Your Daily Phil: HUC ‘deeply disappointed’ by lawsuit to block closure of Cincinnati seminary
Add EJP on GoogleGood Thursday morning!
In today’s edition of Your Daily Phil, we examine Israelis’ uncertain present as they wrap up their first full workweek since February and prepare for next week’s national holidays, and report on the Ohio attorney general’s lawsuit to block the closure of the Reform movement’s Cincinnati rabbinical program. We feature an opinion piece by Deanne Weiss Etsekson about a new Samis Foundation report that draws lessons from the Catholic private school system to address the Jewish day school tuition crisis, and Nadav Rozenblat spotlights a group underserved by Haredi integration programs in Israel. Also in this issue: Mark Shpall, Amy Marks and Amy Bornstein.
What We’re Watching
Harvard University is hosting a landmark public conference on antisemitism and civil rights today, one of the terms of a legal settlement between the school and the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law.
The American Jewish Historical Society is hosting a screening tonight of “They Fight With Cameras,” a new documentary about Jewish American WWII combat cameraman Walter Rosenblum.
The Shalom Hartman Institute’s Yehuda Kurtzer and The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg will sit in conversation at an event this evening at the Capital Jewish Museum focused on “Jewish America at 250” ahead of the U.S. Semiquincentennial.
After being delayed due to the war with Iran, the Jerusalem Marathon will take place early tomorrow morning. However, as dangerously high temperatures have been forecast, the full-marathon race has been called off.
What You Should Know
A QUICK WORD FROM EJP’S JUSTIN HAYET
The barbecue or the bomb shelter? As Israelis look ahead to next week’s back-to-back national holidays, Memorial Day and Independence Day, that question seems to sum up the anxious place Israelis find themselves.
For most Israelis, whose workweek runs Sunday to Thursday, this week marked an uneasy return to normalcy, following the end of Passover last week and as the fragile truce with Iran holds. Residents of the North were not as lucky, as the fighting with the terror group Hezbollah has persisted, with Israeli communities along the border being targeted repeatedly as Israeli forces conquered Hezbollah-aligned villages in southern Lebanon, even as Lebanese and Israeli officials discuss a ceasefire.
That routine will again be disrupted next week with the country’s back-to-back Memorial Day, Yom HaZikaron, which begins on Monday night, and Independence Day, Yom HaAtzmaut, which begins Tuesday night. But as fighting in Lebanon continues and the war with Iran threatens to resume, Israelis are left wondering if next week they will be running to barbecues or bomb shelters.
Beyond the immediate security situation, a broader sense of systemic instability continues to challenge Israeli civil society. Many nonprofit executives are currently recalibrating their financial projections to account for the historic strength of the New Israeli Shekel against the U.S. dollar — the denomination in which most donations are made. As the barrages of Iranian missiles at central Israel have waned, Ben Gurion Airport has begun seeing international carriers return, allowing more Israelis to travel abroad — including nonprofit figures — and foreign visitors to arrive. A resumption of fighting could again see the skies close.
In any case, the country will again mark its national holidays differently this year. For the third year in a row, the annual flyover show of Israeli Air Force fighter jets and other aircraft that normally traverses the country will not take place. Instead, pilots are expected to remain either on base or close to base, ready for the war with Iran to resume at a moment’s notice. The local and national ceremonies for both Yom HaZikaron and Yom HaAtzmaut, which are staples of the Israeli cultural, social and political calendar, are being held in smaller configurations, virtually or are not being held at all in light of the Israel Defense Forces’ Home Front Command’s safety restrictions.
MIDWESTERN JUDAISM
HUC ‘deeply disappointed’ by suit to block closure of Ohio seminary, as new school looks to step in
The Reform movement’s Hebrew Union College said on Wednesday that it was “deeply disappointed” by Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost’s decision to file a lawsuit to block the institution’s plans to shutter its Cincinnati rabbinical programs, rejecting the claims against the school. “The allegations mischaracterize our decision-making, misrepresent our stewardship of donor funds, and ignore our sustained record of transparency and good faith,” said Andrew Rehfeld, the president of HUC, in his first comments since the lawsuit was filed last week, reports eJewishPhilanthropy’s Jay Deitcher.
Meet in the middle: While the lawsuit plays out between the Ohio attorney general and HUC, a group of Jewish leaders in Cincinnati is looking to fill the vacuum in the middle of the country by founding a new nondenominational rabbinical school, the College for Contemporary Judaism. “Every non-Orthodox rabbinical Seminary is reporting a decline in the numbers, and therefore, now that there are only rabbinical seminaries either on the East Coast or the West Coast, those are the places that are largely going to be served because students who are studying in those places have internships and experiences there,” Rabbi Gary Zola, founding president at CCJ, told eJP.
