Latest / In the Valley of Giants / Architect of the New World's Foundation | Rabbi Steven Burg | ITVOG Ep. 32

Transcript

Architect of the New World's Foundation | Rabbi Steven Burg | ITVOG Ep. 32 · In the Valley of Giants

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  Our next stage is utilizing AI and we create some of our ACE
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  university where you can take our curriculum and using AI, it
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  will tailor it to your background to and you can
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  interact and the reason we do that look I'm.
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  Starting to interrupt. Is that active?
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  Yeah. And Aster Berkowitz, what's the
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  story? And he pushes us to be way out
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  there, really on TikTok. And it's, yeah, when you run an
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  organization, an institution, you have to focus.
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  Yeah. If you don't focus, then it
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  throws people a little bit. And, and part of the focus, and
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  this is any company in the world, you have to have a target
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  audience. And for us, our target audience
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  is always going to be our brothers and sisters who are
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  totally unaffiliated. When I got to Asia was really,
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  we were like, bankrupt. It was really, really.
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  Yeah. It was 11 years ago.
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  And no, I had passed away. And why was Asia bankrupt?
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  Hello everyone. Today we're joined by the CEO of
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  Asha Torah, Rabbi Steven Berg. Rabbi Berg is the king of
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  outreach today. He's the head of age.
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  So I discussed with him three really important topics #1 does
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  outreach today look like it did 50 years ago?
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  What's changed and how can we be effective?
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  2 with the advances of artificial intelligence, how can
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  AI change the landscape in doing that sort of education?
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  And lastly, I discussed with him social warfare post October 7th.
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  It's true that Israel won the military war against evil and
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  Hamas here, but the social war we have lost.
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  Propaganda that's anti Israel and full of lies is everywhere.
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  How do we combat that and how bad the damage is?
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  That's what we discussed. Hope you enjoy.
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  Ray Berg, thank you so much for being with us here today.
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  Thanks for joining the show. My pleasure, thank you for
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  having me. Yeah, so I have a whole bunch of
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  questions to ask you, but I want to start off with good and evil.
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  So there's a debate aim, as we say in Hebrew mahalkas, between
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  educators and people that do outreach on how it should be
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  done. So us as rabbinical figures are
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  competing with sexuality, media, drugs, anything, basically
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  everything that's interesting about a modern day Western life.
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  And then we're trying to teach them age-old wisdom.
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  Much at first blush feels like it's a a losing battle, but yet
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  we're successful, we hope, in giving over that ancient wisdom
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  to the next generation. So as the CEO of I would say,
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  and I think this is even inappropriate to say because you
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  do so much more, but the CEO of the center of outreach, you do
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  far more than that. It's just much more than just
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  outreach, but OK in the world. What do you think that that
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  interplay is like between Western ideologies and what's
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  attractive versus, you know, old age wisdom?
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  Should we just be leaning and, you know, we give you the
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  Talmud, we give you the Torah and that's that?
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  Or are you more pro? Let's make a Jewish TV show.
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  Let's make Jewish music. You know that that seemed to
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  incorporate some Western ideas. So as an excellent question,
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  especially today, technology, the way things have evolved, you
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  know, I always tell people I said the Torah never changes,
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  but the delivery mechanisms do. How you get to people changes.
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  And you know, if Noah Weinberg, in his infinite wisdom, when the
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  Internet started, you know, over 25 years ago, he immediately saw
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  a vehicle to really to reach every Jew.
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  And about five years ago, Asian, we had one of the most
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  significant websites out there, h.com.
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  We had taken a look at social media and we decided that that
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  that is where all the Jews are, every single Jew that we want to
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  touch that is not connected to ours on social media.
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  And so we started and today we wound up with over 4 million
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  followers. We do a million video views a
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  day, Torah content and our next stage is utilizing AI and we
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  create some of our ace university where you can take
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  our curriculum and using AI. It will tailor it to your
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  background to and you can interact and the reason we do
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  that look, I'm. Starting to interrupt you is
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  that active? That sounds.
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  I have the app on my phone and and this summer it's going to
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  start going out by September it's going to go out white
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  widespread. Yeah, that's a great.
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  Idea We've been a lot of attention and work into AI.
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  We actually have an AI rabbi on the website that people can
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  interact with, but you're going to have all the ability with our
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  classes to interact through AI on an app.
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  And I look, the bottom line is, is that we call this base
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  measures without walls because the ideal is for a Jew to come
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  to the base measures and to sit down and learn or for a woman to
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  go to a seminary and sit down and study and to learn.
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  But the bottom line is the overwhelming majority of Jews
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  are never going to do that. So we have a choice.
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  You know, we could just stay with a very small fraction of
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  Jewish people, or we could try to reach out to them.
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  And and you know, those that have a taste of Torah, it starts
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  them on on their own journey. And I often say that the goal of
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  Asia is not necessarily to get someone to keep shopping for
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  kosher. Our goal is to get them to study
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  Torah. We believe study Torah is going
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  to put them on a path to all the other great things, right?
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  But that's primarily are, you know, that intellectual
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  engagement is, is our focus. You know, we started a program
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  more recently called Mominary. It's seminary for moms.
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  We found so many mothers of students had never been there or
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  people with no background. And so we come from Sunday till
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  Thursday, no trips down South or north.
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  No, you know, just sit in classes for a week.
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  It's transformative. It's transformative.
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  Torah transforms a person's soul in a way nothing else can.
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  And so once you understand that, the question is just how do you
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  get it in front of people? So in age, you know, I don't
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  know if that makes us more liberal, but we, we engage very
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  much with technology because we believe that you have to be in
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  the cottage to hope. You have to take the technology
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  that unfortunately, you know, terrible things can be brought
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  through technology, but also really great things.
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  And so we we concentrate on the great things.
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  Yeah, but what's do you think it's appropriate to say make?
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  I believe it's called Angel Studios.
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  One of our guests mentioned that he's a Christian.
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  I think they make like Christian focused movies and Christian
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  focus. Like they're they're trying to
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  be an Amazon Prime. That's what they're trying to be
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  of movies. Is it appropriate for us to be
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  making that sort of thing? Should we be leaning into
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  Western candy in order to be bringing people into the base
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  matter? Should there be a Jewish rapper?
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  Should there be Jewish heavy metal are to us?
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  You know, so all these things, do you, do you see them as as
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  part of bringing people in or is it more like I'm on social
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  media, we'll post Torah and then hopefully people will come?
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  The bottom line is I always say this, you know, people reading
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  show a magazine, same reason they read People magazine.
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  Meaning like people like people and people connect their people.
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  And a lot of times you have personalities that are more
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  colorful. And if you have a colorful
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  personality that's also connected to Judaism, it makes
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  it all the more interesting. People do a double take.
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  You know, I can tell you the postings when we get famous
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  people on our roof, you know, we're traveling to Israel and
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  our roof, I always call it World Center.
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  I call it the United Nations, the Jewish people.
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  So we get everyone coming through our building.
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  And when you get interesting people like that, you know, it's
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  I had I tell the story. I had Conan O'Brien up there one
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  time. It's very interesting media
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  personality, very funny guy. And I had the chance to tell him
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  that that there's a piece of wisdom that he gave that I use
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  all the time. It was in his commencement,
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  commencement address in Dartmouth.
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  And you know, if you watch it, if you watch on YouTube, 3/4 is
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  hysterical, you know, because he's a funny guy in the last
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  quarter, he gets very serious and he talks about he had had a
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  show and then he got cancelled and it was very public
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  embarrassment. And he say, he makes a statement
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  there where he says they say whatever doesn't kill you makes
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  you stronger with a neglect to tell you.
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  He still almost kills you. And, and I told him, I said, you
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  know, like I gave me some great empathy for people because even
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  though people are going through difficult things, you know, and
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  he was like, oh, kind of a little take it aback that there
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  was a rabbi in Jerusalem using his his quote.
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  But I think, look, there's, there's no business book in the
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  world that if I were to read that I wouldn't pick out pearls
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  from Pecoria boat in there, but that, you know, people are not
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  always in Pecoria boat. So if they will confine the
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  wisdom in some way, shape or form, I think that's great.
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  We just have to show them that Judaism also has that wisdom.
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  And, and if that's through certain people, I wouldn't know
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  necessarily tell someone, OK, go become a rapper so you can come
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  back and do this. But there are people that have
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  had journeys in their life that they can now come in and and
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  share. And I think that that's probably
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  a good thing. Yeah, but is that something that
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  you want? I understand that it's good in
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  the outcome. Would you?
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  Would you endorse making a ace rapper?
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  Yeah, look it, I think it's irrelevant what I want.
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  It's really about what God wants, right?
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  Meaning our job in this world to figure out what God wants and
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  try making that happen, right? Because ultimately we're
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  servants of God. So I think that perspective is
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  the most important perspective in the world, right?
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  And and constantly asking. And in that way, I think Asia is
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  very blessed that we have a rush Shiva like Rivisik Berkowitz,
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  right? Absolutely.
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  That literally, you know, it doesn't matter.
