Dear JNF Campaign Leaders:

Fundraising momentum continues at a brisk pace.  Not only have we reached $70 million for the annual campaign with more than one full quarter left in our fiscal year, but we are now at nearly $518 million toward our $1 billion ten-year goal.

This week, our amazing Makor team met in New York for a two-day retreat to hone their fundraising, public speaking and leadership skills as well as to learn the most current information about JNF programs and projects.  Our Makor team is a group of highly motivated major donors who, in addition to their generous financial contributions, also give considerable time to speak and solicit across the country on behalf of JNF. Our Makor team of twenty-six lay leaders will be traveling to many communities for our upcoming Summer Blitz program, and you will have a chance to meet them at our annual Campaign Planning Summit in August.

CAMPAIGN PLANNING SUMMIT

Everybody is coming to New York August 12 & 13 for the annual Campaign Planning Summit at the Ronald S. Lauder JNF House, 42 East 69th Street, New York.  I am looking forward to working with you to help prepare for our 2019 annual campaign. If you have not yet registered, click on the link below. On Sunday, August 12, we will provide a light lunch and time to mingle at 11:00am, and the meeting will begin promptly at 12 noon.  On Monday, we will begin our day at 8:30am and all participants are invited to attend the national Board of Directors meeting from 1:00 – 3:00pm.  We are planning a special cocktail reception early Sunday evening with entertainment by the Israel Scouts Caravan and remarks by the esteemed Ambassador Danny Dayan, Israel’s Counsel General.

Our agenda for the two day Campaign Summit is under development, however, we plan to focus on many of these issues:

• Helping communities use data to evaluate and develop local campaign strategies
• Using Social Media to educate and inspire the market place
• JNF branded events to project the strength and prestige of JNF USA
• How to grow our donor base from 6,000 donors at $1,000 or more to 10,000
• Asking for money can be intimidating…. Ten ideas you can put into practice today to help JNF reach our $1 Billion goal
• In addition, you will be among the first to see our suite of 2019 marketing materials

To register for the Campaign Planning Summit, click here: CampaignSummit

We have procured a room block at the Loews Regency Hotel, 540 Park Avenue (at 61st street). Reservations can be made by calling the Loews Reservation Center phone #: 1-800-233-2356 and referencing Jewish National Fund or by going to https://www.loewshotels.com/regency-hotel/jewish-national-fund until August 1, 2018. 

Shabbat Shalom from Israel!

Bruce K. Gould
President Elect and Vice President, Campaign

By Yossi Kahana

In this week’s Parshat Chukat we sadly lose Moshe and Aaron’s sister, Miriam—she dies and is buried in Kadesh. Her death is (not coincidentally) juxtaposed to Israel losing their water source—Miriam’s well—and their turning against their living leaders, Moshe and Aaron.

Who was Miriam? What is her legacy? There aren’t too many clues about her throughout the Torah. We know she was a prophet, and the sister of Moshe and Aaron, but her prophesies weren’t recorded. She famously led the women through the sea with song. She errs, as any human does, by speaking evil words (lashon hara) and is subsequently forced out of the camp due to her punishment of leprosy, tzara’at. 

But there are deeper ideals from Miriam’s narrative that can be learned from her recorded actions, and ideas that marry the connection between her and water. From a young age, Miriam was able to care for those more vulnerable than she, as was the case with her baby brother Moshe in the Nile, and the babies she and her mother helped care for in Egypt. Miriam was able to step up and challenge others regardless of her position—as she did with Moshe’s leadership—even though she was a female in a male world. Miriam also was able to praise G-d and lead during a less than ideal time—while escaping Egypt and heading into unknown land—with song and dance, the most joyous of expressions. Indeed it was Miriam’s Well—the one that disappeared upon her death—that watered the nation’s thirst all those years in the desert.

Water followed Miriam her whole life—watching in secret at the Nile River, guiding the song-filled journey through the sea, and the well of her namesake. It’s no wonder that this powerful force of a woman and leader was represented by the most basic of human needs—water.  A leader who quietly provided a foundation for those more vulnerable, giving them strength and vitality in their wanderings. That was Miriam, and that is the power of water.

Water is, as we know, a huge focus at Jewish National Fund, in Israel, and in the world. And as our own Talia Tzour Avner says, “With the help of Jewish National Fund, Israel has been able to mitigate some of its water challenges and has become a global trailblazer in water technology and conservation.” As leaders in the area of water preservation, we can learn much from Miriam as we become role models for the world to look towards in the area of water preservation and conservation.

Shabbat Shalom,

Yossi

Plant Your Way to Israel, the amazing program that lets anyone up to the age of 30 raise money for their own trip to Israel while also supporting the work of Jewish National Fund, just got a facelift. Please visit our brand new website, jnf.org/plantyourway, watch our new video, and spread the word to eligible family and friends. Great to start for newborns!! Great way to help fund a semester at the Alexander Muss High School in Israel!!

Discover Israel’s rich history, heritage, and culture on a meaningful journey exploring the country from north to south on Jewish National Fund’s Spirit of Israel tour in May 2019. Perfect for first-timers and repeat visitors alike. Learn more.

This week, Alexander Muss High School in Israel welcomed 180 students from across the United States for our Summer 2018 session. Over the next six weeks, these students will learn our Israel Studies curriculum of over 4,000+ years of Jewish and Israeli history, using the land as the classroom. This curriculum is also eligible for up to six college credits from The University of Miami. Students sleep in dorms on our Hod HaSharon campus, gaining independence and preparing for life on college campus and beyond. They will make new friends and have an incredible and transformational summer!

The trend of young adults leaving peripheral Negev towns stops now! The NetGev Centers for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, managed by Jewish National Fund partner Eretz Ir, enable us to work closely with entrepreneurs in small development towns and create the workshops, events, and courses that will create the largest impact for their business development. For example, young programmers from Dimona gather for a night of networking, pizza, and fun. NetGev enables them to have a successful career, mentors, friends and both professional and leisure activities, while proudly choosing to stay in their hometown of Dimona.

Jewish National Fund, in conjunction with partners Society for Preservation of Israel Heritage Sites, LOTEM, and the Office of Jerusalem and Heritage, is working on an important, new initiative for heritage sites across the country: making them accessible to visitors with physical and/or cognitive disabilities. Currently, the new project has been set up at 6 different heritage sites in the North. The guides received special training from LOTEM professionals and more accessible tour routes were created. Last week, the team at the Valley Train Site at Kfar Yehoshua was very excited to host their first group as part of the new project, using their new training to cater the tour to the specific needs of their visitors.