DATA DIVE
The price of Jewish literacy
“For years, some of the most prominent voices in American Jewish life — Bret Stephens, Bari Weiss, Dan Senor — have been making the same argument: the most powerful response to antisemitism and assimilation isn’t defensive. It’s generative. Fund Jewish day schools. Make them affordable to middle-class families. Charge tuition at Catholic school levels. The argument is compelling and the urgency is real. What has been missing is the math,” writes Deanne Weiss Etsekson, member of the Samis Foundation Board of Trustees, in an opinion piece for eJewishPhilanthropy.
New insights: “This month, the Samis Foundation released ‘Day School Affordability and the Catholic School Model,’ a rigorous structural and financial comparison of Catholic and Jewish day school economics produced for a philanthropic audience. The report is dense with data and includes school-by-school tuition tables across five major metropolitan areas, side-by-side comparisons of funding models, cost driver analysis and endowment modeling. The result is a road map of what Catholic-parity tuition would actually require — and what it would actually cost.”
LEFT OUT
A blind spot in Haredi integration efforts
“Over the past two decades, a broad and welcome consensus has emerged among the Israeli government and Jewish philanthropy around the need to invest in integrating the Haredi population into Israeli society,” writes Nadav Rozenblat of the Israeli nonprofit Out for Change in an opinion piece for eJewishPhilanthropy. “Yet within this effort lies a significant gap.”
Barrier to access: “According to Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics, as high as 14% of each Haredi cohort (defined as individuals aged 20 to 64) chooses to leave their community and integrate into broader society… And yet, the moment they no longer meet the formal definition of ‘Haredi,’ many find themselves excluded from the very programs designed to support the transition they are already undergoing. The result is a troubling reality: highly motivated individuals seeking to integrate are left without access to the primary tools meant to enable that process.”
Worthy Reads
Staying Human: In Time magazine, MacArthur Foundation President John Palfrey argues that philanthropy must play a central role in ensuring AI serves human dignity rather than stripping individuals of their personal agency. “As we stand at the cusp of AI’s broader societal integration, we must remember that people are AI’s designers, users, investors, and inventors, and we can also be its governors. We have a unique opportunity to design systems with robust ethical frameworks and guardrails. It is essential that philanthropy resource organizations to help shape AI governance, inform public thinking, and innovate how these digital technologies are built and used.” [Time]
A Better Brotherhood: In The Times of Israel, Noam Raucher acknowledges the appeal for Jewish men of violent organizations like the Jewish Defense League in a post-Oct. 7 world, but encourages them to pick a different path. “[When] a group like JDL 613 presents itself not only as a response to antisemitic violence, but as a brotherhood for Jewish men — a place where frightened, isolated, or angry men can find strength, purpose, belonging, and even an answer to loneliness or suicidal despair — that appeal should not be dismissed with a wave of the hand. … Perhaps the harder calling is this… [to] build communities where a Jewish man can admit he is scared, lonely, furious, or unraveling without needing to cosplay as a warrior to remain respectable. That may be less thrilling than militant brotherhood. It is also much harder. But it is closer to the best of Jewish tradition.” [TOI]
Lessons From the Bomb Shelter: In the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, de Toledo High School’s Mark Shpall reflects on a recent trip to Israel and how his students’ composure and refusal to flee during a wartime crisis transformed a trip of “unusual weight” into a profound demonstration of the next generation’s resilience and enduring commitment to the Jewish story. “For Israelis, living with sirens and shelters is a difficult but familiar reality. For these American teenagers, it was something entirely new. Yet their instinct was not to run from the experience. It was to remain connected to it. Those lessons cannot be taught solely in a classroom. They are experiences that must be lived. They offer lessons that shape identity, strengthen character and deepen responsibility.” [JTA]
Word on the Street
A new study by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education found that 2% of donors provided 89% of university funding, indicating a deepening “donor concentration” crisis…
A top official at Meta highlighted the company’s efforts to combat online Jew-hatred, including restrictions on Holocaust denial, amid accusations that Meta’s moderation policies enable antisemitic content to circulate on its platforms; the official made his remarks at “Hack the Hate NYC 2026,” an event at Yeshiva University organized by the school, Generative AI for Good, the 8200 Alumni Association, the Israeli Ministry for Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism, Maccabee Ventures, the Voice of the People Initiative and the World Jewish Congress…
Apple TV+ released the official trailer for “Unconditional,” an Israeli thriller acquired from Keshet International. The series marks one of the distributor’s largest deals to date for an original series…
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency spotlights the ongoing campaign to get a national park named for Jewish businessman and philanthropist Julius Rosenwald, who helped fund some 5,000 schools for Black children in a project with Booker T. Washington; the effort comes as the Trump administration has taken aim at diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives across the country…
A new report from Yale University’s Committee on Trust in Higher Education found that universities themselves cultivated significant public distrust of higher education and must reclaim their roles as neutral, truth-seeking forums to rebuild faith in them…
The Harvard Crimson reports that Interim President Alan Garber is championing a “culture of civil disagreement” to protect academic freedom and de-escalate the intense polarization surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on campus…
The Chronicle of Philanthropy examines how nonprofits are adopting artificial intelligence to automate administration and scale impact while weighing ethical risks regarding algorithmic bias and donor privacy…
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky signed into law legislation levying criminal penalties — including fines and prison sentences — against individuals convicted of antisemitic offenses…
Major Gifts
Ahead of Yom HaAtzamut, the National Library of Israel has been gifted the personal archive of legendary British officer Orde Wingate, a Christian Zionist and foundational architect of Israeli defense strategy…
Dr. Miriam Adelson donated $40 million to the Republicans’ super PACs ahead of the upcoming midterm elections…
Transitions
Amy Marks was hired as the new chief advancement officer of the JCC Association of North America..
