David Frum is the Jewish Heritage Centre of Western Canada’s 6th Sol and Florence Kanee Annual Distinguished Lecturer. Previous speakers were historian Sir Martin Gilbert (The Jews of Arab Lands), Emory University Professor of History Dr. Debra Lipstadt (My Day in Court with David Irving), Hebrew University of Jerusalem Professor Emeritus Dr. Shlomo Avineri (Israel at 60), Rabbbi Dr. Chaim Rozwaski (Winnipeg to Berlin and Back), and in 2010, Ambassador Dore Gold (The Iranian Threat: Myths and Realities). Frum’s lecture Is time Running Out For Israel, however, could not be timelier.

As he has written recently in The Week, on cnn.com, the National Post, and on his blog frumforum.com, David Frum comments again about Libya and US involvement there. Quoted in the March 31 National Post, Frum says: “Obama’s stated policy on Libya, as detailed in a televised speech Tuesday, may be the most deceptively sold US military policy since Franklin Roosevelt’s ‘all aid short of war’ policy in 1941. Obama declared that US involvement is strictly humanitarian in nature, would not involve ground troops, is not US-led and does not include a commitment to oust Gaddafi.” The article can be read in its entirety at: http://www.frumforum.com/the-real-libya-policy-obama-wont-admit

The Distinguished Lecture is the JHC’s major annual fundraiser, and is but one of many of the organization’s projects. To share the history and experience of the Jews of Western Canada, the JHC develops exhibits. Presented in the Marion and Ed Vickar Jewish Museum located in the Goldberg Walkway of the Asper Jewish Community Campus, the exhibits change several times each year. In 2010, exhibits opened on Manitoba’s Jewish War Veterans and on the Jews of Thunder Bay. The exhibit Put a Face to the Name provided new information about previously unidentified photographs found in the JHC’s extensive archival collection. The Rabbi Peretz Weitzman Window outside the Holocaust Education Centre has recently been re-curated with new material that highlights Weitzman’s life. Six to eight lectures and panel discussions are offered each year. Recent programs have included Manitoba’s Jewish War Veterans, a screening of a documentary on antisemitism in Winnipeg entitled Paper Nazis, and a talk by Lynn Roseman entitled Things Your Mother Never Told You! What Cemeteries Can Teach Us About Manitoba Jewish History. In October 2010, Professor Lynne Marks of the University of Victoria delivered the second biennial endowed Switzer-Cooperstock Prize lecture. Professor Marks’ topic was Religion, Irreligion, and Jewish Identity in late 19th and early 20th Century British Columbia.

Individual tickets to David Frum’s Distinguished Lecture on April 28 at 8 pm at the Shaarey Zedek Synagogue are available through the JHC at 477-7460 or at jhcwc.org. $36, $24 seniors and students. Lecture sponsorships that include a tax receipt are available starting at $100. Please note that an American Sign Language interpreter will be present at the lecture.