About the Event 

The third annual Andrew H. Siegal Memorial Lecture took place on Thursday, October 17. The Center for Jewish Civilization’s Professor Danielle Pletka spoke about “The Bystander Effect: When Bad Things Happen in the World and No One Cares.” CJC Director and Rabbi Harold White Professor of Jewish Civilization Jacques Berlinerblau provided introductory remarks and thanked the Andrew Siegal Foundation for its ongoing support of the CJC. Professor Pletka then began her urgent call to action against global injustices, and decried the ongoing lack of response to current issues, such as the ethnic cleansing campaign against Rohingya Muslims and the internment of Muslim Uighurs in China. Pletka ended her compelling lecture by asserting her belief that “the world will be a better place when we [the United States] lead.

About the Speaker 

Danielle Pletka is the Andrew H. Siegal Professor at the Center for Jewish Civilization in the Walsh School of Foreign Service. She is also the Senior Vice President for foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Before joining AEI, Ms. Pletka was a longtime senior professional staff member for the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, where she specialized in the Near East and South Asia.

Ms. Pletka has authored, coauthored, and coedited a variety of studies and book chapters, including the report “Tehran Stands Atop the Syria-Iran Alliance” (Atlantic Council, 2017), and the chapter “America in Decline” in Debating the Obama Presidency (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016).