Know What We’ve Been Up To?

Know What We’ve Been Up To?

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JFM's Summer Campaign is now on!

As we begin this summer’s campaign (throughout the month of June), here’s an update on what we’ve been doing lately.

When we created The Jonah Maccabee Foundation, we began inviting you to donate to one of three “buckets” —  areas of communal importance that we thought were also important to Jonah. Since then, we’ve committed ourselves to raising funds and to help finance projects in these three areas:

  • The Arts Fund – offering young people dynamic learning experiences in visual and/or performance arts
  • The Social Justice Fund – making the world a better home for young people in need
  • The Jewish Life Fund – offering young people compelling opportunities to deepen their passion for living lives that are steeped in Jewish ideas of kindness and compassion

Through your incredible generosity, in the past six months we’ve supported the following projects which we feel not only fit into Jonah’s “buckets,” but inspire us as well. Through the foundation’s work, we can lend them a helping hand and maybe inspire you to nurture your own friendship with one of them.

Here they are:

1) Road to Recovery brings Israelis and Palestinians together with more than 750 volunteers driving critically ill Palestinian children to medical treatment in Israel. 10,000 trips every year! Here’s a beautiful 6-minute video about it.

2) The HUC Soup Kitchen serves dinner to 100 people who might not otherwise get a meal that evening. Free legal aid, clothing and other supplies, live music and free flu shots too.

3) The Galilee Foundation for Value Education brings Jewish and Arab families in northern Israel together for shared learning, celebration, and the world-famous Galilee Circus where children of different backgrounds build trust and have a great time through learning and performing stunning acrobatics.

4) Brave New Films produces documentaries and internet video campaigns that inform the public, challenge mainstream media, and motivate people to take action on social issues nationwide. We were most recently moved and inspired by their work to assist undocumented immigrants.

5) The Ziv Medical Center’s Child Refugee Relief Project ensures that severely ill and injured children who are victims of the conflict in Syria receive essential medical services in Israel. Watch a 5-minute video here.

6) Families for Freedom seeks to repeal anti-immigration laws that are tearing apart homes and neighborhoods. This organization helps families and communities resist and fight deportation through “Know Your Rights” training, and to combat the isolation and disorientation they feel when threatened by criminalization and deportation.

7) The 52nd Street Project produces new plays for, and often by, kids between ages 9 and 18 who reside in Hell’s Kitchen, New York City. The objective is to strengthen self-esteem and the drive within each child to build a strong and secure future.

8) Mainestage Shakespeare is one of our favorite arts organizations, bringing the Bard to the Pine Tree State, creating accessible, professional, classical theater for a wide audience of adults and children, enriching both the artists and the community.

9) The Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation was irresistible to us not only because Mr. Holland’s Opus is one of Billy’s all-time favorite films, but because the film’s composer, Michael Kamen, was inspired to create an organization that gives young people the opportunity to learn and play music in schools that lack the means to do so themselves.

We think Jonah would love the work we’re doing in his name. And we hope you do as well.

As always, your donation is gratefully accepted right here.

Take care of yourselves, let us know of any incredible organizations you think might fit into Jonah’s buckets, and have a great summer!

Very sincerely,
Ellen, Billy, Katie, Mark and Aiden
The Jonah Maccabee Foundation

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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BillyKnow What We’ve Been Up To?

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