Letter from The Executive Director of OU Israel

WELCOME EVERYONE,

Whether you live here in Israel, are visiting, spend every Pesach here, or it’s your first time back in years, it is so wonderful seeing the streets of Yerushalayim and the whole land filling up once more with our brothers and sisters from around the world. It is such a great feeling that on Pesach, when we talk about the miracle of the Jews leaving Egypt and coming to Eretz Yisrael, we actually see Jews from around the world celebrating Pesach together in the Holy Land. We at OU Israel wish all of you an uplifting and incredible Pesach.

This guide is being put out with the tremendous efforts of Rabbi Ezra Friedman and Rabbi Yissachar Dov Krakowski, who run OU Kashrut here in Israel. To be forthright, we are presenting this guide in response to the many requests we’ve received to provide a guide that will instruct people on how to overcome the difficulties they encounter here in Israel in keeping the level of kashrut that they are accustomed to and desire.

Producing this guide took a huge amount of work, which was done with enthusiasm, because we know how many people will enjoy, appreciate and use it. While here in Israel, I am sure that you will enjoy many products and establishments that the OU supervises.

With the incredible work that is being done by Rabbi Krakowski, Rabbi Friedman and the other team members of OU Kashrut, new factories and importers are coming under our supervision every week. Companies are joining the OU for two major reasons:

• the fact that the OU is a reliable, professional and knowledgeable kashrut agency that spares no effort to ensure that Jews around the world—Israel included—will be able to enjoy their Shabbatot, chagim and weekdays with kosher food at the highest level. It is not for nothing that the OU is called “the gold standard of kashrut.”

• the fact that since its inception, the OU has taken all the profits from OU Kashrut and pumped them back into the Jewish community.

OU Israel provides programs for the English-speaking population all across the country—including tiyulim, Torah Tidbits, OU Israel Center Shiurim, NCSY, Yachad, and JLIC—as well as the work we are doing with 6,500 teens-at-risk from Kiryat Shmona down to Dimona. I hope you get a chance to see the incredible impact that the OU is having here both on a program level and a kashrut level.

Wishing you an enjoyable stay in Israel, if you are visiting, and much success and fulfilment for those living here.

And wishing you all a chag kasher vesameach!

Rabbi Avi Berman