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  You know what it is. If there's a question, you know,
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  yeah, we we'll get a TikTok video that some people will push
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  back on. And I'll say go bring it to a
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  Berkowitz. And someone's going to walk in
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  with the phone, you know, and answer Berkowitz.
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  What's his story? And he pushes us to be way out
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  there really on TikTok and his yeah, it totally came from him.
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  You know, he wanted, when we we said it was called Age Vision
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  2030 for us to go get 3,000,000 Jews connected to Torah through
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  online. And he wanted six.
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  We bargained him to three. That's 20% world Jews
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  population. But he believed, he believes
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  very heavily in it. And so for me, the barometer of
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  something comes up and people have a question like let's go
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  speak to Berkowitz. You know, we, I think in essence
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  that's the power of age, the fact that we have a yeshiva at
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  the center of our organization and movement, whereas a lot of
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  organizations may not have it, not good or bad, they just don't
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  have it right. And the fact that we do have it
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  and we discussed it, you know, the yeshiva we had, we had, you
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  know, last year over 1000 guys through our dorms, 65,000 people
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  came by to learn classes. The seminaries also are close to
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  numbers, but that's still not millions.
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  So is there a value in the Shiva?
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  And we decided that the Shiva is the heart and soul of the
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  institution and there is value, right?
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  And then everything has to flow from that.
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  So that that's kind of other people may do it differently.
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  That's how we look at it. OK, the so so of Burkwitz, does
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  he ever push in a particular direction or or?
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  Yes, he does. If you go to his office and he
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  has with Noel's office on top of the Shiva on the top floor
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  looking at the Kotel obviously. Quite a holy office.
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  It's unbelievable. And behind his desk there's a
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  map of the entire world, and on it are all the Jewish
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  populations around the world. The message is, I want you to go
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  get every June, Connecticut or that's his message.
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  And it's quite amazing because I would say for cure in the world,
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  90955 percent. Shiloh's are flowing in his
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  direction everywhere I travel, people have some help from him
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  and Jerusalem Koala and, and, and they're, you know, they,
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  they relate to him. And it's really amazing because
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  he has not left Israel since he made out over 50 years ago.
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  Really. Yeah.
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  He came here from from New York, from America.
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  Yeah, sure has not left since. Doesn't own a passport that
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  doesn't leave Israel. But he's on Zoom constantly with
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  his students around the world. He knows exactly what's going on
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  around the world. And he he tells his students,
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  you got to go find the Jews and bring them back.
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  That's, that's your marching order.
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  So he's very adamant about that and he wants us using every tool
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  at our disposal to to do that. Do you think he's a do you think
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  he's aware of of what's out there?
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  Yes. And what can be utilized so he
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  understands it. The level of questions that come
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  to him, I mean you. Have an example in general.
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  You have a godola, you know, people have family issues and,
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  and, and the average Orthodox family today has, you know,
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  children who are not Orthodox who get caught up in all kinds
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  of pieces and things. And all those questions come to
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  him. He's very aware and this I can
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  tell you, very aware of the issues out there and very
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  connected to them. And and that's, you know, his
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  other hat, so to speak, is, is just within the Orthodox
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  community. But yet he feels that that we,
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  you know, we have a job to do. Really, the philosophy is, and
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  this is what drives Asian. One of the reasons I, I'm so
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  passionate about being there. I've been there now 11 years, is
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  that he says, very much like with Noah, that the greatest
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  Phil Hashem, the greatest desecration of God's name is
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  that the majority of Jews have no relationship to God.
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  The way to change that is to get them to study Torah.
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  So our job is to get connect Jews at Torah so they can
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  connect to God, right? Full stop.
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  And you know, that stands for every single Jew in the world.
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  There's no such thing as it's not like color war.
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  You know, my team, for your team and Judaism, it's every single
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  Jew. We have to go and get every
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  single Jew and connect them back to God.
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  That's that's our marching waters from him.
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  How do you fight dishonest elements within your
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  institution? Meaning I think a she's a great
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  institution, but if I were someone from the opposite faith,
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  like if I was in Jews for Jesus, I would find you as like you.
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  As you said, the Shiva is the heart.
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  I would say the heart of outreach is age.
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  You guys just do so much. So if I wanted to really steal a
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  lot from Jewish Thunder, I'd go to you.
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  Does that ever happen? Are you sensitive to that sort
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  of thing? Do you ever see it or am I just?
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  You mean someone who kind of masquerades as someone?
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  Else, I mean this one. I mean, I mean, does that
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  happen? That does happen everywhere,
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  yeah. We, we, and I mean, I've heard
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  stories about that. Look, the truth is, I think that
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  if you look like the literature you read, the stuff that Ravari
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  Kaplan wrote and, you know, the real Messiah, and a lot of those
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  books, a lot of it was written in the 70s.
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  Let me tell you the real issue, OK, Why?
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  Why? I don't think this is as much of
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  an issue as it used to be the 70s and 80s, right?
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  You had truth seekers, people are backpacking around the
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  world. They were going to cults and
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  nostrums and introduce AJ and all these different things.
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  They were, they were seeking, they were seeking, right?
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  You don't really have that as much today, right?
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  You don't have the guys at the Kotel trying to figure out which
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  end is up, etcetera. And you know, I, I explained to
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  people that you know, Monty Berger, who is one of the, the
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  jewels of age, who's been teaching discovery forever,
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  which is our seminar which connects people to God.
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  He said years ago, I would give the seminar and people would
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  fight me if there was a God. They fight because if there was
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  a God, the eradication is to their life, right?
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  Today, guys, like on his phone, you know for sure there's a God,
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  you know, like what? You know, the seminar that used
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  to take three days, We're lucky if we can get it in, you know,
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  2-3 hours, you know, and and more ideally, can you send it to
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  me on TikTok or Instagram, right.
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  So the world changed. So you don't really, I don't
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  find that that our threat is as much people converting to
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  Christianity as I think it was in 70s, eighties and on those
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  pieces, our threat today is just total indifference.
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  You're right now indifference is one piece.
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  And I think the step further, which is really, I think
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  translating negative is when Jewish kids go up against Israel
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  and Jewish kids take take the other side of the street.
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  And, and I think that that's a little bit our fault.
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  We don't explain our narrative. We don't explain who they are.
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  A Jew in their DNA always wants to, you know, make a difference.
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  And so they're getting sold a terrible story about the Jewish
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  people and about Israel. And unfortunately, and that we
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  do get students all the time who are coming in more liberal, who
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  were, you know, hanging out and protesting against Israel, who
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  at some point, you know, they say in Hebrew the the phrases
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  Nafala a Simone. It clicks.
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  Wait a minute now I'm not getting the full story.
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  And that we do get a lot more. And then religion.
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  Does it do anything from the ground up, meaning you get guys
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  like that, you get girls like that?
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  Do they try spreading that rhetoric?
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  No, they can't. They can't really in age because
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  the second you walk in you're just bombarded by goodness and
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  sweetness and and all that, all those things.
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  It doesn't. That part doesn't really work.
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  But the, the, the good thing is, if you have an activist, let's
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  say you have someone who's fighting against Israel and
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  they're an activist against Israel, they're an activist in
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  their nature. If you could change them, you
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  know, and show them the goodness, they'll be an active
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  activist for God and for Torah. So so Robert was talked about
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  all the time. You know, it's we got to go
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  shopping sometimes in extreme to get some of the the players that
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  can come over and really do some good work for God, right that
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  you do see. OK.
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  Well, maybe playing back into something that you said before,
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  how 70s and 80s were quite a long time ago and things are
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  very different now. You've been involved in that
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  reach for a long time. How things changed and when did
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  they change? Well, the advent of for sure of
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  social media, in the Internet. I started my career now 35 years
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  ago. Who'd you start with?
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  NCSYI spent my first 22 years in NCSY, 22 years.
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  That's really where I grew up. I grew up in NCSY.
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  I grew up in teen outreach. I was, I was the assistant
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  regional director of Central E, kind of Cleveland, Columbus,
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  Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Dayton, like in the Midwest.
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  Then I was a regional director West Coast, San Diego to
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  Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, and then I became the head of
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  NCSY for eight years. So that like that was my career,
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  right, where I grew up. Everything I did in those, those
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  like my 25 years before I got to age, it got me ready for age
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  because age is just kind of that next level.
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  And since why I was really, you know, 13 to 17 and age is, is
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  much more expansive. So, you know, yeah, I would say
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  back then it was pre social media, pre cell phone, you know,
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  it's pre all this stuff. And so you would have like a
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  base measure session, people would come, they'd be focused.
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  You know, you can talk to people.
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  And I think, you know, we've watched the attention span just
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  dip down. So it's, I think it's a little
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  harder to capture people's attention.
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  There's so much going on. And you know, just doing this
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  if, if you, if you got like 1.2 seconds, you know, you get
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  someone's attention as they're flipping.
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  You know, in age, we, we stayed there.
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  There are two beginner levels. One is we give you content
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  without your permission. You're flipping and you stumble
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  onto US and then you follow us and then we'll give you content
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  with permission. Those are two things.
