Newly named to The Jerusalem Post’s 25 ViZionaries, the Emmy Award–winning actor and filmmaker turned full-time advocate on why the Jewish people have always answered hatred with joy — and why the fight belongs to today’s teenagers as much as anyone.

There are pro-Israel voices, and then there are the rare few you actually believe. Yuval David is one of the believable ones. Watch him for five minutes — on a news panel, at a rally, in the comment-section trenches — and the thing that comes through is not talking points. It’s conviction. “I’m glad you can sense the BS,” he says with a laugh when I tell him as much. “I can as well. In fact, I now call it out professionally.”

Courtesy  Aaron Herman

The wider Jewish world has taken notice. The Jerusalem Post and Jewish National Fund-USA recently named Yuval one of their 25 ViZionaries — the annual roster of the most influential young Zionists making their mark in Israel advocacy, Jewish life and beyond. “Proudly Jewish. Proudly Zionist. And deeply grateful,” he wrote of the honor. For David, though, the label reads less like a title than a set of marching orders.

Calling it out is, these days, close to a full-time job. Yuval is a celebrated actor, host and filmmaker — an Emmy winner with more than 100 international film festival awards to his name — whose creative mantra is simply “to entertain, uplift and inspire.” His most recent documentary, Wonderfully Made – LGBTQ R(eligion), has swept the festival circuit, and his acting credits stretch across Feud, Madam Secretary and The Plot Against America. But since October 7, the storyteller has become something else entirely.

“October 7th absolutely changed my world,” he tells me. “I became much more of a professional Jew than ever before — a full-time Jew, whether it’s in media, in government affairs, or just walking down the street.” The reason, he says, is refusal. “I refuse to let anybody’s hate silence me. I refuse to let anybody’s discomfort with who I am........

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