Grants

JMF Awards Grant to KIND (Kids in Need of Defense)

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As we continue to witness both a surge in immigration from Central America and a hostile response from the White House, we’ve found an organization that has devoted itself to assisting the children, especially those traveling alone, who have been caught up in this mess.

KIND works to do the following: a) ensures no child appears in immigration court without high quality legal representation; b) lobbies for legislation that ensures children’s protection and their right to due process; and, c) promotes in countries of origin solutions to child migration grounded in the best interests of the child, to ensure that no child is forced to involuntarily migrate.

The Jonah Maccabee Foundation feels privileged to be able to support this most worthy work. Learn more by visiting Kids in Need of Defense website or their home on Facebook.

Thank YOU for making our support possible.

BillyJMF Awards Grant to KIND (Kids in Need of Defense)
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With Your Help, Here’s What We Accomplished In 2018

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Dear friends,

We thought you might like to know how we spent the money you donated to The Jonah Maccabee Foundation in 2018.

Here’s the rundown of the grants we made:

1) California Fire Foundation: The wildfires in California devastated so many lives. California Fire Foundation’s SAVE program provides financial assistance and other support services to survivors struggling to put their lives back together.

2) Families Belong Together: As we continue to witness America’s betrayal of its long-standing passion for being a nation of refugees, some 250 organizations representing Americans from all backgrounds have joined together to fight family separation and detention, seek accountability for the harm that’s been done, and to reunite all families who remain torn apart.

BillyWith Your Help, Here’s What We Accomplished In 2018
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JMF Awards Grant to Refugee Center in McAllen, TX

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As we continue watching refugees at our southern border be treated with cold-hearted animus, all of us want to try and be of help. Fortunately, we have friends who are lending a hand. Catholic Charities’ Humanitarian Respite Center in McAllen, TX, is frequently the 2nd stop for those entering our country. After processing at the U.S. Border Patrol immigration processing center in McAllen, men, women, children and infants are released to the Respite Center for food, a shower and other care until they move on to join their family or sponsor, awaiting their date in immigration court where they will be granted or denied their asylum claim.

It was Sister Norma Pimentel’s idea to create a place to welcome the immigrants to the border town of McAllen. She calls them “miracles,” as they flee poverty and violence in the hopes of finding sanctuary in the United States.

The Jonah Maccabee Foundation feels privileged to be able to support this most worthy work. Learn more by visiting the Humanitarian Respite Center online (or visit their Facebook page).

Thank YOU for making our support possible.

BillyJMF Awards Grant to Refugee Center in McAllen, TX
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JMF Awards Grant to Post Bail and Reunite Immigrant Families

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We are heartbroken here at The Jonah Maccabee Foundation as we watch families being separated at our nation’s border, with children experiencing grave trauma from the prospect of never seeing their parents again. As our summer campaign concludes, we know that this is exactly what Jonah would have wanted us to do with the money you’ve entrusted to us. RAICES, Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services, is hard at work throughout the state or Texas providing free legal information, referrals and direct representation for unaccompanied children in the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR). Given their proximity to the U.S.-Mexico border, RAICES is uniquely positioned to help thousands of children find their way back home.

Learn more about RAICES by visiting raicestexas.org.

BillyJMF Awards Grant to Post Bail and Reunite Immigrant Families
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JMF Acts to Support Gun Violence Prevention

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With your generous donations, we’ve been able to make a grant from the Jonah Maccabee Social Justice Fund in support of the NFTY-Reform Movement Gun Violence Prevention Campaign. The North American Federation of Temple Youth has long been involved in gun violence prevention. Now, in the aftermath of the shootings at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland and in response to the remarkable activism of the teen survivors there, NFTY has upped its game. We’re honored to serve as ally to every young person who is taking a stand in this difficult but crucial struggle. Jonah would have been right there beside you.

BillyJMF Acts to Support Gun Violence Prevention
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What We Accomplished In 2017

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Dear friends,

Happy new year! Our winter campaign has ended and we thought you might like to know how we spent your money in 2016. Here’s the rundown of the grants we made:

1) IsraAID is an Israeli-based humanitarian aid agency that responds to emergency crises and engages in international development around the world. Our grant supported their work with Syrian refugees.

2) Treehouse Shakers provides teacher trainings and residencies for students that focus on the art of dance and storytelling.

3) The American Indian College Fund supports Native student access to higher education. The Jonah Maccabee Foundation believes that every American has a profound responsibility to assist our nation’s indigenous peoples in building whole, healthy lives for themselves and their children.

BillyWhat We Accomplished In 2017
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Join JMF’s effort to help families in war-torn Yemen

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Far away and out of mind, but the Republic of Yemen, in the Arabian Peninsula, is contending with violence and famine and disease as a result of six years of internal and external conflicts. 7 million people are at risk of famine, with more than a million children under the age of five suffering from malnutrition. The nation has been struck by a cholera epidemic and the national blood bank may close due to lack of funds.

We’re preparing to forward grants from The Jonah Maccabee Foundation to help kids who are caught in this disaster. We hope you will join us by making a generous donation that we will send to folks who are working in the trenches there.

Please DONATE FOR YEMEN RELIEF HERE. We’ll be working with the International Rescue Committee as they deploy emergency response teams to provide clean water, medicine, nutrition services and other urgent aid to as many people as possible.

We are so grateful to have you join us in this effort. All unspecified donations between now and the end of August will go directly to relief projects in Yemen.

Most sincerely,
Ellen, Billy, Katie, Mark and Aiden
The Jonah Maccabee Foundation, Inc.

Donate at The Jonah Maccabee Foundation.

BillyJoin JMF’s effort to help families in war-torn Yemen
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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.

BillyKnow What We’ve Been Up To?
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JMF Awards Grant to HUC Soup Kitchen

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“I will never forget the sight of Jonah leading a group of tenth graders into the Manhattan subway system to find where the homeless were and to offer them food and a kind word” (Billy Dreskin, Jonah Maccabee Foundation).

That’s why we feel especially good about making this grant. For nearly 30 years, the common room of Hebrew Union College (Reform Judaism’s rabbinical/cantorial seminary in New York City’s Greenwich Village) has been transformed each Monday evening into a dining room where students prepare and serve dinner to 100 people who might not otherwise get a meal that evening. NYU law students offer free legal aid, and there are clothes and supplies available to help these folks get by. There’s live music by professional jazz musicians and free flu shots at the Duane Reade down the street.

BillyJMF Awards Grant to HUC Soup Kitchen
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JMF Brings Palestinians and Israelis a Tiny Bit Closer

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We recently learned about a beautiful Israeli project called “The Road to Recovery” in which more than 750 volunteers drive critically ill Palestinians (mostly children) to receive medical treatment in Israel. 10,000 recovery trips now happen each year!

There are so many ways that we see Israelis and Palestinians coming together. We’re touched by them all. This one, saving lives one at a time by making sure patients can get from the West Bank and Gaza to hospitals throughout Israel for treatment, is simply fantastic.

We are touched and honored to support this worthy program.

Learn more about “The Road to Recover” — watch a 6-minute video here. You can learn more about “The Road to Recovery” at roadtorecovery.org.il.

 

BillyJMF Brings Palestinians and Israelis a Tiny Bit Closer
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