By Janis Siegel, Jewish Sound Correspondent
TAG International Development isn’t a public relations firm, but its founder and CEO, Orthodox rabbi and Londoner Yossi Ives, fervently believes PR can go a long way toward recasting Israel’s image in the world.
The Israel-based nonprofit matches Israeli experts with local partners in poor countries setting up humanitarian projects that improve their standard of living, but the work, Ives said during a Seattle visit in early February, is really the destiny and the future of the Jewish people.
“One of the ways we can support Israel is to capitalize on its unique abilities and make it harder to portray it as this baby-killing heartless entity,” he said, “and start to establish it as a recognizable force for good.”
Ives was quick to add that he in no way advocates that Israel retreat from its attention to defense or its strategic alliance with America — only that it widen its scope of influence.
“This is in addition to recognizing that Israel is still in need,” said Ives, “but is now in a position to give an enormous amount. It is a very powerful way that we can strengthen Israel.”
TAG is an acronym that describes the group’s core values — Torah, avodah or work, and gemilut chasadim, acts of kindness. Headquartered in Seattle since September 2014, Tag’s new Seattle office is located in the South Lake Union neighborhood.
Among its many programs within Israel, the group works with emergency health organizations, the Bedouin community, Israel’s agency for international development, Hadassah Hospital, and Bishvilaych, which does outreach to the ultra-Orthodox community in Jerusalem.
Outside of Israel, TAG operates projects with women and children in Indonesia, small business ventures with villagers in Sri Lanka and Myanmar, and an agricultural training farm for orphans and victims of genocide in Rwanda, among others.
It was no coincidence that TAG chose Seattle as its world headquarters. The region just understands the mission the organization is committed to, Ives said.
“We are speaking to people here who instinctively get it, there is a kind of resonance here that works,” said Ives. “To them Israel is a thriving country, not a struggling developing country. They are also aware that a large part of the world lives in abject poverty and struggle daily just to eat.”
TAG opened its first project for the Seattle area — a successful Hoops for Kids program started in Israel. The after-school basketball clinic and coaching opportunity serves over 500 kids in Israel and is now operating in Kenya. TAG’s plan is to host a delegation of youth from Seattle to visit Kenya and help implement the program there.
“This is a great way to get the younger generation, who are perhaps much less hinged to the traditional assumptions about Jewish community,” said Ives. “The younger generation is saying, ‘We’ve done very well, but what are we doing to solve the problem of billions of people living in abject poverty and under tremendous hardship?’”
Ives also advocates a new approach to the study of Israel in the American Jewish day school system, from grade school on, because youth today don’t relate to the traditional portrayal of Israel as the so-called “underdog.”
“They’re not hostile to Israel necessarily, and they’re not hostile to the Jewish community, but they just don’t connect with the values of their parents,” said Ives. “We now need to add to our sense of mission. Memorializing the Holocaust, investing in the State of Israel, and reestablishing the Jewish community in North America, these have actually been achieved. The particular infusion of Jewish values, the support of Israel, and the general concern for the plight of the most underprivileged people on the planet — that combination resonates very well.”
The 41-year-old self-described social entrepreneur who lives in London with his wife and seven children holds a doctorate degree in coaching psychology and is the author of five books, all dealing with Jewish values, Jewish mysticism and coaching psychology. He is also the founder of the TAG Institute for Jewish Social Values.
In addition to his work around the world and in Seattle, Ives visited Los Angeles during his West Coast tour and garnered a contribution of $350,000 for another project that is close to his heart — relationship counseling and organizing Jewish singles events.
“We need to focus on platforms to get them together,” Ives said. “The other half is getting them to work out. There’s some internal struggle and somewhere it’s gotten stuck.”