Yosef I. Abramowitz

Yosef I. Abramowitz, better known as Yossi, lived in Israel as a child from 1969 to 1972, that brief moment between a miraculous and swift Israeli military victory and a humbling and costly war. The optimistic post-1967 character of Israel was deeply imprinted on Yossi’s soul, and since his departure for Boston in 1972 at the age of eight, his sense of Jewish possibilities and power in the service of values has never been tempered.

The gift of early Hebrew fluency, followed by attendance at the Solomon Schechter School of Greater Boston, created a base of Jewish knowledge. Yossi found a home for his restless soul and an extended family of Jewish do-gooders at Young Judea. For 25 years he has considered himself a Young Judean, having served in leadership capacities at three YJ camps. At Boston University, where he majored in Jewish Public Policy, he was elected chair of the World Union of Jewish Students (WUJS) and led the international student movement on behalf of Soviet Jewry. In addition, he worked on an international campaign for the reunification of Ethiopian Jewry and participated in an international conference in Ashkelon with the goal of rescuing the remaining Jewish community of Yemen.

Toward the end of his chairmanship of WUJS, Yossi felt that the Jewish people were about to win the major “oppressed Jewry battles” and that it would be necessary to strategize what would animate students in the future. The WUJS international student executive committee resolved that it would be Judaism itself. Yossi has devoted the past 18 years to acting on that insight. After serving in the Israel Defense Forces during the first intifada, Yossi was awarded a Wexner Graduate Fellowship to pursue a Masters in journalism from Columbia University and to take courses at the Jewish Theological Seminary and Hebrew Union College. His first major job was as Senior Editor at Moment Magazine.

He and former Moment publisher Sue Laden later followed their dream of starting a national Jewish parenting magazine. Jewish Family & Life! was launched in March 1996. JewishFamily.com was launched later that year, the first webzine in Jewish history. This was followed by the bestselling Jewish Family & Life: Traditions, Holidays and Values for Today’s Parents and Children (Golden Books, 1997), which Yossi co-authored with his wife, Rabbi Susan Silverman. The book’s emphasis is on Judaism as life-affirming and relevant to people’s lives.

In his role as CEO of Jewish Family & Life!, Yossi co-founded with the Avi Chai Foundation the BabagaNewz Jewish Values Initiative, which is being used in over 1,000 Jewish schools. With Hebrew College, he coproduced MyJewishLearning.com. He also co-founded the Jskyway.com

distance professional development program for Jewish educators. With Martin Kaminer, he co-produced Jewish Web Week, among other new Jewish media endeavors. Together, these initiatives reach record

numbers of Jews. Yossi lives outside of Boston with his wife and four children, Aliza, Hallel, Adar, and Ashira.