New Israel Fund Celebrates Libby Lenkinski’s Fourteen Years of Leadership as She Launches Albi

For the last fourteen years, Libby Lenkinski has served as the New Israel Fund’s (NIF) Vice President of Public Engagement, where she became one of NIF’s most visible, trusted, and creative voices. Libby has been a primary NIF spokesperson in the U.S. and globally, helping to shape the way countless people understand and connect to Israel-Palestine.

As the leader of NIF’s public engagement efforts, Libby has been a translator and synthesizer of complex political dynamics; a vital conduit between changemakers on the ground and audiences around the world; and, for so many in the NIF community, a kind of “Israel therapist,” helping people wrestle with what it means to stay in deep, values-driven relationship with a complex and often painful reality. She has infused storytelling into the work of social change in innovative ways, and has built bridges between Israeli cultural leaders, activists, artists, and people around the world who support democracy, equality, and justice for all.

NIF CEO Daniel Sokatch expressed his deep gratitude for Libby’s extraordinary contributions: “Libby has made a huge contribution to the work of the New Israel Fund. She has brought tremendous clarity and creativity to our messaging and public facing work, she’s become a trusted and beloved figure to our supporters, and she has helped us reach new audiences around the world. We are grateful for her leadership, and though we will miss her dearly, we are also thrilled to see her take the next step in her remarkable journey.”

Reflecting on her time at NIF, Libby said: “I am deeply grateful for the New Israel Fund community, with whom I have had the privilege of working for more than a decade. Across hundreds of webinars and events around the country, the most common question has always been: ‘What can we do?’—a reflection of the profound commitment and conscience at the heart of this community. I will always be proud of moments like the Haaretz conference almost ten years ago, when MK Ayman Odeh moved the room to tears and standing ovations multiple times. I am equally proud that the very same group of donors who rushed to support displaced families immediately after October 7th came back less than a year later with well over three million dollars in humanitarian and food aid for Gaza.

“The NIF teams—in Israel, led by Mickey Gitzin and Rachel Liel, and in the U.S., some of whom I had the joy of helping to bring on board—are simply the best in the world. I will never be far from this work or this community. My hope is that the work I continue to do in culture and storytelling will be a meaningful contribution to the extraordinary infrastructure that NIF has built, globally and on the ground, for nearly half a century.

“This is a moment of profound upheaval, as authoritarianism rises, words are weaponized, and silence itself feels like complicity. But in this moment, as in so many others, NIF is a North Star, the boldest and most consistent champion of democracy, equality, and justice in Israel-Palestine. I’ve always believed in the power of storytelling to shape realities and drive social change.”

Last year, Lenkinski launched Albi—a cultural fund, institute, and lab that is an independent 501(c)(3) under NIF’s umbrella. Albi’s mission is to harness the power of culture to shift narratives, spark imagination, and drive change in and about Israel-Palestine.

Albi supports filmmakers, artists, and storytellers—Palestinian and Jewish—who are trying to widen the lens: to challenge the narrative fortress that says this is a zero-sum game, to replace stuckness with political imagination, and to create the cultural groundwork for equality, justice, and co-resistance. It is a creative insurgency, a lighthouse for those telling the stories that aren’t supposed to be told.