How does one begin to describe Jane Goodall’s legacy to the world?
Few people in history have saved more individual animals or wildlife species from extinction and restored or protected more environments. In fact, conservation of the environment has been globally defined by her measures and moral compass.
Goodall, who died on Oct. 1 at the age of 91, was a U.N. messenger of peace, founder of the Jane Goodall Institute and a Dame of the British Empire. She touched millions upon millions of lives and inspired a love of nature for generations.
In 65 years of her field research observing chimpanzee cultures at the Gombe Stream Reserve (now a UNESCO World Heritage Site), she revolutionized the natural sciences and humanities, opening career paths for women. She was a groundbreaking scientist, conservationist, humanitarian, ethologist, anthropologist and nature-rights activist.
It is an immense public loss. But for me, it is also a very personal one.
My story with Jane began when I was in high school, an avid young naturalist obsessed with reading books about nature and wildlife.
One title in my library was her work, In the Shadow of Man. I saw on its final page a list of addresses of the various Jane Goodall Institutes. I contacted a few of the offices. The organizations in Germany and the United Kingdom forwarded my letters to Jane; it turns out that she was excited to hear of my love of frogs and wetland protection.
From then on, she started directly communicating with me. She encouraged me to establish her “Roots & Shoots” environmental humanitarian movement for youth in the State of Israel.
I told her that I was heartbroken to see a wetland next to my school in Herzliya being drained for real estate purposes, so I took action. I approached the then-mayor, Yael German, and asked her to protect the wetlands for the endangered species living there. She asked me to tell her what rare species I was referring to. I said the IUCN (International Union for the Conservation of Nature) red-listed the endangered Syrian cat-eyed spadefooted frog (or Syrian spadefoot toad).
Scientists from Tel Aviv University confirmed my observations, and the mayor fought for nine years to stop its development. Now Herzliya Park, it is a municipal reserve and recreation area. Jane loved how a frog with a funny name could save an ecosystem at risk of extinction in Israel.
Jane shared that story in some of her lectures and requested more updates on my activities over the years. It led me into a life of wanting to spread her message that “every individual matters, every individual has a role to play, and every individual makes a difference.”
From then on, Roots & Shoots began with my coordinating beach clean-ups and raising awareness about chimpanzees suffering at the hands of humans. This led to my meeting Jane in person for the first time in 2002, when I was invited by Fauna Foundation chimpanzee sanctuary in Chambly, Montreal, Canada. At the sanctuary, I met their resident chimpanzees, saved from horrific biomedical research and given a lifetime safe home.
She was able to convince the directors of the National Institutes of Health to stop chimpanzees from being used in biomedical work. In 2013, Congress passed the CHIMP Act for laboratory chimpanzees to be transferred to federal sanctuaries for the remainder of their lives.
Jane loved Israel and the Middle East, with Jerusalem as the religious heart of the world. She felt it was truly symbolic for humanity that peace be manifested there. Her Roots & Shoots youth movement for projects supporting humans, wildlife and the environment embodies positive action for peace.
She knew the history of Israel and the Palestinians, and longed for both to have self-determination and a sustainable existence.
After the horrors of the Hamas-led massacre in Jewish communities in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Jane immediately exhibited her concern, which continued through the war. She lit candles for our health, praying for peace. She sent us messages of strength while we huddled in bomb shelters as ballistic missiles flew from Iran last June. Both the parents and grandparents of a Jane Goodall Institute Israel colleague from the Max Stern Yezreel Valley College were murdered on Oct. 7, and Jane wrote her a long, comforting letter on such an unimaginable loss.
Jane wanted to establish the Jane Goodall Institute of Israel since the time we first met, but once I found the enriching academic home of the Max Stern Yezreel Valley College, we knew this was the place. Located downhill from Nazareth and up the road from Armageddon, Jane loved the symbolism of it for promoting her legacy and vision for Israel and the region. With JGI Israel based at the college, students and faculty conduct projects, research and exhibits that fulfill her dream of historic ecological restoration, sustainable living, acknowledgement of the wildlife/ecosystem rights and cultures from modern day to prehistoric times, showing that we are all connected.
The college students sprout rare and endangered endemic Israeli wildflower, bush and tree seeds, and plant them in our ecological restoration plots on campus and in the field. They also create frog/toad, papyrus and lily ponds as part of our wetland restoration, as described in Jane Goodall’s Israel Institute inauguration video, attached at a conference in 2022.
She was deeply concerned with the status of ecosystem collapse and species extinction in Israel and the region. She called for a historic ecological restoration plan for Israel to be expanded to the entire region, with replanting open savannah acacia woodland in the desert south, and diverse species Mediterranean forests in the center and north, cut down by the Ottomans to build the Transjordan Railroad. This, along with reflooding wetlands drained during the British Mandate period and by Jewish pioneers arriving back in Israel after the Holocaust.
Through the years, Jane was equally concerned with the destruction of the Amazon rainforest as she was with relic wetlands still being drained for development in Israel. She always mentioned nature as a source of healing for the heart, mind and soul—demonstrating how all living beings have the spark of life and should be treated with respect.
The college aims to translate her books into both Hebrew and Arabic. We look forward to keeping and promoting her legacy.
