On May 12 the “American Jewish Committee (AJC) formalized their partnership with CyberWell to understand, respond to, and prevent online antisemitism.”
We are extremely knowledgeable about CyberWell as our daughter (Lara Portnoy) started working for it before it was even an NGO. Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor, the woman who had the foresight to see that the social media platforms were seething with Jew-hatred, knew that there had to be some way to track this hate speech and work against it. She had the vision but needed help starting an NGO from scratch.
One of her friends, who had worked with our daughter at the Peres Center for Peace in Yafo, Israel, said, “I know who you need,” and introduced Tal-Or to our Lara. They have now been working together for almost five years to stop online Jew-hatred. They have grown from the formation of a nonprofit that included just the two of them to a thriving nonprofit that is doing exactly what they set out to do: tracking Jew-hatred and working with digital platforms to stop the spread of online hate. There are now 14 people who are working together to find it, identify it, contact the social media platforms with the evidence, educate others and work to get it removed.
It is not easy to deal with hate every day. It is not easy to live in a war zone and work from a bomb shelter. But these two and their wonderful team of analysts and employees keep working to help ensure the safety of the Jewish people throughout the world.
We were so proud to read that the AJC has recognized the importance of CyberWell. We are so proud of both Tal-Or and our daughter, Lara, for the hard work and persistence they have put forth to make the world a better place.
Sometimes a Jewish mother and father just have to kvell. We kvell for the entire CyberWell staff. Yasher Koach. From strength to strength.