Our dedicated staff and board members represent a broad alliance of Jews from across the political and religious spectra who care deeply about the country, the people and the land of Israel, and who are dedicated to working toward a sustainable future.

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Staff, Board of Directors and Israeli Representatives

Rabbi Michael Cohen

The director of special projects and former executive director of Friends of the Arava Institute, Rabbi Michael Cohen is a founding faculty member of the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies. He is also the vice president of global resource development for the Arava Power Company, which works to make solar power the main energy source for southern Israel and Jordan. Previously, Michael served as president of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association and as pulpit rabbi at the Israel Congregation of Manchester, Vt., where he remains the rabbi emeritus. Michael is a VPR Radio commentator and the author of numerous articles. He also wrote a novella, "Einstein's Rabbi." For his role in co-founding the GZA, Michael was named a Jewish Community Hero.

Dr. Orr Karassin

Orr Karassin holds a PhD in law from Bar Ilan University, an LLM magna cum laude from Tel Aviv University and an LLB from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She has held the position of visiting research fellow at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science and she is currently a lecturer at Sapir College Law School in Sderot, where she is responsible for the law-and-environment program. Orr was awarded several prizes for her doctoral work, including the Rothschild Scholarship for early-career researchers, and the Wolf Foundation Prize for excelling doctoral students. Orr is one of the GZA representatives on the board of directors of Keren Kayemet L'Yisrael, where she heads the board's Students and Research Grants Committee. She is also the chairperson of the Sustainable Development Council of Kfar Saba. Orr was the first executive director of Life and Environment, the umbrella group for Israeli environmental organizations. She was appointed by the Israeli government to serve as a charter member of the National Committee for Environmental Quality. Additionally, Orr was among the founders of Green Course, Israel's largest environmental organization for students. Orr is the author of two books on environmental policy and has published widely on environmental policy and law both in academic and non-academic journals. She lives in Kfar Saba with her husband and their two young children.

David Krantz

David Krantz is the president and chairperson of the board of directors of the Green Zionist Alliance. A founding member of Jewcology.com, David also serves as a leadership fellow at COEJL: The Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life and as a member of the Cabinet and the board of directors of the American Zionist Movement. He completed his first master's degree at the University of California, Berkeley, and currently he's studying toward master's degrees in nonprofit management and Judaic studies at New York University.

Liore Milgrom-Elcott

Liore Milgrom-Elcott has worked as the chief of staff at Hazon and as the project manager at COEJL: The Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life, where she led national campaigns to engage the Jewish community on environmental action. Liore's environmental passions took root and grew as she spent summers camping in the backcountry of America's national parks, leading to degrees in natural resources and environmental economics from Cornell University. Through American Jewish World Service, she spent five months in Kanchipuram, India, teaching women's self-help groups and supporting tsunami relief efforts. Liore also has worked in the Dominican Republic and Mexico on environmental and social-justice projects.

Dr. Alon Tal

Dr. Alon Tal has degrees in political science from the University of North Carolina and law from Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He completed his doctoral studies at Harvard University, where he served as an adjunct faculty member from 1989—1998. He also has taught environmental law at Tel Aviv University, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and University of Otago in New Zealand. In 1990 Alon founded Adam Teva v'Din – the Israel Union for Environmental Defense, a public-interest advocacy group which is now Israel's second largest environmental organization. In 1996 he founded the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, where he served as director, and more recently as director of research. Alon has worked as a consultant to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and as an assistant to the attorney general of Israel. A founding board member of Friends of the Earth, Middle East, Alon served as chairman of Life and Environment, Israel's umbrella group for environmental organizations, from 1999—2004, and he is presently one of the GZA representatives on the board of directors of Keren Kayemet L'Yisrael. In 2005 Alon was awarded the Charles Bronfman Prize and in 1997 he won the Henry Ford European Conservation Award. In 2008 he co-founded Israel's Green Movement Party and today he serves as its chairman. Considered by many to be the leading environmentalist in Israeli history, Alon is a co-founder of the Green Zionist Alliance.

GZA delegates to the 36th World Zionist Congress

David Krantz

Dr. Richard Schwartz

Aviva Melissa Frank

GZA member of the Zionist General Counsel

Rabbi Matthew Earne

GZA representatives on the American Zionist Movement board of directors

David Krantz

Liore Milgrom-Elcott

GZA representatives on the Keren Kayemet L'Yisrael / Jewish National Fund (KKL-JNF) board of directors

Dr. Alon Tal

Dr. Orr Karassin

GZA Presidents & Chairpersons

Rabbi Michael Cohen

2001—2007

Noam Dolgin

2008

David Krantz

2009—present

GZA Executive Directors & Administrators

Alison Hill

2001—2003

Hal Klopper

2004—2006

Noam Dolgin

2007—2010

GZA Co-Founders

* Primary co-founder

Former GZA Board of Directors Members

Photographer

Chanan Getraide

Chanan lives on Kibbutz Shiller in Israel, where he focuses his lens on nature, industrial development and the interaction of people with technology. His work has been displayed in galleries throughout the United States and Israel.