Your Daily Phil: NYC stabbing follows Jewish warnings of antisemitic violence
Add EJP on GoogleIn today’s edition of Your Daily Phil, we examine the circumstances around yesterday’s stabbing attack in New York City. We interview Daryl Messinger, the incoming chair of the Israel Policy Forum, and report on JCC Association of North America‘s $19.5 million push to expand the JCC MaccabiGames. We feature an opinion piece by Hadara Ishak emphasizing the necessity of coordination among funders and organizations in their approach to combating antisemitism in America, and a piece by Sharona Israeli-Roth spotlights the role Israeli teens in the Jewish Agency’s Shinshinim program can play in bringing Israel into early education classrooms. Also in this issue: Ari Melnik, David M. Einhorn and Adam Pollack.
Shabbat shalom!
Today’s Your Daily Phil was curated by eJP Managing Editor Judah Ari Gross, Opinion Editor Rachel Kohn and Israel Editor Justin Hayet. Have a tip? Email us here.
What We’re Watching
We’ll be keeping a close eye over the weekend on the situation in the Middle East amid continued U.S. strikes on Iran and Iranian attacks across the region.
RikudAmerica, a three-day Israeli dance camp in Cherry Hill, N.J., marking the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and honoring leaders of the American Israeli dance scene, begins tomorrow.
The Rochester Jewish Film Festival begins Sunday and runs through Aug. 2.
What You Should Know
A QUICK WORD FROM eJP’S JUDAH ARI GROSS
Yesterday’s stabbing on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, in which the assailant reportedly yelled “Allahu akhbar” before attacking two men — one who was visibly Jewish and attacked as he left a nearby synagogue, the other not — with a screwdriver in what police are investigating as a hate crime caught no one by surprise.
Jewish leaders and organizations have regularly warned about precisely this type of violence, including in the day preceding the attack. “At a time of rising antisemitism, repeatedly singling out and vilifying the world’s only Jewish state for perceived political benefit is repugnant, puts Jews at greater risk — and leaves many Jewish New Yorkers feeling targeted and unwelcome in the city we call home,” UJA-Federation of New York wrote in a statement on Wednesday in response to Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s viral video in which he called Israeli Prime Minsiter Benjamin Netanyahu a war criminal.
Within the Jewish community, the Manhattan attack is sure to intensify the ongoing debates about antisemitism and security: Are communal funds best spent on combating antisemitism and fortifying institutions or would those resources be better spent on Jewish education and initiatives to deepen Jewish identity and pride?
Read the rest of ‘What You Should Know’ here.
News
Q&A
Holding the middle ground: Reform layleader Daryl Messinger steps in as chair of Israel Policy Forum
Last month, Daryl Messinger — the immediate past chair of the Reform movement’s Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA) and former chair of the Union for Reform Judaism — stepped into the role of chair of the Israel Policy Forum, one of the leading advocacy groups pushing for a two-state solution and, more broadly, for a “secure, Jewish and democratic Israel.” She spoke with eJewishPhilanthropy’s Judah Ari Gross recently about the challenges facing liberal Zionism, her goals for the organization and its role in the broader Israel ecosystem.
JAG: We are in a time where Israel is viewed in an increasingly polarized, partisan way. How does IPF plan to bring more people into the middle? Does IPF serve as a resource for the elite levels, for Jewish leadership, or is there a way for it to reach the masses of American Jews directly?
DM: We’re trying to be a space and a place for the folks in that middle ground who feel unmoored, as I described — to have a conversation and to have a community, particularly among young adults, post-college to 35 or 40 years old. We’ve had success there, and there’s interest in growing it, and also in making sure those leaders continue their journey within the larger communal spaces.
BIG SWINGS
JCC Association plans to expand its Maccabi Games, return them to Israel in 2028
The JCC Association of North America is taking a big swing, doubling down on Jewish teen sports with a planned $19.5 million investment over the next four years, most of which has already been raised, in its JCC Maccabi Games, reports eJewishPhilanthropy’s Justin Hayet.
Major growth: Through the campaign, the JCC Association plans to grow participation in teen sports by more than 80%, from roughly 2,650 teen athletes to 4,000 in the JCC Maccabi Games. The campaign will also return the JCC Maccabi Games to Israel in 2028. The campaign has already $12.45 million in funding, with the Marcus Foundation providing $5 million and the Samueli Foundation giving $6.25 million, JCCA said in a press release. The organization did not identify the sources of the remaining $1.2 million.
