Opening the event, Board CEO Michele Goldman described Ossip’s presidency as one of the most consequential and demanding in the organisation’s history. “No president has led through a period as consequential, demanding and challenging as the one that David has navigated,” she said. Ossip assumed the presidency in 2022, entering the role at a time when few could have anticipated what lay ahead. He said Ossip had consistently found the strength to tell Australia what it needed to hear: that the Jewish community had been badly failed and that meaningful change was required. He led government engagement and media advocacy while helping coordinate security, community support and responses to rapidly unfolding events.