I was born in Ein Karem, Jerusalem. My grandfather was a Chief Rabbi. I have spent more than 40 years leading Jewish organizational groups to places that carry the weight of our history. I have stood with federation missions at Auschwitz-Birkenau and with donor groups at the Mellah of Fez. I have walked the Sephardic quarter of Dubrovnik with groups who did not know a Jewish community had been established there in 1408, and watched people reorganize their understanding of Jewish history in real time.
What I know from those 40 years is this: the quality of a Jewish organizational group trip is almost entirely a function of preparation and intention. A well-prepared group will be transformed by even a short program. An underprepared group will have a pleasant trip and come home without the experience your organization was trying to provide.
Here is what 40 years of running these programs has taught me about how to do them right.
Types of Jewish Organizational Programs
Jewish organizational group travel takes several distinct forms, and each one has a different purpose, a different ideal structure, and a different ideal destination set.
Federation missions are the oldest and most established form. A federation brings a group of community leaders, major donors, and organizational stakeholders to Israel or to a diaspora destination to see the work the federation funds in context. The mission is both a cultivation tool and a leadership development experience. Participants come back with a deeper understanding of why the federation’s work matters and a stronger peer bond with the other leaders in the group.
Donor trips are more tightly focused on cultivation. A nonprofit or federation brings a small group of existing or prospective major donors to a destination whose connection to the organization’s mission is explicit. The goal is experiential philanthropy: making the cause real in a way that a gala or a phone call cannot. I wrote about these at more length in the piece on nonprofit donor trip planning.
Leadership tours bring boards of directors, committee chairs, or organizational officers to a destination where the program is designed around professional and organizational development as much as heritage experience. These often include structured sessions, briefings from Israeli or diaspora community leaders, and deliberate conversations about the organization’s own direction and priorities.
Holocaust commemoration trips are the most emotionally significant programs in the portfolio. These bring groups to Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, France, or other sites of European Jewish history specifically to mark the memory of what was lost and to create an experience of Jewish continuity in the face of that loss. March of the Living is the most well-known example of this format, but independent organizational programs often run a more intimate and more customized version of the same experience.
Destinations by Program Type
The portfolio of Jewish heritage destinations I work with across 40 years is broad. Not every destination is right for every program type. Here is how I think about the match.
Israel is the right destination for almost every program type. Federation missions, donor trips, leadership tours, and many commemoration programs all use Israel as either a primary or supplementary destination. The range of experiences available and the depth of connection to Jewish identity and history makes it the most versatile destination in the portfolio.
Poland is the primary Holocaust commemoration destination. Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial, the Krakow Jewish Quarter, the Nozyk Synagogue, the Treblinka memorial site. A three or four-day program in Poland, either standalone or as a companion to an Israel program, produces the most significant single-experience transformation I have seen in Jewish organizational travel.
Germany and the Netherlands add important dimensions to Holocaust commemoration programs. Berlin’s Jewish history, the Wannsee House, the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam. These destinations work well for groups that want to understand the European dimension of the Shoah beyond the Polish sites.
Morocco is the most underused destination in the portfolio for Jewish organizational groups, and the one I am most personally enthusiastic about. Before 1948, 250,000 Jews lived in Morocco. The Mellah neighborhoods of Fez and Marrakech, the synagogues, the cemeteries, the story of how King Mohammed V refused to enforce Vichy anti-Jewish laws during World War II: this is a story most American Jewish donors and leaders do not know. Arriving at a story you do not know is exactly the right state for a transformative organizational trip.
Spain and Portugal carry the Sephardic heritage story. The expulsion of 1492, the converso communities, and the remarkable survival of Jewish identity in Belmonte, Portugal, where a community of conversos maintained hidden Jewish practice for 500 years after the expulsion. The Sephardic quarter of Toledo, the Grand Synagogue of Cordoba. These destinations work well for organizations with a Sephardic focus or for groups that want the full arc of Diasporic Jewish history.
Turkey holds a piece of the Sephardic story that most people miss. When Ferdinand and Isabella expelled the Jews from Spain in 1492, the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid II welcomed them. The Balat neighborhood of Istanbul has been a Jewish quarter since that welcome. For groups that want to understand Jewish-Muslim relations in a historical and non-adversarial context, Turkey is a powerful destination.
Italy carries the story of the oldest continuous Jewish communities in Europe. The Roman ghetto, established in 1555. The Venice ghetto, the original use of the word “ghetto.” The synagogues of Rome, Venice, and Florence. For organizations whose constituency has Italian Jewish roots, or for groups interested in the ancient dimension of Jewish European history, Italy is the right destination.
Croatia surprises most groups. The Dubrovnik synagogue, established in 1408, is the second-oldest active synagogue in Europe. The small but continuous Jewish community of a city most visitors experience only for its walls and its Adriatic beauty adds a dimension that stays with people.
East and Central Europe form a natural triangle: Prague’s Josefov quarter, Budapest’s Dohany Street Synagogue (the largest in Europe), and the broader landscape of Central European Jewish life and loss. These three cities can be combined in a five to seven-day program that covers the full range from medieval Jewish intellectual life to 20th-century destruction to contemporary revival.