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  So I would say that, yeah, for sure the attention spans in
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  general have gone down. And that's hard because Tor
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  really takes concentration. It takes focus to sit through a
• 17:46
  sheer. You know, what's interesting to
• 17:48
  me, I'm seeing now is podcast had broken that spell, whereas
• 17:52
  someone can't sit for more than 20 seconds on Instagram, but
• 17:54
  they can listen to like a 52 minute podcast, right?
• 17:57
  So there are, it's very interesting to see where some
• 17:59
  methodologies have crept back in and you have to, you have to
• 18:02
  just constantly just be at the forefront to understand where
• 18:06
  you know you can, you can get in front of people.
• 18:09
  I mean, personally, what I felt is that for some reason, pre and
• 18:15
  post COVID are two totally different universes, which is
• 18:18
  strange because tech didn't change all that much until AI
• 18:22
  kind of came right up, you know, right after that.
• 18:26
  And I think that's a really significant shift.
• 18:28
  So how do you get someone in 1.2 seconds?
• 18:31
  Like what? Yeah.
• 18:32
  Like, what are you putting out? What's your TikTok strategy?
• 18:35
  Yeah, so, so COVID, absolutely. Again, I don't think it changed
• 18:38
  the world per SE, but it's speed up like crazy.
• 18:40
  Everything was heading in a direction and COVID just sent
• 18:43
  it, you know, I like you know, in Manhattan, I talk to people
• 18:45
  in Manhattan all the time. No one has a five day work week
• 18:48
  anymore. Literally 3, only three days.
• 18:49
  Yeah, in general, most companies, you know, what are
• 18:52
  they doing the other. Two days of the week.
• 18:54
  Remote, just working remote, you know, and there were people
• 18:56
  working remote before, but now it's like it's such a common
• 18:59
  thing. And so people are in their
• 19:00
  homes, they're just, it's just different.
• 19:01
  You know, you in the old days, you might have a lunch and
• 19:03
  learn. Now there's no one in the
• 19:05
  company to have lunch with and learn with and interesting.
• 19:08
  So I think COVID definitely speed it up.
• 19:10
  You know, we, we again, four or five years ago, we made a
• 19:12
  decision to go to social media in a big way because it was very
• 19:15
  different. H.com was, it was incredible
• 19:16
  website, but we realized that the younger generation wasn't
• 19:19
  going to websites. Articles were important, but we
• 19:22
  needed to kind of be in front of people.
• 19:23
  It was interesting when we went into it, we made certain
• 19:27
  assumptions and I remember we met with Bob Diener, who's a
• 19:31
  incredible donor partner of age who started hotels.com, started
• 19:35
  getaroom.com, Very, very interesting guy in Florida.
• 19:38
  And he said to me, one of those important things he said
• 19:40
  wherever you start is not going to be where you wind up.
• 19:42
  Just understand that that's the way it works and he was right
• 19:45
  when we started social media, we thought we're going to be bread
• 19:47
  crumbs back to h.com and that's where the real learning is going
• 19:50
  to happen. So we found out that number one
• 19:53
  is people don't like to leave their social media areas
• 19:56
  wherever they are. If you're just TikTok answer,
• 19:58
  whoever it is, you don't want to go anywhere else.
• 20:00
  Number 2 is the companies don't want you to go anywhere else.
• 20:02
  So they're going to disincentivize that happening.
• 20:04
  And the third piece, perhaps more most importantly, we didn't
• 20:07
  think we could give torrent social media and that was wrong.
• 20:09
  We could give Torah, right. So in believe it or not, you
• 20:12
  know, in 90 seconds, that's. It's a pretty sizable amount of
• 20:15
  time to be able to give over some kind of concept.
• 20:17
  Now you want them to continue the journey.
• 20:20
  But if you can hook someone, it's enough time for them to
• 20:22
  start thinking. How do you hook someone on
• 20:23
  TikTok though? Well, you just, you know, you
• 20:25
  have to kind of right off the bat, something pops up there
• 20:28
  that's that's going to capture their attention, you know?
• 20:30
  Just like terror isn't that, isn't that bite sized?
• 20:34
  Is that? I've never used tech talk ever,
• 20:36
  but isn't it just like a few seconds?
• 20:38
  Well, it's a few, it's what you decide, right?
• 20:41
  Meaning like everyone's going like this is a few seconds, but
• 20:43
  if you watch something 60 seconds, 90 seconds is 120
• 20:46
  seconds, you know, it depends, you know, and, and it'll measure
• 20:49
  how long you're on there. Like for example, one of the
• 20:50
  good things about the work we do is it's, it's very measurable.
• 20:54
  Like on YouTube, we do a lot on YouTube, obviously, because
• 20:56
  that's where the more, you know, substantive longer form content
• 21:00
  is, we know literally exactly how much time people spend on
• 21:03
  each YouTube. You, you, it's, it's totally,
• 21:06
  you know, people spend, you know, 9 minutes that that's a
• 21:09
  world, you know, you know, 12 minutes, etcetera.
• 21:11
  So we can, we can measure everything.
• 21:13
  So you, you can give over concepts like that.
• 21:16
  What we're doing now in Asia University and as you mentioned,
• 21:19
  because the admin of AIAI is a game changer for the world.
• 21:22
  I don't even know if, if, if the world totally understands what's
• 21:25
  going on, right. So, so we have, I have an app
• 21:28
  now on my phone. We're beta testing it.
• 21:30
  We're literally, you know, there's like a kick off video,
• 21:32
  right? And then you're in dialogue with
• 21:35
  the AI, right? So for example, when you when
• 21:39
  you sign in, you give your background.
• 21:41
  So I have no background. AI is going to ask questions in
• 21:43
  a certain way. I have, you know, I have a day
• 21:45
  school background. It'll ask it in another way,
• 21:48
  right? So we ask some guided questions
• 21:49
  so the AI can know who you are and then it'll ask you
• 21:52
  questions. And that's people.
• 21:54
  That's why people are operating today.
• 21:56
  They're talking their AI all day long, you know, asking advice,
• 21:59
  asking it guided, right. So it's a conversation.
• 22:02
  You just keep typing in there and it'll take you down to tow a
• 22:05
  rabbit hole and get you over concepts.
• 22:07
  And and you know, we're in the midst we should have by the end
• 22:10
  of the summer, I think 6070 classes loaded up our curriculum
• 22:13
  and and we're just our goal is to get, you know, hundreds and
• 22:16
  then to thousands of classes to you can go on your own journey
• 22:19
  because that's where you're living on your phone.
• 22:21
  You know, now is the ideal of how Cabrusa absolutely, which is
• 22:25
  why on that app you can click on partners in Torah, which we
• 22:28
  which we absorbed partners in Torah in Asia are the same
• 22:30
  organization now, thank God. And so on your app, you know,
• 22:35
  you can click on there and get a human to continue the journey
• 22:38
  with, or you could stick with your AI class because I'm home,
• 22:42
  I'm on my phone, I'm in between this, right?
• 22:44
  We're going to allow you, but it's about total growth.
• 22:47
  When you say AI class is, you mean the the class is completely
• 22:51
  made-up of material that AI is made or?
• 22:53
  No, no, no. It's all our curriculum.
• 22:54
  OK. So basically what the AI is
• 22:56
  going to do, it's in creating that sort of different
• 22:58
  engagement and then you put someone there.
• 23:00
  Noah's 48 ways 5 bucks a pleasure of Noah has classic
• 23:03
  that all that stuff's in there, your history, all these
• 23:06
  different pieces. It's our curriculum that is now
• 23:09
  placed in there and the teacher, so to speak, that you're
• 23:13
  engaging with. Is the AI utilizing Asia towards
• 23:15
  curriculum? Do you mean for AI to be
• 23:18
  answering serious questions? Well, that's on the website.
• 23:21
  We have an AI rabbi. Is that already active?
• 23:24
  At the end, yeah you can go on right now and you can you can
• 23:26
  engage with it, but we've tested a lot you know, like you know
• 23:29
  what broccoli make on cheeseburger you know we we
• 23:31
  tried to break it every which way it's self-contained It's
• 23:33
  it's our material has all of NOx pieces in there.
• 23:36
  But what's interesting is, you know, we, we have literally, we
• 23:39
  have hundreds of thousands of conversations that we now know
• 23:42
  what topics people are interested in, right?
• 23:44
  Because people are asking certain questions a certain way.
• 23:46
  And I would say like about a third of those are very serious
• 23:49
  conversations, 1/3 are back. And then a third people, you
• 23:51
  know, whatever, playing around. We we kind of know what's
• 23:54
  floating out there, you know, in terms of whether there's
• 23:56
  spirituality, whether you know what the topics are.
• 23:59
  And it gives someone a very that because the bottom line, that's
• 24:02
  how people are using AI today. Chat JBT.
• 24:04
  I'm just more concerned of of lies I don't know about.
• 24:08
  So we only use self-contained. We that's we're we're very
• 24:10
  careful about. We don't just open it up here
• 24:13
  and say AI come up with a class and give it to them.
