The B’nai B’rith World Center in Jerusalem has announced that Israeli Channel 2 News reporter Lee Abramovich is the recipient of the 2012 Award for Journalism Recognizing Excellence in Diaspora Reportaģe in Memory of Wolf and Hilda Matsdorf. The jury also decided to present foreign correspondent citations to AP correspondent Diaa Hadid and Jana Beris (Jerozolimski), editor of the Uruguayan Jewish weekly Semanario Hebreo.
Abramovich will receive the journalism award for her July 9, 2011, report on Channel 2 News about Orthodox American Jews who make live kidney donations to Israeli patients. The moving report revealed this little-known phenomenon, as well as the donors’ motivations and support structure.
AP correspondent Hadid will receive the foreign correspondent citation for her June 18, 2011, article on Tripoli’s Jewish community and the remnants of the city’s Dar al-Bishi synagogue during Libya’s revolution. Uruguayan editor Beris won the citation for her interview with Natan Sharansky, chairman of the Jewish Agency, published on March 24, 2011. Semanario Hebreo—edited in Israel and distributed in Uruguay 50 weeks a year—was established in 1960 by Beris’ father, Joseph Jerozolimski. When he passed away in 2004, Beris became editor.
Since its establishment in 1992, the B’nai B’rith World Center Award for Journalism has recognized excellence in reportaģe on contemporary Diaspora Jewish communities and on the state of Israel-Diaspora relations today in the Israeli print and electronic media. The award is widely acknowledged in the media industry as the most prestigious prize in its field in Israel. The award ceremony will be held this summer.
Members of the distinguished award jury are: Professor Yehudith Auerbach, head of the Communication and Journalism Studies Division, Bar Ilan University; David Horovitz, former editor-in-chief, Jerusalem Post; Sara Frenkel, Diaspora reporter, Broadcast Authority and Lifetime Achievement Award winner for 2002; Shalom Kital, former general director, News Company, Channel 2; Bambi Sheleg, founder and editor-in-chief, Eretz Acheret and award winner for 2011; and Asher Weill, publisher and editor of Ariel, The Israel Review of Arts and Letters (1981-2003).
The B’nai B’rith World Center Award for Journalism is named for the late Wolf Matsdorf, former editor of the B’nai B’rith World Center journal Leadership Briefing and a journalist in Australia and Israel; and his wife, the late Hilda Matsdorf, a pioneer in social work in both Australia and Israel. The award is made possible through donations from the Matsdorf family and from Daniel Schydlowsky, a member of the B’nai B’rith World Center International Board of Governors, with homes in Lima, Peru and Washington, D.C.