Shira Zemel

Shira Zemel is the Director of the National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW)’s abortion access campaign, the coordinated Jewish movement for reproductive health, rights, and justice. Shira has led this work since before the fall of Roe v. Wade and the Dobbs decision, helping guide the Jewish community through the rapid and devastating shifts in abortion access nationwide.

In this role, Shira launched the Jewish Fund for Abortion Access, creating a national Jewish communal response to fund the complex, patchwork care patients need in a post-Roe landscape. She activates and mobilizes Jewish leaders and communities to take action for abortion access, trains clergy and lay leaders to bring Jewish values into the public square, and leads one of the largest faith-based abortion access efforts in the country.

Shira serves as president of the ARCH board, a local abortion fund serving patients in northern Virginia. When not getting into good trouble, she enjoys curating feminist yard signs for her front lawn, listening to politics podcasts, and tackling seasonal craft projects—preferably with her two young kids.