• 24:15
  This is our curriculum. You're in a closed thing.
• 24:17
  It's going to stay within, within the.
• 24:19
  Book if I ask the AI like do Jews have did you just believe
• 24:22
  in free will and then it will start to you know will it give
• 24:26
  source it look my experience with AI is I can barely trust it
• 24:30
  like I I feel yes. That's why, that's why.
• 24:33
  That's why we have a self-contained AI.
• 24:35
  So what does that mean? I don't know.
• 24:36
  It's gonna tell you. It's it's our information.
• 24:38
  Maybe it's gonna tell you. I.
• 24:40
  Mean it's really gonna work off. Of a wreck, correct our
• 24:42
  curriculum how? Do you do that while you train?
• 24:43
  How do you train that AI? I'm not technical.
• 24:46
  I'm happy to bring all my technical people here, OK, but
• 24:48
  but this is, by the way, the challenge of AI.
• 24:50
  Everyone's aware of the fact that AI is like a liar, like
• 24:54
  that'll just come up with stuff. And, you know, and there's a lot
• 24:56
  of challenges there. You know, my, I have a son, my
• 24:59
  son works in healthcare. And the challenge, you know, how
• 25:02
  do you, you know, work with healthcare?
• 25:04
  There are certain things, confidentiality laws, It's a lot
• 25:06
  of work within AI, how to have self-contained AI, You know, law
• 25:10
  firms are using it. How do you keep the information
• 25:12
  confidential and not out there? There's a lot of work going on
• 25:15
  to be able to use AI, not let it just go out there.
• 25:18
  And by the way, what's scary about AI is every single day is
• 25:21
  getting better. Yeah, that's what's scary about
• 25:23
  it. But but you can, you can design
• 25:26
  AI to just be kind of within my organization controlled here
• 25:31
  because, because companies are using it for proprietary
• 25:33
  information. And so therefore, you know, like
• 25:35
  I was talking to someone, they were talking about an aerospace
• 25:38
  thing where, you know, they've got a team of 30 AIS managed by
• 25:40
  a human. They're one, they're one rule is
• 25:42
  a human has to manage. Yeah, they have 30.
• 25:44
  And so you're, you're trying to get the wing, right.
• 25:46
  Stuff that used to take you, you know, months being done in days
• 25:49
  now by having them work. The problem?
• 25:51
  That's crazy. I know they were there.
• 25:52
  It's it's totally, I'm telling you, talkers, people, people
• 25:57
  have no constant where this whole thing is going.
• 25:59
  And so we have to, you know, Asia's job has always been to be
• 26:02
  at the cutting edge of technology and Torah to be able
• 26:05
  to, to utilize it. So we're we're doing that.
• 26:08
  By the way, I think it's a Hazel approach too.
• 26:09
  I mean, the sages and the Gamarts in the Talmud, it's so
• 26:12
  clear that they were up with the cutting edge of medical and
• 26:15
  technological knowledge. Doesn't mean that they were
• 26:17
  correct, but that's because it was very archaic.
• 26:20
  But they rabbits have always been interesting I.
• 26:22
  Think it's one of the beautiful things about Judaism is we've
• 26:24
  always, we never, never been archaic like a medieval time.
• 26:27
  We're like we've always understood that the the world
• 26:29
  moves and all these things within the confines of Allah.
• 26:32
  We need to understand all those pieces.
• 26:33
  Absolutely, Absolutely. Absolutely, in tracing this goal
• 26:38
  that every Berkowitz gave you of 6,000,000, which is now 3, which
• 26:42
  is still quite a large number, but are your numbers really
• 26:45
  going up? Look, we had when we started
• 26:48
  this about four or five years ago, we had zero thought.
• 26:50
  We weren't in social media. Meaning six years ago, there's
• 26:53
  no social media. Presence on social media and
• 26:54
  today we have over 4 million, you know, people that we engage
• 26:57
  with. So for me, that was building a
• 26:58
  market. How how's that like I I looked
• 27:00
  right before our our episode today just say at H studios.
• 27:04
  So that's 300, some 1400, some 1000.
• 27:07
  People we have, we have many, many, we don't just have one it,
• 27:09
  we have many, many different covers, many different names.
• 27:12
  You know, Judy, just like all you know, you don't, you don't
• 27:14
  just put everyone in in one thing.
• 27:16
  You know, we, we have certain people.
• 27:17
  We have, we had one Stew soon at the seminary.
• 27:19
  We had 10 million followers, you know, abolished, true, which is
• 27:22
  amazing, you know. So you have people that do that,
• 27:25
  but for organizations, right? And most usual organizations
• 27:28
  unfortunately are not as sophisticated as they need to be
• 27:30
  in this area. But you we have many, many
• 27:31
  different handles under many different, you know, six or
• 27:35
  seven different social medias and broken out in different
• 27:37
  ways. And you know, so that's
• 27:38
  cumulative of our reach, OK? It's not going to be 4 million
• 27:41
  under one thing. OK, fair enough.
• 27:43
  Fair enough. OK.
• 27:43
  So the reach numbers are going up.
• 27:44
  Do you think impact though you're also going up as well?
• 27:48
  I think look, I can I can you know, you tell the impact of
• 27:50
  Asian general. You know, our yeshiva has never
• 27:53
  been more full. We just open up a fully Spanish
• 27:55
  speaking base measures in the old city, the largest one in
• 27:58
  Israel. Our numbers are way bigger than
• 28:00
  they've been in 50 years, you know, so, so it physical
• 28:03
  presence, we're stronger we've ever been.
• 28:06
  And with the same Bali Chuva we always had, you know, yeah.
• 28:09
  But there is the rigor, different meaning.
• 28:11
  In other words, the rigor like 10 years ago, 15 years ago.
• 28:15
  I mean, everyone knows about the Discovery Seminar, or at least
• 28:17
  they should because I mean, it's famous for a reason, right?
• 28:20
  But like you said, ain't no one going to be sitting three days
• 28:22
  of that anymore. Yeah, correct.
• 28:24
  So we did. We did it last year for the
• 28:25
  first time online. We did a fully.
• 28:28
  But when we say online, it's not like, you know, you go click on
• 28:30
  and watch it engaged session. And it's very interesting.
• 28:34
  We had 800 people sign up, 400 of them were unaffiliated Jews.
• 28:37
  So it was kind of like half and half in terms of the make up
• 28:40
  And, and we've been like working through and by the way, you're
• 28:42
  now going to be able to do discovery on a man university,
• 28:46
  you know, in that way. That's one of our our big pieces
• 28:48
  there. So we're trying to understand
• 28:50
  that. We do discovery seminars in our
• 28:52
  building throughout the year. People come, absolutely people
• 28:55
  come, but it's a different clientele.
• 28:57
  Look, a lot of them have backgrounds, you know, you don't
• 28:59
  have, especially during the war last two and a few years, you
• 29:01
  don't have the unaffiliated Jews coming to Israel unless they're
• 29:04
  very specifically on a birthright, etcetera.
• 29:06
  And it's and it's very tough. You know, any time something
• 29:09
  happens like that, it's, it's really difficult.
• 29:12
  If you have this much reach and you referenced it before, why
• 29:16
  aren't you? Why aren't you also pushing more
• 29:18
  of the proper information for the Israel narrative?
• 29:22
  Because I think there's no doubt that on the physical war, Israel
• 29:27
  versus Hamas, we're winning. Israel and America versus Iran,
• 29:32
  we're winning. But in the propaganda war, Oh my
• 29:35
  gosh, we've lost. Oh my gosh, we've lost.
• 29:38
  And I don't mean that's because we need us to be lying like they
• 29:42
  do, but just I think we're not understood.
• 29:46
  And because of that, there's a heck of a lot of hate.
• 29:48
  And that's horrible to receive all that from Gentiles when it's
• 29:51
  not for any good reason, but even more so Jews came are like
• 29:56
  the best and and most ferocious anti semites at times.
• 30:01
  Especially you know a little bit about the the Spanish
• 30:03
  Inquisition. So why have you not used your
• 30:05
  amazing platform and skills and resources to to push this this
• 30:10
  agenda that is so lacking in the Jewish sphere?
• 30:13
  Yeah, we do. We do.
• 30:14
  If you go to h.com, tremendous amount of Israel articles post
• 30:17
  October 7th, you know, the week after October 7th, we, we
• 30:22
  usually do about 6 to 7000 new followers a week.
• 30:25
  We were doing over 65,000. I think we did that week.
• 30:29
  We do you know, a million the of his day.
• 30:32
  We did 50 million that week. You know, we were out front and
• 30:34
  center a lot. We have like a war room
• 30:36
  together. You know right away to fight
• 30:38
  that. We do a lot of the Israel
• 30:40
  pieces. I personally write op eds
• 30:42
  constantly about the Israel pieces.
• 30:44
  But I, I will tell you that our philosophy is, is that number
• 30:49
  one is to fight the anti-Semitism battle around the
• 30:52
  world. I don't think that's winnable.