Opinion
MIND THE GAP
The Jewish community doesn’t have a funding problem. It has a strategy problem.
In an opinion piece for eJewishPhilanthropy, Hadara Ishak, president and COO of the Jewish Future Promise, argues that the Jewish community in America is locked in asymmetrical warfare against antisemitism.
“We are answering a systemic campaign with scattered responses. No amount of individual organizational excellence closes that gap. … Imagine what becomes possible if the largest Jewish foundations, federations and major donors stopped solving this problem separately and started working from a shared long-term strategy.”
SHALOM SHINSHINIM
Bringing Israel to the classrooms of our youngest learners
In an opinion piece for eJewishPhilanthropy, Sharona Israeli Roth, president and executive director of EarlyJ, writes about the partnerships that brought a Shinshinim program tailored specifically for preschool settings to the Bay Area and the model the program offers for cultural connection and immersive learning.
“By embedding Shinshinim [Israeli high school graduates who dedicate a year to service before beginning their military commitment] directly into these environments, children experienced Israeli culture as a daily, joyful presence. Hebrew language, music, traditions and stories became part of the rhythm of the school day. Educators gained creative partners, and classrooms became spaces where connections to Israel felt personal, tangible and alive.”
Worthy Reads
One More Day: In the Times of Israel, historian and licensed tour guide Ari Melnik ??laments that visitors now book only the Gaza envelope and Nova sites while Jerusalem and Masada sit empty, arguing that Israel deserves to be shown as more than its worst day. “So when you come to Re’im, and I hope you will, know that you are already standing inside the fullest answer to the question the world keeps asking about us. Do not let it be the only thing you see. Give me one more day, and I will show you the country that existed before that morning, the country that survived it, and the country that is already building what comes next.”
Major Gifts
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia announced a $50 million gift from Einhorn Collaborative to create the David M. Einhorn Institute for Early Relational Health…
Philanthropist Herbert Wertheim has pledged $100 million to Baptist Health South Florida to establish the Wertheim Center for Cancer Prevention and underwrite its research partnership with Florida International University…
Bill Ackman‘s Pershing Square Foundation is committing $260 million toward two Manhattan buildings that will house the Ackman Oxman Institute, a brain research center the investor conceived after his 26-year-old daughter survived a hemorrhage in February…
Knight Foundation and Village Media unveiled a partnership to build 15 digital newsrooms across three states — Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Illinois — backed by a $5 million Knight investment that buys an ownership stake meant to seed operations and eventually hand the outlets to local owners…
Nvidia co-founder Jensen Huang and his wife, Lori, donated $75 million toward a new Vanderbilt University arts college based in San Francisco…
Anthropic is giving another $20 million to Public First Action, a tax-exempt group pushing for AI oversight…
Transitions
Adam Pollack was promoted to be 18Doors’ executive director…
Amnon Shashua, founder of the Shashua Family Foundation and co-founder of Mobileye, will step down from his role as CEO of the company once a successor is hired…
California Gov. Gavin Newsom tapped podcaster and self-proclaimed “October 8 Jew” professor Scott Galloway for a seat on the University of California Board of Regents…
Word on the Street
The Harvard Crimson reports that Hillel International filed an amicus brief backing Harvard‘s bid to restore $2.7 billion in federal funding and then swiftly pulled it after backlash, saying the filing never cleared its internal vetting process…
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has dropped its subpoena demanding the University of Pennsylvania identify Jewish employees, ending a fight the school framed as a government effort to catalog Jews, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports…
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) is unveiling a bill that would strip anonymity from fiscal-sponsorship arrangements, taxing sponsors and denying donor deductions for money routed to anti-Israel and far-left groups…
Israeli prosecutors charged an Israeli man over a July 11 attack on a CNN crew in the West Bank…
The Mossad foiled an Iranian Intelligence Ministry plot to send foreign operatives into Israel to surveil and assassinate senior officials…
