A delegation of 24 students from Bi-Cultural Hebrew Academy Upper School were among 18,000 Israel supporters who descended upon Washington D.C. last week to attend the 2020 AIPAC Policy Conference. The teens – one of the largest high school delegations at the conference – were all members of the Stamford school’s Israel Advocacy Club (IAC). It was the fifth consecutive time the school sent a delegation of students to the annual conference. 

In addition to listening to the remarks of dignitaries and spending a few days in the nation’s capital rubbing elbows with national and world leaders, the students had the opportunity to learn in depth about the efforts of AIPAC to support and strengthen the Israel-United States relationship. On the final day of the conference, the delegation headed up to Capitol Hill to speak with members of Connecticut’s congressional delegation – including Senators Richard Blumenthal and Chris Murphy and Congressman Jim Himes – about the need for full support of Israel at the highest levels of the American government. 

The BCHA Upper School’s Israel Advocacy Club was founded five years ago to take the students’ burgeoning belief in the ideal of Zionism and transform into their advocacy for the American-Israel relationship. Through a myriad of speakers and workshops, the club teaches students how their small voices can grow louder when raised in concert with the rest of AIPAC’s pro-Israel community. 

“The Jewish people have been persecuted throughout history, and we have finally returned to our ancestral homeland and now stand strong as a sovereign nation,” said BCHA Upper School principal, Rabbi Shimmy Trencher. “As Americans and Jews, we proudly stand with Israel, a country that is both the Jewish homeland as well as a strong strategic partner of the United States. It was uplifting to join together with 18,000 pro-Israel Americans–Democrats and Republicans, Jews and Christians, young and old – in support of the U.S.-Israel partnership.”

For BCHA sophomore Shira Haron the conference was both not only an immersive eduational experience, but a bonding experience as well.

Said Haron: “My love for Israel intensified after attending the AIPAC Policy Conference and seeing thousands of other students from all backgrounds coming together for one common purpose: standing up for Israel’s rights.”

Main Photo: Members of Bi-Cultural Hebrew Academy Upper School’s Israel Advocacy Club at the 2020 AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington, D.C. The group was accompanied by BCHA Upper School principal, Rabbi Shimmy Trencher (far left) and BCHA Upper School history teacher and Israel Advocacy Club advisor David Giver (far right).