• 30:53
  You know, in terms of the not the people are not Jewish who
• 30:56
  hate us. Why?
• 30:57
  Because it's, it's so massive. You look at the amount of, of
• 31:00
  Muslims after you look at Al Jazeera, you look at all the
• 31:02
  things coming up against US. One of the issues I think Jews
• 31:04
  have in general is that, you know, they don't know how to
• 31:07
  talk to this generation. I'll talk to a lot of Jews
• 31:09
  organizations and they're like, don't people know that, that the
• 31:12
  truth of no, actually no one cares about the truth.
• 31:15
  They have a, a great Jingle from the, you know, from the river to
• 31:19
  the sea, Palestine River. They, they are speaking to this
• 31:22
  generation. You know, someone said to me, a
• 31:24
  very, very brilliant international lawyer said to me,
• 31:27
  he said, look, Ukraine versus Russia, right?
• 31:29
  I'm an international lawyer. I've been involved a long time.
• 31:32
  You would think I looked into all different sides and decided,
• 31:35
  you know what side I'm on? He's like that.
• 31:36
  I'm a liberal guy. My friends are pro Ukraine, so
• 31:38
  I'm pro Ukraine, he said. That's how it, that's how it
• 31:40
  happened. We don't really understand it
• 31:42
  for the other side, You know, we're like, don't they
• 31:44
  understand that if they lived in Arab country, they'd be thrown
• 31:46
  off? No, because their friends are
• 31:48
  doing this. So it's it's very social out
• 31:50
  there. But is that a reason why not to
• 31:52
  fight this? War not to fight, but I don't
• 31:54
  think we could better them. To me, the war is for our Jewish
• 31:58
  brothers and sisters. Why?
• 31:59
  Why is that all that everyone's made in God's image?
• 32:01
  Why can't it be both? Because I, I, I think you have
• 32:05
  excellent resources and you can affect X amount of people in
• 32:08
  this world. And I think you have to be
• 32:09
  realistic about that. And I, to me, the bottom line is
• 32:12
  if you go to America, right, North America, right, you go to
• 32:15
  North America. If you take reform,
• 32:17
  conservative, Orthodox, APEC Jews, pro Israel Jews across the
• 32:22
  board, we're less than 30% / 70% of Jews in North America. 0
• 32:27
  connection to Judaism or to Israel.
• 32:30
  That's my target. Now if I can increase that from
• 32:34
  30% to 35% or 40%, those Jews will go fight that battle.
• 32:39
  So I am very focused on our brothers and sisters, right?
• 32:43
  You know, do do Christians and, and Muslims come to our website?
• 32:47
  yeahabsolutelyh.com is, is widely read, right?
• 32:50
  And they see a lot of articles and people share them and, you
• 32:53
  know, but that's not my target audience.
• 32:55
  And, and I think that, you know, everyone, you have to have a
• 32:58
  target audience. You have to figure out who am I
• 33:00
  going after when you're whatever you're doing who, who is the
• 33:03
  recipient of what I'm sending out?
• 33:06
  Look, that's why you're here today because I respect so much
• 33:09
  what you're doing. And I think you're doing an
• 33:10
  amazing, like such a weirdly good job that like I want like
• 33:16
  you're part of history and I want to figure that out.
• 33:18
  That's why you're here. But what I am saying is that in
• 33:22
  order to do the job that you're doing, you had to build up this
• 33:26
  behemoth of a thing. Yes.
• 33:27
  And that behemoth of a thing could be used for other things
• 33:29
  too. So why can't I'm just throwing
• 33:33
  ridiculous stuff out there, but it's possible.
• 33:35
  Hire another guy and have that guy be your, you know, anti, you
• 33:39
  know. Anti-Semitism spirit, Yeah.
• 33:41
  Look, we, you know, we. And op eds are great and I'm and
• 33:43
  you're great writing op eds. But and I'm sure a guy like me
• 33:46
  or my door from that reader from his car on the way to, you know,
• 33:48
  walking to the basement. But like like you said, we got a
• 33:51
  lot of scrollers, we got a lot of 1 to 62nd.
• 33:53
  People look, I, I, I go on Newsmax all the time and which
• 33:57
  is primarily a non Jewish audience.
• 33:58
  They hit Chris Ruddy. He's a CEO.
• 33:59
  He's a phenomenal guy, a real guy who loves Israel guy who
• 34:04
  when he was in college came to Hebrew you in the summer.
• 34:07
  That's how far back he goes with us.
• 34:08
  And he's he's a Christian. So we do have the engagement.
• 34:11
  But but I, I just and I ministered that for affairs
• 34:15
  after October 7th. We actually went to them and
• 34:17
  said, let us help you with social media because, you know,
• 34:20
  Israelis in general really struggle with this.
• 34:22
  They really struggle with this. You know, you fuck the Israelis.
• 34:24
  They're like, don't people know we're right?
• 34:26
  We're like nobody. They don't know you're right.
• 34:27
  Nobody. Yeah.
• 34:28
  And who's fighting from our side?
• 34:29
  You mentioned Rudd like but but but.
• 34:31
  It's really bad. It's really hard, it's really
• 34:33
  bad. But look, the bottom line is
• 34:35
  it's, it's not just one guy, you know?
• 34:36
  And, and I think to a certain extent, look, I believe that God
• 34:40
  runs the world. And, and, and because I believe
• 34:42
  God runs the world, I think there are elements out there
• 34:45
  that just don't like this. And they have issues with us and
• 34:48
  have issues with us being the chosen people and that, you
• 34:50
  know, and if you look at societies in the last 2000
• 34:53
  years, I have a good friend that lives in Spain and he told me
• 34:56
  straight out, he said, if you go back to 1492, you can Spain
• 34:59
  could have been at the top of Europe had they not thrown out
• 35:02
  all their Jews, right? And so this stuff has been wrong
• 35:04
  forever and I think it's going to exist.
• 35:07
  And to me, the way that God, what God really wants is going
• 35:11
  after our brothers and sisters. If all our brothers and sisters
• 35:13
  came back to us, we'd be so incredibly strong.
• 35:15
  We'd win that war. So the question is this, do you
• 35:18
  go fight that war or do you come back to the recruiting and say,
• 35:21
  I need more soldiers to fight that war?
• 35:22
  I think Asia's in the recruiting soldiers business.
• 35:25
  I just don't know. I'm going to push us a little
• 35:26
  more. I just don't know why you can't
• 35:28
  do both. Like I actually would disagree
• 35:30
  with your outlook a little bit. I think the world is not for,
• 35:34
  for the Jews, the world is for God and therefore it's for the
• 35:37
  people. Jews are the chosen people.
• 35:39
  So it's, it's, it's, we're the main character, right?
• 35:42
  But but Gentiles are made in God's image for sure, right?
• 35:45
  And, and I definitely want to be helping and interacting with
• 35:48
  them, get closer to the like. What do we envision for the
• 35:51
  Messianic age, which I believe we're in the beginnings of right
• 35:54
  now? The one for the Messianic age is
• 35:56
  that we have our Jewish freedom and everyone is connected to God
• 35:58
  and bringing to God and learning to God and giving sacrifices in
• 36:01
  the third temple. But what do we also want?
• 36:03
  We also want Gentiles to bring their own sacrifice as it was in
• 36:05
  the 1st Temple, right? That that sort of Orla Gola
• 36:09
  that, that, that, that light that goes absolutely everywhere.
• 36:12
  And you guys are so effective with doing that to Jews.
• 36:15
  Like, why not? Why not spread that to the
• 36:17
  Gentiles as well? As I said, a lot of probably
• 36:20
  more gentiles read h.com than probably any website, you know,
• 36:23
  in the Jewish world. But But when you run an
• 36:26
  organization and institution, you have to focus.
• 36:29
  Yeah, if you don't focus, then it throws people a little bit
• 36:33
  and, and part of the focus, and this is any company in the
• 36:36
  world, you have to have a target audience.
• 36:38
  And for us, our target audience is always going to be our
• 36:41
  brothers and sisters who are totally unaffiliated, which is
• 36:43
  why we're on social media because, you know, there are a
• 36:45
  lot of organizations out there that deal with low hanging
• 36:48
  fruit. You know, being someone has
• 36:49
  connected to our our goal and we get in trouble for this.
• 36:53
  Our goal is a Jew that's totally unaffiliated.
• 36:55
  When I say we get in trouble for this is h.com started to skew a
• 36:59
  little bit more towards the Orthodox community, religious
• 37:01
  community, the connected affiliate community, right?
• 37:04
  Why? Because no one should take
• 37:06
  offense. But sometimes the observant
• 37:08
  community is not so spiritual and they need to find
• 37:11
  spirituality and they find it in Kira.
• 37:13
  They find it in outreach organizations.
• 37:14
  They find organizations that that you know, so they will come
• 37:17
  to h.com. Berkowitz pushed us, He said.
• 37:20
  You have to be h.com has to be a place that the total.