The Orthodox Union Advocacy Center welcomed a new Justice Department initiative offering houses of worship and police departments more than $7.7 million to cover surveillance upgrades, on-site patrols and joint training…
AIPAC touted the House-passed fiscal 2027 National Defense Authorization Act, which authorizes $750 million for U.S.-Israel cooperative programs, a $65 million increase over the prior year…
The Adolph & Rose Levis Jewish Community Center in Boca Raton, Fla., is undergoing a $9 million renovation of its 31,000-square-foot campus, adding an amphitheater and upgraded gathering spaces to broaden its programming…
Baltimore housing nonprofit Comprehensive Housing Assistance, Inc, better known by its acronym CHAI, is completing a $14 million overhaul of its Weinberg House senior living facility in Pikesville, backed by federal, state and county funding…
The shekel has reached a three-month low against the dollar…
The Times of Israel spotlights a Maccabee Task Force-sponsored trip that brought 15 non-Jewish UCLA student leaders to Israel for 10 days…
The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and the Anti-Defamation League reached a settlement with Reed College, in which the school agreed to adopt a range of measures, including an updated discrimination policy detailing how anti-Zionist conduct can constitute unlawful discrimination…
A Sydney man who wore a shirt with a swastika outside a hearing in which survivors of the Bondi Beach Hanukkah attack testified before Australia’s royal commission investigating antisemitism was fined $1,500, with a judge ruling that the man was “frustrated with the horrific events [in the Middle East] as he perceives them”…
Barry Levitt, a South African immigrant to Israel who founded the international Chilla beverage company, died on Monday when a balcony collapsed onto a Jerusalem cafe where he was having coffee with his wife and two grandchildren…
Zehava Shaul, the mother of slain Israeli Staff Sgt. Oren Shaul, whose body was held by Hamas for more than a decade after he was killed in 2014, died at 71…
Pic of the Day
Jewish men read the Book of Lamentations on Wednesday night at the start of Tisha B’Av at the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem.
Birthdays
Ella Blumenthal, participant in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and a Holocaust survivor, she is the subject of the 2021 documentary “I am Here,” turns 105 on Saturday
FRIDAY
Alfred H. Moses, Former U.S. ambassador to Romania, now senior counsel at Covington and Burling, turns 97
Lowell Bergman, pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter who worked for ABC News and CBS’ “60 Minutes,” turns 81
Iddo Netanyahu, Israeli physician, author and playwright, he is the younger brother of PM Benjamin Netanyahu, turns 74
Joel Benenson, political consultant known for his role in both of President Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns, turns 74
Michael Jeffrey Bordy, retired Los Angeles-based business and real estate attorney
Michael Sugerman, radio anchor and reporter on both CBS nationally and NYC’s WCBS
Charlie Crist, member of Congress (D-FL-13) until 2022, he previously served as the governor of Florida, turns 70
Boris Mints, Russian businessman, one of the largest real estate investors in Russia, he is a member of the Board of Patrons of The Conference of European Rabbis, turns 68
Patty Shwartz, judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, turns 65
Gil Troy, presidential historian, professor at McGill and senior fellow in Zionist thought at the Jewish People Policy Institute, turns 65
Alan “Shlomo” Veingrad, director of donor development for AIPAC, he is a retired NFL player who played for the Packers and the Cowboys, where he won in Super Bowl XXVII, turns 63
Esti Rosenberg, founder of the Migdal Oz seminary for women in Gush Etzion, she is a granddaughter of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, turns 61
Douglas Eric Liman, film director and producer, turns 61
Jonathan Miller, partner in Frost Brown Todd and author of The Liberal Case for Israel, he was the first-ever Jewish statewide elected official in Kentucky (state treasurer), turns 59
A.J. Baime, author, he wrote roughly 600 stories for the “My Ride” column on exotic cars for The Wall Street Journal, turns 55
Esther E. Manheimer, mayor of Asheville, N.C., she was elected in 2013, 2017 and 2022, turns 55
Jamie Denbo, actor, writer, podcaster and comedian, turns 53
Jason Miller, president of Access Computer Technology in West Bloomfield, Mich., he is a rabbi, entrepreneur and social media expert, turns 50
Rabbi Noah Zvi Farkas, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles
Sharon Yeshaya, executive vice president and CFO of Morgan Stanley, turns 47
