One Journey, Multiple Voices: Deanne Weiss Etsekson’s Perspective
June 17, 2026
One Journey, Multiple Voices: Louis Treiger’s Perspective
June 17, 2026
DAY 2 – FEBRUARY 17, 2026
Kehillah (Community): Our Collective Oxygen
We are all humans, desirous of connection — of being seen, heard, and held by others who share our purpose and our path.
I am privileged to be in community with the Samis Foundation as a Board of Directors Trustee, and I am currently on Day 2 of an 8-day grantee learning trip in Israel. In the last 48 hours, I have sat across from leaders doing extraordinary work — in mental health, vocational training, rehabilitation, and community organizing. What strikes me most is not the breadth of their programs, but the thread running through all of them: each has made kehillah itself a cornerstone. Not an afterthought.
This morning we visited the Nova festival site and Kfar Aza, one of the kibbutzim hardest hit on October 7th and the days after. I will write more about that experience when I find the words. What I can say now is this: kehillah saved lives that day. Neighbors sheltered neighbors and coordinated rescues in real time. And in the devastating aftermath, community is the vessel that is holding the collective grief — and the ground from which healing is occurring and resilience is being reinforced.
Leaving for this trip earlier this week, I kissed and hugged my two little humans goodbye. They attend a Samis-supported Jewish Day School and are engaged in Zman Kehillah (Community Time), an intentional program about how to engage meaningfully with their community, both now as children and as future leaders. I feel the full circle of it. The same force that is enabling Israel to heal is the same force we are nurturing in classrooms in Seattle.
Kehillah is not a program or an agenda item. It is oxygen. Samis understands this — and I have seen it alive in every grant visit, every convening, every connection they foster on both sides of the world.
Who are your kehillot? Reach out to them. Show up. Breathe each other in deeply.
In community,
Deva
Samis Foundation Trustee, Mom of 2 Jewish Day School Kiddos