• 37:23
  The other way, yeah. And we get we get hate mail from
• 37:27
  from religious Jews. So we'll have an article and
• 37:30
  they'll be like, how could you do this, this that you know, and
• 37:32
  we haven't. We have an automatic letter we
• 37:34
  send back. Thank you so much for all the
• 37:36
  years of being a fan of h.com and being with us.
• 37:38
  But perhaps this is not the website for you.
• 37:40
  This website is geared for Jews that have no background.
• 37:43
  This is hilarious because the criticism that I hear about you
• 37:47
  guys is the exact opposite, that oh, they're just trying to make
• 37:49
  everyone hurry to you like they do.
• 37:51
  Yeah, it's not, it's not true. It's not true.
• 37:52
  Yeah, it's it's absolutely beyond that true.
• 37:55
  I say all the time, which also gets me in trouble, is that our
• 37:57
  goal is not to make people show me somewhere conscious.
• 37:59
  Our job is to get people intellectually connected to the
• 38:02
  Torah. And that's why our metric set
• 38:05
  with Roberto, it's is to get 3,000,000 was by 20-30 at
• 38:08
  3,000,000 Jews. Now it's really every Jew in the
• 38:10
  world, get them connected to the Torah, which is why, you know,
• 38:13
  we have the largest, you know, yeshiva and seminary here.
• 38:16
  We started seminary, you know, in the last three years we have
• 38:19
  a massive building on King George packed and which is why,
• 38:24
  you know the number one product coming out now is Asia
• 38:26
  University, right? You know, with AI it's a method
• 38:29
  to teach story. That's.
• 38:30
  Going to, that's going to change the.
• 38:31
  Plan I I think so. And look over 50 years, this has
• 38:33
  kind of been who we are. You know, people always ask a
• 38:35
  very common question. What's the difference between
• 38:37
  Asia and Habad? The most common question I get
• 38:39
  is I travel the world and I explained to people, I said
• 38:42
  Habad is experiential, right? It's about the mitzvah, the
• 38:45
  Hassa and the Mizuzu, which is beautiful.
• 38:47
  Asia's always been more intellectual.
• 38:49
  We're about sitting and studying.
• 38:50
  Now, it's not to say we don't have experiential, they don't
• 38:52
  have intellectual, but it's where you focus your time and
• 38:55
  they're great at what they do. You walk in a Kabat house, they
• 38:57
  feel love. You know, we're really good at
• 38:59
  taking a complicated piece of Torah and explain to you in a
• 39:03
  very easy to understand way. We each have our our strengths.
• 39:06
  So you said before that you were with NCS wife for how long?
• 39:10
  I was there for. 22 years, that is an amazing amount of time.
• 39:13
  Yeah. Why'd you leave?
• 39:16
  It was just I had risen to the top.
• 39:18
  I'd been the head of NCS wife for eight years.
• 39:20
  You know, I, I fully believe that God has a, a, you know, has
• 39:25
  a destiny laid out for everyone. My role within every job I've
• 39:29
  taken in my life was what can I do that maybe, perhaps no one
• 39:33
  else can do? And I think I just got to a
• 39:35
  point where I was imagining directed OU for five years
• 39:38
  concurrent to 8 years the head of NCSY.
• 39:41
  I just felt like someone else can do it.
• 39:42
  And there's got to be another challenge out there.
• 39:44
  And and then I wound up. There was, there was.
• 39:47
  Yeah, yeah, there. Absolutely was and I and I say
• 39:49
  everything God, you know, that had had put me through for 22
• 39:53
  years there and you know, and post was getting me ready for H
• 39:57
  or getting me ready to take help, take H to the next level.
• 39:59
  When you got to H, was it? Did it feel like a different
• 40:02
  step? When I got to H, it was really,
• 40:04
  we were like, bankrupt. It was really, really, yeah.
• 40:06
  It was 11 years ago and Noah had passed away and.
• 40:10
  Why was H bankrupt? Because the the charismatic
• 40:13
  founder had passed away. He was the sun, the moon, the
• 40:16
  stars, who was what took it together.
• 40:18
  He raised a lot of the money and it just how.
• 40:20
  Bad was it? Was it really?
• 40:21
  Is it like? My first four years in age, we
• 40:24
  paid $11 million outside the budget in debt back.
• 40:28
  Wow, it was a lot of money and it was it was very difficult.
• 40:31
  No one did anything wrong. This is very classic, you know,
• 40:34
  you have you know, this someone starts a business or anything
• 40:37
  like this and and they wind up not there and and it just you
• 40:41
  know. Heck, a CEO shake up in any
• 40:42
  company. No, totally.
• 40:43
  Yeah, yeah, it was very normal. We what what H went through.
• 40:46
  And so I I was hired by some of the lay leaders because we had
• 40:50
  to figure out how to get that back.
• 40:51
  And then I was very blessed, you know, my first five years was
• 40:55
  being reactive, just fixing it. And then after that we need to
• 40:58
  get proactive to what we wanted to do.
• 40:59
  And then we brought Roberkowitz on as the Russia Shiva and and
• 41:02
  then we created this vision, you know, age vision 20-30 that
• 41:05
  we're going to get 3,000,000 Jews.
• 41:07
  And we started growing from there.
• 41:08
  And so, yeah, I feel very blessed that I was able to take,
• 41:12
  you know, no Heinberg's legacy and the legacy of everyone that
• 41:14
  came behind me with so great age and, and help it, you know, just
• 41:18
  just realign it to get to the next level.
• 41:19
  So it's debt for age, I think in the past then?
• 41:22
  No, we've had a very rough year this year.
• 41:24
  Anyone that has been following the shekel dollar understands
• 41:27
  that. You know, we we lost this year.
• 41:28
  This is, it's public information.
• 41:30
  We lost $4 million in this every .1 was a 500 dollars, $500,000
• 41:35
  swing for us. So we lost $4 million in doing
• 41:38
  nothing other than the, it chuckles now 2.9 from 3:00 to
• 41:41
  7:00. So we had a very, very tough
• 41:44
  year in that way. And so we're working harder.
• 41:47
  You know, in any organization you got to keep building and you
• 41:50
  know, was an amazing person because he really believed, I
• 41:53
  believes my heart and soul every day he was going to bring with
• 41:55
  you. He I think when he passed away,
• 41:56
  he was shocked. You know, he was such a, a ball
• 41:59
  of moon. He was such a person that
• 42:00
  believed so deeply. And so we didn't have
• 42:03
  endowments. You're right.
• 42:04
  Because, because I know this from late years.
• 42:06
  They told me. They said, they said, no, let's
• 42:08
  build an endowment. He said, can you raise the money
• 42:10
  endowments? Yeah, I'll get to the first
• 42:11
  million. He's like, if you bring it to
• 42:12
  me, I'll spend it tomorrow because the trains are going out
• 42:15
  here. We got to save the, you know,
• 42:17
  that's who he was, you know, So, you know, I think our next job
• 42:21
  is to try and create. I I joke with workers.
• 42:24
  The rest of us. No, I ran a Sprint.
• 42:26
  We're running more of a marathon.
• 42:27
  Is that OK? Rashevitz?
• 42:29
  Yeah, that's OK. So, you know, we, we still have
• 42:31
  some work to do in, in that way, but we have some incredible
• 42:34
  donors. You know, we we're I just, we
• 42:37
  brought Rabbi Mayor May, who's the executive director of the
• 42:41
  Sun Wiesenthal Center for 47 years.
• 42:43
  And he was my mentor. And he just came over to age and
• 42:46
  the last six months, he's helping us get to that next
• 42:48
  level. And thank God, we have great
• 42:50
  people. So I think we're we're going to
• 42:51
  get there, but we still have challenges for sure.
• 42:54
  How long did was a Shiva less after Weinberg?
• 42:59
  And it was a couple years. It was a, it was, I would, I'd
• 43:02
  have to go back and see the exact math, but you know, it was
• 43:05
  six or seven years, you know, someone took over.
• 43:07
  It didn't. Work out.
• 43:08
  Oh, OK, so there. Was some yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 43:10
  There were some apparatuses and then there was trying to figure
• 43:12
  it out and. And it was, it was just how you
• 43:14
  live in a poster of Noah world of Noah, you know, he was, it
• 43:19
  was, it was Bali chuba, Bali chuba.
• 43:21
  So in essence, he was also like a father to so many of the
• 43:24
  professionals with an age. And it was, it was just it was
• 43:26
  just hard and rough and difficult.
• 43:28
  And when I first got there, everyone said you got to get Ray
• 43:31
  Berkowitz. Like he's the person.
• 43:33
  As as soon as you got there. Absolutely.
• 43:35
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 43:35
  Berkowitz, you know, was an age for many years.
• 43:38
  He was, you know, I mean, so to speak, He caught them from the
• 43:42
  mirror to the program. But it took me 5 years to just
• 43:47
  clean up a lot of the, the stuff.
• 43:48
  Nothing bad or good, it just, it just, that's what happens, you
• 43:51
  know, when you don't have a a head and, and you fall into debt
• 43:54
  and stuff like that. Did he want it when you asked
• 43:56
  him? Burgoids We had many, many, many
• 43:58
  conversations. We many conversations.
