Middle East, Fraiman said, Z3 will “create a sense of community and belonging, while encouraging intellectual rigor and deep conversations.”
Among the sessions on offer are:
- A panel on the Abraham Accords featuring former White House envoy Jason Greenblatt, Egyptian American scholar Hussein Aboubakr Mansour and Moroccan Jewish activist Chama Mechtaly.
- A live, interactive strategy simulation that invites participants to imagine four possible Jewish futures in the year 2050 — testing decisions that could shape the Jewish world for generations.
- Historians and policy experts Ethan Katz, Scott Lasensky and Izabella Tabarovsky on the mainstreaming of antisemitism and the collective strategies required to counter it.
- Venture capitalist Shaun Maguire and Jewish Federation Bay Area CEO Joy Sisisky on how innovation and philanthropy sustain Jewish resilience.
- Educators David Bryfman, Rabbi Daniel Lehmann and Sivan Zakai on the renewal of Jewish and Zionist literacy.
J. is once again a media partner for Z3. Editor-in-chief Chanan Tigay will moderate a panel on “Why Israeli Society Feels Fractured and How a New Covenant Can Be Forged.” Tigay will be in conversation with Rachel Azaria, former Jerusalem deputy mayor, Rabbi Menachem Bombach, a leader in haredi education and integration, and others to examine how Israelis might rebuild civic trust amid political and social strain.
“Why War Puts Our Humanity to the Test and How Compassion Endures,” moderated by J. culture editor Maya Mirsky, will bring together humanitarian leaders including Alice Miller, CEO of NATAN Worldwide Disaster Relief, and Dr. David Hasan, a neurosurgeon who has led medical missions in Gaza and is building centers for Gazan orphans, to explore how compassion and moral clarity can persist amid conflict.
J. staff writer Emma Goss will moderate “Why the U.S.–Israel Alliance Holds and How It’s Being Redefined,” a session with Ambassador Dan Shapiro, the former U.S. envoy to Israel, and Nadav Eyal, an award-winning Israeli journalist, to explore how the historic partnership between the two nations continues to evolve.
Z3 Conference 2025: “Why We Persist, How We Thrive”
8 a.m.-7:30 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 9, at the Oshman Family JCC, 3921 Fabian Way, Palo Alto. Advance tickets required. Seiler Family Gymnasium tickets are sold out; $99 tickets are available for livestream viewing of the plenary from Schultz Cultural Arts Hall, and then a full day of the workshops in person. z3project.org
The opening and closing plenaries, breakout sessions and more will be on the Z3 Project’s YouTube channel after the conference.