The Technion has announced a NIS 25m. hit due to investments placed with Madoff (through the American Technion Society). Putting a positive spin on the loss, they say “this is a negligible sum, relative to the Technion’s overall portfolio.”

Meanwhile, the Council of Higher Education here in Israel has scheduled a meeting for Wednesday “to consider the formation of a task force to assess the extent of the loss of funding that academic institutions in Israel have suffered as a result of the global economic crisis.” The president of Bar Ilan University, Prof. Moshe Kaveh, has said a number of large donors have been “wiped off the philanthropy map.”

Israeli universities are reporting delays in funding decisions and cancellation of pledges. Their budgets generally assume 7% of revenue is from donations.