Seeks to direct money from Jewish donors to low-income communities Advocates redistribution of wealth
Jewish Funds for Justice (JFJ) was established in 2006, when its legacy organizations -- the Shefa Fund, the Jewish Fund for Justice, and Spark: Partnership for Service -- merged to form JFJ. With offices in New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Los Angeles, JFJ's mission is to “mobilize the resources of American Jewry to combat the root causes of domestic economic and social injustice.” By JFJ's reckoning, chief among those root causes are the inherently negative by-products of capitalism – most notably racism and “gross economic inequality.” Rabbi Mordechai Liebling, JFJ's Vice President of Programs, contends that “the concentration of wealth harms a society” and must be counter-balanced by “mechanisms for wealth redistribution.” Toward that end, JFJ seeks to “bring about social change” by making grants to grassroots organizations – Jewish and non-Jewish alike – that “support economic development in marginalized neighborhoods.”
A major conduit for JFJ's grantmaking is its Opportunity Fund, which invests in “grassroots organizations engaging in new types of organizing, based on a model of personal, organizational, and field-wide transformation.”
JFJ also disburses money through its Tzedec investment program. Launched in 1997, Tzedec pools low- and no-interest loans from Jewish philanthropists and reinvests those funds in Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) “to serve individuals, businesses, and nonprofits typically neglected by mainstream banks.” The ultimate objective is “to increase Jewish investment and involvement in the work of revitalizing and rebuilding healthy low- and moderate-income neighborhoods.” As of June 2007, Tzedec had collected more than $20 million in donations from the American Jewish community for projects in Washington DC, Los Angeles, Baltimore, and the Gulf Region.
By no means, however, are JFJ's efforts to redistribute wealth limited to private philanthropy. Lobbying the federal government to help bankroll CDFIs, JFJ has exhorted Congress to allocate some $300 million to those institutions. In a related endeavor, JFJ trains community organizers to effectively agitate for increased government funding of JFJ projects, on the theory that “by transforming leaders, we are better able to transform society” and “create a more just world.” JFJ's Selah Leadership Program, subsidized through a grant from the Nathan Cummings Foundation, is designed to provide this type of training. As of mid-2007, more than 200 leaders from 165 organizations had gone through the program. Among these past participants are Midwest Academy founder Heather Booth and Working Families Party executive director Dan Cantor.
JFJ has also developed seminary programs to prepare rabbinical students for “the challenges of engaging their communities in the critical and profoundly Jewish work of meaningful social justice” – i.e., the redistribution of wealth. These seminary programs are outgrowths of JFJ's emphasis on “congregation-based community organizing” (CBCO), which is described by Benjamin Ross, JFJ's Director of Organizing, as “a social change strategy developed by Saul Alinsky.” Aiming to “challenge [religious] congregations to address systemic issues relating to poverty and social injustice,” this type of organizing is spearheaded by four major national CBCO networks: the Alinsky-founded Industrial Areas Foundation, the PICO National Network, the Direct Action Research and Training Center, and the Gamaliel Foundation. JFJ works in partnership with local affiliates of each of these organizations.
JFJ focuses its advocacy and philanthropy on the following major concerns. In each case, it views government intervention and taxpayer funding as crucial components of enlightened social policy:
Child Care: Noting that “poor parents are less likely to take time off for their child's birth and they are denied access or assistance for quality child care,” JFJ supports organizations that lobby for greater amounts of federal financial aid to parents with child-care needs.
Civil Rights: JFJ views the United States as a nation where “discrimination is still a reality for too many,” particularly for nonwhites, females, and homosexuals. Thus the organization favors race-and ethnicity-based affirmative-action preferences; it laments that “a woman is raped every 6 minutes and battered every 9 seconds”; it claims that “at the federal level and in most states gays and lesbians lack even basic civil rights protections”; and it contends, misleadingly, that “for every dollar white men earn, women earn approximately 77 cents, Latinas earn 56 cents, and African-American men earn 75 cents.”
Education: Lamenting that government-funded education grants "are scarce," JFJ says: "The most recent data on urban 12th-graders finds that 84% are not proficient in math and 83% are not proficient in science." "For students who do graduate," adds JFJ, "attending college now means taking on substantial debt."
Environment: “Our world is waking up to the implications of the damage we have done to our environment,” JFJ declares. “The flow of ice from glaciers has doubled in the past decade. If nothing is done, sea levels could rise up to 20 feet. There are twice as many Category 4 and 5 hurricanes as there were 30 years ago. Without action, global warming will cause an estimated 300,000 deaths a year by 2035.” To head off such calamities, JFJ calls for Americans to dramatically reduce their reliance on coal, oil, and natural gas as energy sources.
