Good Tuesday morning. In today’s edition of Your Daily Phil, we report on theAnti-Defamation League’s 2023 annual audit, which found record-high numbers of antisemitic activity spurred by Oct. 7 attacks, and a new campaign by theAcademic Engagement Networkto provide tools to university faculty to combat antisemitism. We feature an opinion piece byPhilip Bendheimabout the unique benefits offered by older volunteers. Also in this newsletter:Emma Tsurkov,Alexandra CohenandIsraeli PresidentIsaac Herzog.We’ll start with the Israeli relief groupSmartAidproviding thousands of tents to Palestinians ..read more

The Israeli humanitarian tech aid nonprofit SmartAid has provided thousands of tents to civilians in Gaza in partnership with an American relief group, which its founder claims makes it the only Israeli non-government organization to distribute aid in the Strip since the Oct. 7 terror attacks. “We have helped build three refugee camps; it is thousands of tents,” Shachar Zahavi, founding director of SmartAid told eJewishPhilanthropy. “We have experience in war-torn areas for decades —this is a whole different ball game.” Working with partners whose logistics infrastructures are spread across ..read more

In one day, Chava David, 80, can experience a range of emotions as she volunteers in the Shaare Zedek Medical Center branch of Yad Sarah, Israel’s largest medical nonprofit. In one moment, she finds herself crying with the distressed mother of a wounded soldier who needs rehabilitation after fighting in Gaza. Only a few minutes later, she takes part in the joy of childbirth when a new father comes in to borrow a car seat and crib. David thinks she is well-equipped for this emotional roller coaster because of the ups and downs in the trajectory of her own life. Born in Europe amid the storm o ..read more

When Professor Ron Hassner made the decision to stage a sit-in protest at his University of California, Berkeley office until the school’s administration agreed to take seriously rising campus antisemitism, several other local professors were inspired to visit the professor of political science in solidarity as he ate and slept in his office — and taught class from there — for two weeks. Encouraged by Hassner’s activism and the support he received from other concerned faculty, the Academic Engagement Network on Tuesday announced it will coordinate a national campaign called the Faculty Again ..read more

Even before the Oct. 7 terror attacks and ensuing wave of antisemitic and anti-Israel attacks and rhetoric around the world, 2023 was on track to see the largest number of reported antisemitic incidents on record, according to the Anti-Defamation League’s annual Audit of Antisemitic Incidents, which was released on Tuesday. According to the ADL’s tally, there were 8,873 antisemitic incidents across the United States in 2023, nearly 2.5 times the 3,698 events recorded in 2022, which was at the time the largest number on record. The majority of the incidents —5,204 of them; far more than in al ..read more

Good Monday morning. In today’s edition ofYour Daily Phil, we interview the new CEO of the Zionist Federation of Australia,Alon Cassuto, about the challenges facing Jews “down under” and report on last week’s episode of“Get Your Phil”withRon Halber, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington. In the latest installment ofeJewishPhilanthropy’s opinion column“The 501(c) Suite,”Mark Charendoffshares his thoughts on “the end of history” and new beginnings in the context of Passover and the war in Israel. Also in this newsletter:David Brooks,Josh ProtasandJo ..read more

Alon Cassuto stepped into his role as chief executive of the Zionist Federation of Australia during one of the most tumultuous periods in the roughly 200-year history of the country’s formal Jewish community, just a few weeks after the Oct. 7 terror attacks as anti-Israel and antisemitic acts, speech and demonstrations were raging across the continent. Protests against Israel began almost immediately after the massacres, including a particularly infamous one outside the Sydney Opera House, where the Israeli flag had been projected, in which the crowd menacingly chanted “Where are the Jews ..read more

The additional staff member hired by the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington for its education department was meant to free up the director for higher level initiatives. Instead, since Oct. 7, its been an all-hands-on-deck as the organization has scrambled to respond to over 100 antisemitic incidents in schools, the JCRCs executive director, Ron Halber, told eJewishPhilanthropy Managing Editor Judah Ari Gross in the latest installment of Get Your Phil. We have responded in this region to over 100 anti-Semitic incidents since the war started. And it could be a teacher ina ..read more

In eJewishPhilanthropy’s exclusive opinion column “The 501(C) Suite,” leading foundation executives share what they are working on and thinking about with the wider philanthropic field.  In 1989, Francis Fukuyama wrote an essay in the National Interest called The End of History?” In this essay, Fukuyama argued that human history is linear and we had evolved over time to humanity’s final form: liberal democracy.  It was an appealing notion. After a war-torn century, full of great struggles among great powers, the end of the Cold War inspired a sense that we were living ..read more

Good Friday morning. For less-distracted reading over the weekend,browse this week’s edition ofThe Weekly Print, a curated print-friendly PDF featuring a selection of recenteJewishPhilanthropyandJewish Insiderstories, including:At antisemitism-focused Ruderman conference, rabbi whose son was killed on Oct. 7 focuses instead on halting internal Jewish turmoil; Several university leaders begin cracking down on anti-Israel disruptions on campus; Is Biden losing his voice against rising antisemitism?; Israelis divided on merits of Gaza military pullback after six months of war.Print the latest e ..read more