For many Jewish progressive organizations, the beginning of 2014 has been marked by a scramble to find new sources of funding, as America’s largest backer of liberal Jewish groups changed its funding guidelines. The Nathan Cummings Foundation, which has been giving nearly $6 million annually to Jewish causes, will no longer fund organizations through a…
(JTA) — In 1992, Edgar Bronfman was preparing to leave North America for Paris for his first meeting with then-French President Francois Mitterand at the Elysee Palace when at the last minute Bronfman decided he wanted to take an unexpected meeting in Geneva instead. So he asked Serge Cwajgenbaum, Bronfman’s right-hand man in Europe, to…
(JTA) — In the coming days, many eulogies will attempt to capture the magnitude of the loss suffered this week by the Jewish community. Really, though, all you need are eight words: Edgar Bronfman was a prince of his people. There are other machers who devote much of their time and money to Jewish causes. But…
Billionaire businessman and philanthropist Edgar Bronfman, the chairman of the Seagram Company and long-serving president of the World Jewish Congress, died at his New York home on Saturday aged 84. Montreal-born Bronfman took control of the Seagram empire from his father, Samuel Bronfman who had founded the liquor company in 1924. He then expanded its…
A Jewish family foundation that allocates $30 million per year is narrowing its focus to two issues: inequality and climate change. The Nathan Cummings Foundation has given $5 million -$6 million annually to Jewish organizations, primarily through its Jewish life program. Simon Greer, the foundation’s executive director, told JTA the new focus is the culmination…
John Ruskay is leaving them wanting more. After 15 years heading the UJA-Federation of New York — one of the largest charities in the Jewish communal constellation — Ruskay, 67, has announced he will retire in mid-2014. The announcement comes with his standing still high in the eyes of New York Jews. That’s something of…
(JTA) — If you’re pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into Jewish identity building, what do you do when a survey comes along showing that the number of U.S. Jews engaging with Jewish life and religion is plummeting? That’s the question facing major funders of American Jewish life following the release last week of the…
The names are recognizable everywhere: Adelson, Steinhardt, Shusterman. Bronfman, Perelman, Kimmel and Tisch. Soros, Bloomberg, Broad, Jacobs, Blavatnik and more. They represent American Jewry’s golden givers, its most wealthy and generous philanthropists. Some of these people direct but a fraction of their giving to explicitly Jewish causes, but they help create, shape, sustain and direct…