• 44:00
  You know, I tell you, everyone said it should be him.
• 44:03
  I didn't really know him. I met him through this this
• 44:04
  process and met a lot of amazing people.
• 44:08
  I, I came to see. I also look, let me take a step,
• 44:11
  step back. I never worked in institution
• 44:13
  with rush Shiva. So I had to appreciate the role
• 44:16
  of rush Shiva and a role of CEO. There are very few organizations
• 44:18
  in the world that have a rush and a CEO.
• 44:20
  We're like a funny, funny bird in that way.
• 44:23
  And even the first year we learned how to work together,
• 44:25
  you know, in, in that way. And you know, I think he got,
• 44:29
  once he got there, I realized how important it was to the
• 44:31
  world in general that he'd become the rush of Asia Torah.
• 44:34
  There's a certain he's in a position people look up and he's
• 44:37
  recognized Gundl here in Israel in that way.
• 44:39
  But I think what also helped was, you know, we, we
• 44:42
  implemented, we, when we started to create the vision.
• 44:44
  I, I say that vision without implementation is delusion,
• 44:48
  right? We're smart guys.
• 44:49
  We can have a great vision, but we don't have it make it happen,
• 44:51
  right? So when we started the process,
• 44:53
  we used something that's called EOS entrepreneurial operating
• 44:55
  system. It's a business system.
• 44:57
  We went to Roberto's, what should be our vision.
• 45:00
  And then we came up with this vision and we said, OK,
• 45:02
  Roberto's yeah, we're going to go implement.
• 45:04
  And then we, we said, OK, how do we get 3,000,000 social media?
• 45:07
  And that's when the whole thing started.
• 45:09
  And so Roberto's and I, we speak once a week, You know, we have a
• 45:11
  call once a week at Zoom and we don't even use the whole time
• 45:14
  because I he knows that every day I'm trying to make his
• 45:18
  vision come true. You know, when you get so In
• 45:20
  Sync like that, you know that that that you defer the
• 45:22
  Russiava. And the Russiava also knows, you
• 45:24
  know, there are major things that were involved in the come
• 45:27
  up. And, you know, I've gone to his
• 45:28
  office and we've had a conversation and the broker
• 45:30
  says, I don't think we should go in this direction now.
• 45:32
  And I turned to the guy said, OK, boys, you heard the Russia
• 45:34
  Shiva, you know, let's do it another way.
• 45:36
  And that's just that's it. And to me, that's part of being
• 45:39
  a Bentora and a Torah institution is that there is
• 45:43
  someone who, whether I like it or not, that's, that's quite
• 45:46
  intellectual honesty. We're just going to, you know,
• 45:48
  we're going to go in that direction.
• 45:49
  And and so he's just been the most wonderful partner in that
• 45:52
  way. I even said to him recently, I
• 45:54
  said, look, I hope Russia is not insulted.
• 45:56
  I consider us friends, you know, but he laughed.
• 45:59
  But but that's I, I, I, I value having that total personality in
• 46:03
  the midst of the institution. I think he values because we're
• 46:06
  able to do a lot of great things that, you know, he, he could
• 46:09
  have the vision here, but you need both, you know, it's like
• 46:12
  Reese's Pieces. You need the peanut butter and
• 46:13
  chocolate every time. When it comes together, you can
• 46:15
  do anything you know. Right.
• 46:17
  I mean, he is a juggernaut, yes. You know, absolutely.
• 46:19
  Has there ever been a time when, like you really built something
• 46:22
  and you invested tons of time and it was ready to go and you
• 46:25
  went through a broadcast and you just like, Nah, that's not
• 46:26
  happened? No, no.
• 46:28
  And we and it was a major decision we had recently with
• 46:31
  him it we're we're in Israeli institutions and we're very
• 46:34
  involved with the Knesset. We're here all the world nice
• 46:37
  Congress. We're very involved in a lot of.
• 46:39
  Efforts. Are you free to talk about
• 46:40
  whatever this decision is? Yeah, it was really, it was a
• 46:44
  World Science Congress is about how we were going to join with
• 46:46
  other groups and stuff and and, you know, should we go this way
• 46:49
  or that way? And, you know, he, he said we
• 46:52
  should go this way. And that's why I turned to the
• 46:54
  guys. OK, we're going that way, you
• 46:55
  know, and, and I got to be honest with you, I feel like the
• 46:59
  luckiest guy in the world because I don't want to make a
• 47:01
  decision. You don't feel like at the end
• 47:02
  of the day, it's like this is like this is like serious stuff
• 47:04
  on, on your shoulders. And the fact that I have a
• 47:06
  partner, you know, someone who is, is totally incredibly well
• 47:09
  versed mentor, has broad shoulders, makes a lot of his
• 47:12
  decisions, you know, to wrap us around the world.
• 47:14
  People would be shocked, you know, you know, he's, he's such
• 47:16
  a, an amazing person. He's able to see all sides in a
• 47:19
  very sensitive way. I, I, I love and adore the fact.
• 47:23
  Again, I didn't really understand that when I took the
• 47:25
  job or even when he can rush Shiva.
• 47:27
  It took me about a year and to get it.
• 47:28
  And then and then we found our balance, you know, about how to
• 47:31
  create an institution like that. How is it possible that you're
• 47:34
  plugged in and you know everything that's going on in
• 47:35
  the ground when you don't live here, you come here.
• 47:38
  I think you said couple days a week, a couple days a month.
• 47:41
  Excuse me. Yeah, I mean.
• 47:42
  It's funny, no one ever knows where I live because I'm always
• 47:44
  on a plane. I love the place, but when I
• 47:46
  took this job, you know, my family stay in Bergenfield.
• 47:48
  I have kids in all different grades.
• 47:50
  You know it. It did take one thing I'll tell
• 47:53
  you right. It took me a year to calibrate
• 47:55
  to running in Israel. We are an Israeli institution.
• 47:57
  We're in Amita and and that's that's the mothership is here in
• 47:59
  Israel. It took me about a year to
• 48:01
  figure out how to run things in Israel.
• 48:03
  It's not like the states. What?
• 48:04
  Do you mean just the red tape of it?
• 48:05
  Yeah, for sure. They everything is, you know,
• 48:07
  like, why don't we do this? Well, the government said no.
• 48:11
  Oh, but we know that guys, brothers, cousins, uncles, who
• 48:14
  does Milo in with him? So now you can do what you
• 48:17
  should be able to do by law anyway, right?
• 48:19
  I, I jokingly, my joke is I say that if you understand the
• 48:22
  Israeli government and you take communism, socialism, the Jews
• 48:26
  in Middle East, you put in a pot and you stir it, you know, you
• 48:29
  know, someone recently said to me and said, you know, you know,
• 48:31
  if you don't want to get frustrating aliyah, you should
• 48:33
  just as a given understand that you have to go to every office 3
• 48:36
  times. You know.
• 48:38
  And, and then it's, it's the beauty of the country, you know,
• 48:40
  it's, it's so you have to, you know, so it took me time to
• 48:43
  calibrate, but it's a system like any other system.
• 48:46
  You just have to learn how to how to work.
• 48:49
  We I spent a lot of my career lobbying in Washington, New York
• 48:54
  State, New York City, a lot of American politics.
• 48:57
  Really. I didn't know that and I
• 48:58
  involved in politics. I will through the Orthex Union.
• 49:01
  Through Orthex Union, I worked for Syme Wiesenthal also for a
• 49:03
  couple years in between. And so, you know, I did a lot of
• 49:06
  stuff in Washington, I did a lot of stuff in Albany, a lot of
• 49:09
  different places. And now I just transfer that.
• 49:12
  Now we're in Israel institutions, so we spend time
• 49:13
  with Knesset and we're involved the World Zionist Organization,
• 49:16
  a lot of things here in Israel because this, you know, you said
• 49:20
  it, we living in messy attic times.
• 49:21
  This is where the hardest Jewish people is, the stronger that we
• 49:24
  can build the base here, right? And to me, you build a strong
• 49:29
  base by getting all these other Jews to to be able to come back.
• 49:32
  You know, my my personal, not for age, but my personal motto
• 49:35
  is bring them back, bring them home, right?
• 49:37
  You got to bring them back to God and you got to bring them
• 49:39
  home to Israel. God and Israel.
• 49:41
  Those are the two motivating factors.
• 49:42
  That's that's just what God wants.
• 49:44
  I don't think, you know, it's hard to debate that.
• 49:47
  So here in Israel, So to me it's been, it's been a pleasure in
• 49:50
  the last 11 years to really do a lot of my that type of work here
• 49:54
  at Israel. Bring them back.
• 49:55
  Bring them to Israel. So what's?
• 49:57
  Your back, bring them home. Bring them back, bring them
• 49:59
  home. OK.
• 49:59
  So what's your outlook on the myriad of very religious and
• 50:05
  staunchly so Jews that have absolutely no interest in moving
• 50:07
  to Israel? We got to convince him.
