AFHU's Annual Leadership Educational Forum (ALEF) was held during the weekend of January 15, 2005, at the Four Seasons Resort in Palm Beach, Florida. American Friends from coast to coast gathered to hear from world-renowned Hebrew University scientists and scholars, plus international leaders and experts in diversified fields ranging from biomedicine to Middle East relations. Assorted exciting activities were planned for this weekend conference, to which American Friends and the public were invited.

At Saturday evening's gala dinner on January 15th, American Friends payed tribute to the philanthropists Joy and Jerry Weinberger of Cleveland and Palm Beach. Professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard University was a special guest speaker. The co-chairs for this black-tie event were Barbara and Ira Eichner.

On Sunday, January 16th, a full day educational conference themed "Shaping the World of Tomorrow" offered ALEF guests a chance to hear from, and interact with an array of distinguished and dynamic speakers including: The Honorable Dan Gillerman, Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations; Ambassador Efraim Halevy, head of the Center for Strategic and Policy Studies at the School of Public Policy and former head of Israel's Mossad; Professor Eyal Ben-Ari, director of The Harry S. Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace; Richard Ben-Veniste, prominent attorney and member of 9/11 Commission; Professor Hillel Bercovier, vice president of Research and Development and an expert on terrorism; Professor Hagai Bergman, of the Interdisciplinary Center for Neural Computation and a specialist in Parkinson's disease research; Ambassador William Brown, former United States Ambassador to Israel; Professor Sergio Dellapergola, of the Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry; Professor Alan Dershowitz, Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School; Professor Rachel Elior, John and Golda Cohen Chair of Jewish Philosophy; and Professor Menachem Magidor, president of The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. For photos of these distinguished speakers, click here.

Program co-chairs for the Sunday forum were Stanley Bogen and George Schieren, both of whom are members of AFHU's national board.

On the morning of January 17th, AFHU held its national board of directors meeting.