Lauren Miller Rogen, actor, screenwriter and director, turns 44
Aviva M. Futerman Schochat, former member of the board of directors of the Jewish Federation of Greater Rochester
Adam Finkel, co-founder and partner at Orfin Ventures, an incubator and deep-tech venture fund
Sarah Citrenbaum, public relations manager at The Avon Company
Shlomo Klapper, actor, best known for her role as Nomi Segal on the Freeform comedy-drama “Grown-ish,” turns 36
SATURDAY
Stuart M. Matlins, Former publisher and editor-in-chief of Jewish Lights Publishing, he is an economist and religious scholar best known for his interfaith work, turns 86…
Peter Suschitzky, cinematographer whose work includes “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” and “The Empire Strikes Back,” turns 85…
Alan N. Maisel, member of the New York City Council from 2014 to 2021, turns 80…
Victor Drai, born in Casablanca, nightclub owner, entrepreneur and film producer, he produced “The Woman in Red” and “Weekend at Bernie’s,” turns 79…
Efraim “Effi” Eitam, former IDF brigadier general (he was part of Operation Entebbe in 1976), then a member of Knesset, turns 74…
Peter Grossman, voiceover artist, he is also the writer, producer, director and narrator of a documentary about the restoration of a NYC synagogue…
Philip Darivoff, chairman of Vibrant Capital Partners and chair emeritus of the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia…
Anne Applebaum, Pulitzer Prize winning author and journalist, she is a staff writer at The Atlantic, turns 62…
José Bautista, retired MLB pitcher from a small Jewish community in the Dominican Republic, turns 62…
Oshrat Kotler, Israeli journalist, former news anchor and author of a non-fiction book and a novel, turns 61…
Rabbi Steven Weil, former CEO of Friends of the Israel Defense Forces…
Arkady L. Bukh, born in Baku, Azerbaijan, he is a NYC-based criminal defense attorney in many high-profile cases, especially involving Russian-born defendants, turns 54…
Rob Senderoff , head coach of the men’s basketball team at Kent State University since 2011, turns 53…
Josh Spiegel, radio personality on Baltimore’s WBAL and 98 Rock, turns 51…
Erin Seidler, senior communications lead at the National Association for Healthcare Quality…
Daniel Lopatin, experimental electronic music producer, composer and singer, known professionally as Oneohtrix Point Never, turns 44…
Michael Welch, film and television actor, turns 39…
Joseph “Joey” Samuel Wagman, pitcher for Team Israel at the 2020 Olympics and at the 2023 World Baseball Classic, he is also a real estate broker at CBRE, turns 35…
SUNDAY
Oscar Goodman, former mayor of Las Vegas for 12 years, where he was succeeded by his wife, turns 87…
Barry Munitz, former administrator at the University of Illinois and the University of Houston, chancellor of the California State University system and CEO of the J. Paul Getty Trust, turns 85…
Paulette Cooper, journalist and author or co-author of nearly two dozen books, both of her parents were killed in Auschwitz, turns 84…
Shammai Engelmayer, author, podcaster, columnist and rabbi, turns 81…
Richard Stark, member of the Florida House of Representatives from 2012 to 2020, turns 74…
Alan H. Spiro, MD, MBA, chief medical officer at F|42…
Lesli Linka Glatter, film and television director, she is best known for her work on the Showtime drama series “Homeland,” turns 73…
Paul Finebaum, sports columnist, author, television and radio personality, he works for ESPN’s Charlotte-based SEC Network, turns 71…
James W. Breyer, venture capitalist, turns 65…
Jeremy Samuel Piven, actor, comedian and producer, turns 61…
Daniel B. “Dan” Harris, former correspondent at ABC News for 23 years, now a founder at Ten Percent Media, turns 55…
Nicholas Muzin, physician and attorney, he is the founder and chairman of the D.C.-based consulting firm Stonington Global, turns 51…
Mageina Tovah Begtrup, actor best known for her role in the Spider-Man trilogy, turns 47…
Nachama Soloveichik, partner of the D.C. office of ColdSpark…
Tal Shalev, senior Reporter at CNN’s Jerusalem bureau…
Gilad Hochman, Israeli born classical music composer, turns 44…
Hila Bronstein, Israeli born R&B singer and songwriter, turns 43…
Lauren Garfield-Herrin, communications manager at Cetera Financial Group…
Hallie Meyers-Shyer, actor and filmmaker, turns 39…
Zachary Andrew “Zach” Kornfeld, member of the comedy group “The Try Guys,” turns 36…
Drew Gerber, associate policy director for complex care at United Healthcare…
Tarik Cohen, NFL running back who retired in 2024, despite his last name he is not an MOT, turns 31…
Tamara “T” Statman Schoen, pitcher on the Israeli Women’s National Softball Team, now a curriculum designer at Great Hearts Academies, turns 29…
Tomer Barazani, president at B&B Digital Media…