• 50:10
  I had to convince people, you know, that learning Torah is a
• 50:14
  is a value in their life, right? And like what they love
• 50:17
  learning. About yeah, you have to convince
• 50:18
  people that Shabbos and and and Kostas is a value you have to
• 50:22
  convince people that living in Israel is a value.
• 50:24
  Now it's kind of hard like once you read through Tana, the
• 50:28
  entire thing talks about Israel and you look through dominating.
• 50:30
  You know how times we talk about Israel, you know, it's just
• 50:33
  difficult. I think it's, it's, you know, if
• 50:35
  people were intellectually honest and they looked around,
• 50:37
  God wants us here, right? We got thrown out 2000 years ago
• 50:41
  to wind up back here, right? OG Shemaba Arya, who does right?
• 50:44
  The prayer is that we make weddings here.
• 50:46
  And you know, you could have like 10 win it weddings in a
• 50:49
  Binet Brock building in one night here.
• 50:51
  You know, it's it's clear that the prophecies are all being
• 50:53
  fulfilled. It's clear that God wants us
• 50:55
  here. But the same way that people
• 50:57
  have a journey towards the other 612 mitzvos, there's a journey
• 51:01
  towards understanding, appreciating Israel.
• 51:04
  Yeah, but don't you find it like so I find it so strange.
• 51:08
  It's the one mitzvah that everyone hates except for the
• 51:10
  people that are doing it. I don't know if you've had this
• 51:12
  experience. People in Lakewood, they love
• 51:13
  learning Terra and they love, they love Shabbos, right.
• 51:16
  And, and I'm assuming a lot of them are intellectually honest.
• 51:19
  I mean a huge something come in there, but speak to people on
• 51:22
  the gun, they have no interest and they'll come up with all
• 51:24
  different reasons why they won't.
• 51:26
  Well, you have that by the entire Orthodox community.
• 51:29
  It's not just Lakewood. It's Lakewood.
• 51:31
  No, I didn't mean to. I.
• 51:32
  Didn't mean to say no, I'm just saying like bad guys.
• 51:34
  I'm just saying like I would expect that like the what's the
• 51:36
  crown jewel of Klutz Lawrence, right?
• 51:38
  The crowning jewel of outside of Israel is the Shiva and Lakewood
• 51:42
  in terms of of power and God. I mean, it's just an amazing
• 51:45
  city, right, of so many Lum days.
• 51:47
  So it's unbelievable. Yeah.
• 51:48
  And it's getting bigger and bigger and bigger.
• 51:50
  And my question is, is like, why is it there now?
• 51:53
  So half of your vision of bringing people you know closer
• 51:56
  to a coach Barako, you're being super successful.
• 51:59
  But what about that vision of? I said this is my personal true
• 52:02
  right. I said that's not age.
• 52:03
  Age has a very specific role, but I do believe this is a
• 52:06
  future Jewish people. But look, look at Ramada Skull,
• 52:09
  you know, you look at all these places where people come here
• 52:11
  for a year 2-3 and then wind up staying for 30 years.
• 52:13
  You know there there is. One to come, one 2-3 years and
• 52:15
  then they. That could be also.
• 52:17
  So look, we have that we have to do a better job of that.
• 52:19
  You know, I often I I fought years ago.
• 52:21
  I think is has done a better job.
• 52:23
  But years ago I met with someone for the Jewish Agency.
• 52:26
  They're all the out of the vision.
• 52:28
  I'm just going back 2530 years ago and and I said them like all
• 52:32
  these, these young men and women are coming to Israel for the
• 52:35
  year. That is when you have to hit him
• 52:37
  with staying in Israel, right, as opposed to waiting till they
• 52:39
  get back to America and then making the pitch.
• 52:41
  I think there are there are there are a lot of universities
• 52:45
  here. I think people can understand
• 52:46
  how to make a living. I think that's a big piece of
• 52:48
  it. We got a lot of work to do.
• 52:49
  We got to make a lot of work to do, you know, and by the way,
• 52:52
  it's not a simple country also, which is the challenge.
• 52:54
  You know, I say that is someone who runs an organization.
• 52:57
  There are people who come in and it's it's it's just, it's hard.
• 53:00
  And we just I think one of the beautiful things they did right.
• 53:03
  And you can argue how success they are not, but they just
• 53:06
  helped Americans because there's no there's not as much customer
• 53:09
  services there here as here in the States.
• 53:10
  They said we're gonna I have a daughter and son-in-law in the
• 53:13
  process, the aliac process and a granddaughter right now.
• 53:15
  And there's has been a godsend. Yeah, for sure.
• 53:18
  So to me, it's such at that that's we need more of that,
• 53:21
  more of that. Look, and then they are doing a
• 53:24
  great job in terms of helping. But like the, the first thing I
• 53:27
  think of when I think of Jewish outreach is you guys, the first
• 53:32
  person I think of is who is, is trying to encourage Jews to move
• 53:36
  to Israel, religious Jews to move to Israel.
• 53:39
  The name doesn't exist. It's completely absent, right?
• 53:44
  You agree that that would be something great for people to
• 53:46
  get involved in? In terms of age, sure.
• 53:50
  You know, look, in terms of age, our goal is to get every Jewish
• 53:53
  state tour and, and we, we, it's such a difficult goal.
• 53:56
  One is enough. You're saying that goal is
• 53:57
  enough? Yeah, yeah, I'm saying like,
• 53:58
  like, you know, it's university, we're long.
• 54:00
  AII can't begin to tell you what that effort has meant, how much
• 54:05
  we've learned along the way. And but I think it it'll be a
• 54:07
  game changer, You know, in terms of that, where Berkowitz, as I
• 54:10
  mentioned before, Berkowitz made ALIA over 50 years ago, has not
• 54:13
  left the country since. He is very clear when he speaks
• 54:16
  to our students that your our destiny is here, unless you're
• 54:20
  going to play some rabbinic role back in the States and you know,
• 54:23
  etcetera. So look, I think I think every
• 54:26
  Jewish organization world and on top of it, the anti-Semitism
• 54:30
  we're facing now in America is unprecedented.
• 54:33
  You know, we've become like Europe, Europe for years.
• 54:34
  You go to Europe and there'd be like guards in front of the
• 54:37
  shore. Like what is that?
• 54:38
  People are blind to this too, by the way.
• 54:40
  Like people be. Oh, it's not Europe at all.
• 54:42
  It's not like things aren't getting worse at all.
• 54:44
  Mandani, you know, in, in New York City, I mean, there's no
• 54:47
  words for what that is and what that means and what the
• 54:49
  ratifications are. And and it's not just him, it's
• 54:51
  it's there is multiple people like.
• 54:53
  People get it. I think people are very nervous.
• 54:56
  Do they get it? That's a strong term.
• 54:58
  I think people are, I think people are very nervous.
• 55:01
  I think people feel to certain and we started with this, you
• 55:04
  know, can we fight against this? How do we fight again?
• 55:06
  You know, I think we can push it off, but it there's a certain
• 55:08
  wave that's coming and it's very difficult.
• 55:11
  This next presidential election is going to be very important to
• 55:14
  Jewish people. The Democratic Party
• 55:17
  unfortunately has, has, really has people that are that hate
• 55:20
  Israel as part of it. We have, you know, Richie Torres
• 55:23
  and John Fetterman who love Israel, right?
• 55:25
  So I'm not saying it's the entire party.
• 55:26
  You have a lot of percentage that people are running on.
• 55:29
  I don't take money from APEC. I don't like Israel.
• 55:31
  You know, I'm not going to Israel.
• 55:32
  You know, that's very, very rough for us.
• 55:36
  And this next election is going to be a very good presidential
• 55:38
  election. Be very big to see which way it
• 55:40
  goes on both sides. Who's a Republican candidate and
• 55:43
  who's a Democratic candidate, because we unfortunately, Tucker
• 55:46
  Carlson has proven and Candace Owens that on the right.
• 55:50
  We have we, we have people that and, and people left.
• 55:53
  So, you know, we're like literally, I used to say that,
• 55:56
  you know, if you have the Proud Boys and Antifa, the only thing
• 55:59
  they're going to agree on is US, right?
• 56:01
  And, and it's always, it's always kind of been like that.
• 56:03
  And so, and I think Israel also has to focus on this because
• 56:08
  let's say there's some catastrophic thing that happens
• 56:11
  and then the state of Israel has to absorb an enormous amount of
• 56:14
  Jews. They're actually not ready for
• 56:15
  it at all. They don't know what they would
• 56:17
  do. You know, they, they would, they
• 56:18
  say Ali, Ali Ali. Ah, but let's say you know a
• 56:21
  couple 100,000 Jews got dropped in here tomorrow.
• 56:23
  Unfortunately, I don't think that's something we need to
• 56:25
  worry about. I, you know, I, I, it's, it's.
• 56:29
  We'll see. I hope I'm wrong.
• 56:30
  I hope I'm wrong. Yeah.
• 56:31
  I hope I'm wrong, yeah. Thanks so much for coming in
• 56:34
  today. Oh, my pleasure.
• 56:35
  My honor. Thank you for having me.
• 56:36
  Sure, 100%.