France (Alsace) carries a distinct regional Jewish history, the communities of the Alsatian villages, the Dreyfus Affair context, and the eastern French Jewish heritage that is separate from the Parisian Jewish experience.
The Heritage Tours Difference: Dina’s Personal Connection
I say this not to promote myself but because it is operationally relevant to what you are deciding: when you work with Heritage Tours, you are working with someone who grew up inside the story your group is coming to experience.
I was born in Ein Karem. My grandfather was a Chief Rabbi. My understanding of what Jewish organizational leaders need to feel and understand when they encounter these places is not academic. It comes from being shaped by these places.
What that means practically: I can brief your guide in a way that goes beyond logistics. I can help you sequence a program so that the emotional weight lands where it should. I can tell you which synagogue in Prague will stop a group in its tracks and which one will feel like a museum. I can tell you what to do with a group on the afternoon after Auschwitz, and I know from experience because I have been the person walking with groups on that afternoon many times.
The guide briefing is the single most important pre-trip conversation in any Jewish organizational program. What I bring to that briefing is 40 years of having been in the room when things worked and when they did not.
Program Design for Jewish Organizational Groups
The principles I apply consistently across program types:
One emotionally significant experience per day, at most. Concentration of heavy experiences produces numbness, not depth. A program that takes groups to Auschwitz in the morning, a Warsaw memorial in the afternoon, and a synagogue visit in the evening is not a richer program. It is an overloaded one.
Build in unstructured time. Jewish organizational groups benefit from the informal conversations that happen over a shared meal or a walk through a neighborhood. Program every moment and you lose the space where the most important exchanges actually happen.
Match the guide’s background to the group’s needs. A federation mission benefits from a guide with deep knowledge of Israeli civil society and the federation-connected organizations working in Israel. A Holocaust commemoration trip benefits from a guide who has personal family history in the region and can speak from that place. A Sephardic heritage tour requires a specialist who knows the Ottoman Jewish history, not a generalist who has read the Wikipedia entry.
End with connection forward, not just memory backward. The most effective programs close with a ceremony or a conversation that links what the group has experienced to what they are going back to do. What does the history you have just encountered ask of you now? That question, asked well, is what produces the organizational commitment and the increased giving that donors and federation professionals associate with well-run programs.
Practical: Kosher Catering, Shabbat, Hebrew-Speaking Guides
Kosher catering is available in all major Heritage Tours destinations. In Israel, it is standard. In Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, Turkey, Morocco, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and throughout East and Central Europe, we work with restaurants and caterers who can accommodate the group’s requirements. The level of kashrut, from mehadrin to basic kosher certification, should be communicated at the planning stage so the right arrangements are made.
Shabbat programming requires intentional design. For groups traveling to Israel, Shabbat can be one of the program’s most significant experiences: Friday evening at the Western Wall, a Shabbat dinner at a private venue, a Saturday morning walk through Jerusalem’s quieter streets. For groups in Poland or Central Europe, Shabbat services at an active synagogue, where a small but living community maintains regular davening, can be one of the most moving elements of a commemoration trip.
Hebrew-speaking guides are available in Israel and, for Israeli-born guides who work across Heritage Tours’ European portfolio, in select other destinations. We brief every guide in advance on the group’s composition, the organization’s mission, and the specific objectives of the program.
FAQ
How far in advance should a Jewish organization book a group trip?
Twelve months is the standard for programs of 20 or more. Six months is the absolute minimum. Hotel blocks at quality properties in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv fill up well in advance, and the same is true for peak periods in Krakow and Prague. Early planning also allows proper guide selection and briefing.
Can we combine Israel with a European destination in one trip?
Yes, and we do it regularly. The most common combination is Israel with Poland, particularly for organizations running Holocaust commemoration programs that want to end in Israel with a sense of Jewish continuity and revival. A seven to ten-day program that begins in Poland and ends in Jerusalem is one of the most powerful itinerary structures in the portfolio.
What is the right group size for a federation mission?
20 to 35 participants is the range where these programs work best. Large enough to create a genuine communal feeling. Small enough that the program director can maintain meaningful contact with every participant and the group does not fragment.
How do you handle a group with mixed levels of Jewish background and knowledge?
Through guide briefing and program design. A guide who knows that half the group has deep Hebrew school backgrounds and half have almost none will calibrate explanations accordingly. Mixed-background groups often produce the most interesting conversations, because participants educate each other in informal ways. The program design should create space for those conversations.
Can a Jewish organizational group trip incorporate meetings with Israeli leaders or diaspora community figures?
Yes. This is a standard element of federation missions and leadership tours. We arrange briefings with NGO directors, municipal officials, educators, and community leaders whose work is connected to the organization’s mission. These meetings require lead time and are best confirmed well in advance of the trip.
If you are planning a federation mission, a leadership tour, a Holocaust commemoration program, or a donor trip in any of these destinations, reach out through our contact page and we will start with the program brief. You can also read more about Dina’s background and Heritage Tours’ approach to understand how we approach these programs from the inside. For organizations specifically thinking about the cultivation dimension of group travel, the piece on nonprofit donor trip planning is the right starting point.