About Me


Rabbi Mishael Zion

Mishael is the co-director and Director of Education at the Bronfman Fellowships, where he oversees the education of new fellows in the Israeli and American fellowships, as well as works with the global alumni community of nearly 1,000.
Mishael grew up in Jerusalem, served in the Israel Defense Forces and studied at Yeshivat Maale Gilboa and Hebrew University. He is the co-author of the celebrated A Night to Remember: The Haggadah of Contemporary Voices (English, 2007) and the Israeli best-seller HaLaila HaZeh: Haggadah Yisraelit (Hebrew, 2004). With roots in both the Israeli and American Jewish communities, Mishael is dedicated to pluralistic Jewish identity and community building in both Israel and North America. He served as faculty at the Shalom Hartman Institute and the Pardes Institute in Jerusalem, was the Director and National Coach of the Israeli Debating Society, and worked for Israeli TV’s popular Channel Two. In 2011 Mishael received his rabbinic ordination from Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, an open Orthodox rabbinical school. Mishael has been a faculty member at the Skirball Center for Adult Jewish Learning and Yeshivat Hadar in New York and in 2010 was invited to serve as a Scholar at NYU School of Law’s Tikvah Center. He has been featured as a scholar-in-residence in diverse North American communities and has written for the NY Jewish Week, the Jerusalem Post and Yedioth Ahronot. Mishael and his wife Elana, a neuroscientist, are committed to furthering inclusivity and broadening women’s roles in synagogue and Jewish life. They have played an active role in partnership minyanim in Jerusalem, New York and Melbourne, Australia. Mishael blogs at Text and the City and in 2013 was named one of ten “Rabbis to Watch” by Newsweek/the Daily Beast.