Amy Bornstein was appointed as the new chief development officer at the Jewish Federation of St. Louis…
Republican Jewish Coalition CEO Matt Brooks is joining Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck as a senior strategic advisor; Brooks will continue in his position at the RJC, in addition to his role leading the Jewish Policy Center…
Pic of the Day
A London Metropolitan Police forensics officer works yesterday on an investigation into an arson attack in the early hours of the morning at the Finchley Reform Synagogue in North London. Police have detained two suspects in the failed firebombing attempt, which is being investigated as a hate crime.
The arson attack comes amid a rise in antisemitic incidents in the United Kingdom over the past year, including a deadly attack on a synagogue in October.
Birthdays
Physician and venture capitalist focused on biotechnology and life-sciences industries, Lindsay Rosenwald turns 71…
CEO and president of American Express in the 1990s, he now serves on many corporate and charitable boards, Harvey Golub turns 87… Chasidic singer, known by his stage name Mordechai Ben David or MBD, Mordechai Werdyger turns 75… Olympic track-and-field athlete, and survivor of the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre, Esther Roth-Shachamorov turns 74… Co-founder of Jordan Company LP, a New York private equity firm, David Wayne Zalaznick turns 72… Emmy Award and Tony Award-winning actress and movie producer, Ellen Barkin turns 72… Professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University, Aaron Louis Friedberg, Ph.D. turns 70… Filmmaker, he directed the 2011 documentary “Paul Williams Still Alive” and the 1997 slapstick comedy “Vegas Vacation” starring Chevy Chase, Stephen Kessler turns 66… Former dean of Harvard’s Kennedy School and former director of the Congressional Budget Office, Douglas Elmendorf turns 64… Former secretary of state of the United States under the Biden administration, Antony John “Tony” Blinken turns 64… Emmy Award-winning television producer and writer, he co-created and produced “Will & Grace” and “Boston Common,” David Sanford Kohan turns 62… Long Island native, he is a Los Angeles pharmacist, Jeffrey D. Marcus… U.S. ambassador to Egypt during the Trump 45 administration, Jonathan Raphael Cohen turns 62… Former mayor of Hoboken, N.J., Dawn Zimmer turns 58… Israel’s former ambassador to the U.S. and minister of strategic affairs, Ron Dermer turns 55… Canada’s minister of the environment, climate change and nature, Julie Dabrusin turns 55… Celebrity plastic surgeon, he is active on social media as “Dr. Miami” and has been on reality TV about his practice, Michael Salzhauer, M.D. turns 54… Board member of Jewish Community High School of the Bay in San Francisco, Ellen K. Finestone… Founder and president of Glass Ceiling Strategies, she is also a managing director for communications at Climate Power, Alex Glass… Founder of Jewish Fashion Council and journalist at Fabologie, Adi Heyman… Former pitcher in the Washington Nationals organization, he played for Team Israel in the 2023 World Baseball Classic, Richard Sidney Bleier turns 39… Attorney who has served as a law clerk to three Maryland judges, now a vice president at JPMorgan Chase, Geoffrey S. Middleberg… Lead product manager at Anthropic, Uriel Kejsefman… Singer, pianist and composer, he is best known as half of the folk-rock duo the Portnoy Brothers, Mendy Portnoy turns 34… Climate and energy transition investor, he was a White House staffer in 2017, Matthew Saunders… Senior client strategy and success manager at Grow Progress, Adam Gotbaum… First baseman and free agent, he played for Team Israel in the 2023 World Baseball Classic, Matthew Jared “Mash” Mervis turns 28… Josh Goldstein… Sarah Wolfson…
