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At its annual dinner, the Orthodox Union (OU) honored two organizations that have made a positive impact on Jewish life in North America: Yachad/NJCD (National Jewish Council for Disabilities) and Schreiber Foods Inc.

The OU's 111th annual dinner and awards presentation took place at the Hudson Theater and Millennium Broadway Hotel in New York Dec. 6 and featured Michael Oren, Israel's Ambassador to the United States, as its keynote speaker.

Celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, Yachad has over the past quarter century provided social, education, and recreational resources for Jewish youth and young adults with disabilities throughout North America. As of today, Yachad has nearly 50 chapters in communities across the continent.

Tikvah Juni, who has been a longtime Yachad member, delivered the evening's d'var Torah, in which she spoke about how the organization has helped create a more diverse and inclusive Jewish community for young people like her.

"Yachad has offered me many opportunities to learn and grow in a community of friends," she said in her remarks, which were received with a standing ovation.

Schreiber Foods Inc., a dairy company with headquarters in Green Bay, Wis., was honored with OU's National Kashrut Leadership Award.

Scheiber, whose sales reach in excess of $4 billion annually, produces dairy products from cream cheese to yogurt, which are then sold through customer brand distribution programs.

The award was accepted by Michael Haddad, president and CEO of Schreiber, on behalf of the company.

Dr. Heschel Raskas, the current treasurer of the Board of Trustees of The Jewish Federations of North America and whose family's business Raskas Foods, Inc. was acquired by Schreiber in 2002, praised the company's dedication to kashrut.

"Each CEO has strongly maintained and strengthened its commitment to kashrus and its relationship with the Orthodox Union," Raskas said of Schreiber.

Following the awards, Oren spoke about the U.S.-Israel relationship and his experience as Israel's ambassador to the U.S. over the past six months, since he was first selected by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to serve in this highly visible spot.

Oren recalled that when Netanyahu first asked him serve in this position, he said to Oren: "Oy, you are going to have a hard job."

This refrain was then reiterated by Ehud Barak, Israel's defense minister and Avigdor Lieberman, the foreign minister.

Oren, who before joining the Netanyahu government was a prominent scholar of the Middle East and American foreign policy and has spent decades researching and writing about the U.S.-Israel alliance, was perplexed on why everyone kept saying this to him as the U.S.-Israel alliance was so deeply rooted that it went back all the way to the founding of America.

The puritans, Oren said, thought of America as the "promised land" and as themselves as the "new Jews." As new Jews, the Puritans felt that it was incumbent to support the "old Jews."

When the state of Israel was established in 1948, the connection solidified as the world's oldest democracy allied itself with the emergent democracy in a characteristically un-democratic region, according to Oren.

After the Six-Day War of 1967, the strategic alliance between the two countries was born, he said.

Yet, when he was selected to serve as Israel's liaison to the United States, a potential fissure seemed to be on the horizon, Oren said. The American people had elected President Barack Obama, whose administration was "center and center-left," while the Israeli public elected Netanyahu, whose coalition was "center and center-right."

Early on differences emerged between the governments over the issues of a two-state solution, Israeli settlements, and the Iranian threat, Oren recalled.

Yet any potential conflict between the two countries over these issues was avoided, Oren said.

"We have largely succeeded in closing the gaps and bridging the differences between the U.S. and Israel," he said.

On the issue of the two-state solution, Oren recounted how Netanyahu has come out in favor of a Palestinian state, albeit one that is demilitarized and conditioned on Palestinian recognition of "the Jewish people as a people with a historic claim for a sovereign state in Eretz Yisrael."

On the question of settlements, Oren said that any potential conflict was avoided after Netanyahu's declaration of a 10-month settlement freeze, which did not extend to Jerusalem and did not include "natural growth."

And on the issue of Iran, Oren said "much of Israel's fears were allayed" after Netanyahu's meeting with Obama in Washington, D.C. this past May. According to Oren, at that meeting Obama pledged that engagement with the Iranian government would not be opened-ended and that if there is no progress after a year then "crippling sanctions" would be imposed. Oren added that Obama told Netanyahu that if these tactics did not change Iranian behavior, then "all options were on the table."

"To this day, there has been no daylight [between] our positions on Iran," he said.

Oren said that although he has spent his entire career thinking about the alliance between the U.S. and Israel, it wasn't until he began his current job that he realized just how deep that alliance went.

"What you don't see is what goes on behind the scenes," Oren said, detailing instances of military, academic, and commercial interaction between the nations.

"Does this mean that we agree on everything?" he asked rhetorically. "No, we don't agree on everything, but the great test of an alliance is how you deal with those differences."