NEW YORK, March 26, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- American
Jewish Committee (AJC) announced today that, due to the Coronavirus
pandemic, it is regrettably canceling the AJC Global Forum, slated
for Berlin, Germany, June
14-17.
"It was a tough call to make – the Global Forum is an incredibly
important event for AJC, especially this year as we looked forward
to marking 75 years since the end of World War II in Berlin," said AJC CEO David Harris. "But prioritizing the health
and safety of AJC staff, lay leaders, conference speakers,
registrants, vendors, and others is more important than wishful
thinking on how the world will look in a few months. Hence, our
painful but necessary decision to cancel the 2020 Global
Forum."
Convening the AJC Global Forum in Berlin would have marked the first time the
global organization's signature annual event took place in
Europe, and only the second time
outside the United States since
AJC's founding in 1906. The 2018 AJC Global Forum was held in
Jerusalem, on Israel's 70th birthday. The
AJC Global Forum brings together thousands of Jewish advocates from
dozens of countries to advance the well-being of the Jewish
community and strengthen democratic values.
The original decision to convene the AJC Global Forum in
Berlin, announced last June and
immediately praised by German Chancellor Angela Merkel, had garnered much anticipation
among political and civil society leaders, the diplomatic
community, and the media. The impressive list of confirmed speakers
for the sold-out, four-day event included chancellors, prime
ministers, foreign ministers, and other German, European, and
global leaders.
It was expected to be the largest gathering by a global Jewish
advocacy organization in modern German history, a testament to the
extraordinary evolution of AJC's unique postwar relationship with
Germany.
The AJC-Germany story will be chronicled in an upcoming
publication. A high point of the AJC-Germany relationship was the
establishment, in 1998, of AJC Berlin, the first permanent office
of an American Jewish organization in what is today Germany's capital.
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SOURCE American Jewish Committee