Health Care: Prior to the passage of the health-care reform bill in 2010, JFJ said: “46.6 million Americans, including nine million children, are uninsured, and the number of uninsured is on the rise.... Tens of thousands of people die from medical errors each year.” In September 2009, JFJ rabbi-in-residence Jill Jacobs emphasized what she depicted as the Jewish mandate "to create a society that takes collective responsibility for all its members." Asserting that opponents of President Obama's health-care reform measure "propagate myths intended to scare us," Jacobs wrote:
"[U]ltimately, Jewish law does not place the responsibility for ensuring access to health care with individuals, doctors or private companies. Shlomo Goren, then the Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel, wrote in a 1978 teshuvah: 'The government may not excuse itself from its responsibility toward the sick, since the government — and not the doctors — is responsible for the health of the people.' … Indeed, the founders of the State of Israel instituted a universal, if imperfect, health care system administered by a quasi-governmental agency."
In an August 2010 Huffington Post article, JFJ President Simon Greer derided the "mythical" notion that "the proposed health care bill would create death panels." He lamented. moreover, that "'[w]ithout the Tea Party movement, we would have had a stronger health care bill [i.e., a full-fledged single-payer plan], a more robust ongoing stimulus to retain and create jobs, maybe even comprehensive immigration reform."
Housing: “In many parts of the country,” says JFJ, “affordable housing is scarce.... For every family that receives federal housing assistance, there are 3 eligible families waiting in line.” To address this problem, JFJ calls for the creation of more taxpayer-subsidized low-income housing.
Immigration: According to JFJ, “today's immigrants face an atmosphere of hostility, violence,... a badly broken system of laws … [and] worker exploitation.” In JFJ's view, justice for illegal immigrants must include a pathway to citizenship.
Wages: “Millions of working families struggle to make ends meet because their jobs fail to pay a living wage,” says JFJ. As a solution, the organization proposes the implementation of living-wage laws mandating that every worker be paid enough to afford basic expenses such as food, clothing, housing, transportation, and medical care. Citing what he perceives to be a biblical mandate for a living wage, JFJ's Vice President of Programs, Rabbi Mordechai Liebling, urges that city governments “not contract with anyone who does not pay a living wage to its employees.”
Green Jobs: JFJ is “working to create good jobs in the green economy,” jobs that will “benefit low-income workers and communities.” These include jobs related to wind and solar power, alternative fuels, and energy-efficiency retrofits to items like the insulation, duct sealing, water heaters, HVAC units, windows, roofing, and doors in existing homes. Green-job advocates have cited Spain's initiatives in that field as exemplary. But according to a 2009 study, every green job created with government money in Spain over the preceding eight years had resulted in a loss of 2.2 regular jobs, and only 10 percent of the newly created green jobs became permanent.
Service Corps - Atlanta (SCA): Saying that “we have taken President Obama's challenge to serve seriously,” SCA is “a domestic service and learning travel program” where young Jewish adults (aged 20-40) partner with community-based organizations throughout the southeastern United States to do volunteer work in low-income neighborhoods. Examples of such projects include: priming and painting a hurricane-damaged home, planting trees as part of a reforestation project, door-to-door canvassing in support of a campaign to create resources for youth, and organic farming initiatives.
Hurricane Katrina Recovery and Redevelopment Project (HKRRP): Launched in 2005, this program aims “to focus the resources and attention of the Jewish community” on those “who were disproportionately affected by the [Katrina] disaster,” namely “the region’s poor and working-class residents, especially immigrants and people of color.” Much like the Tzedec program, HKRRP makes grants and low-interest-rate loans to local community-development banks and credit unions which will “play a critical role in the redevelopment of homes and businesses of poor and working families otherwise unable to access credit.” It also supports “grassroots advocacy” organizations that call for the government to finance relief efforts on behalf of Katrina's victims. Noteworthy grantees of this program include PICO LIFT (Louisiana InterFaith Together), the Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance, ACORN, the NAACP, and the New Orleans Workers’ Center for Racial Justice. As of August 2007, JFJ's efforts had resulted in more than $2.65 million in grants and loans.
JFJ has also given financial support to the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee
In 2010, when controversy arose over a plan by Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf and his American Society for Muslim Advancement to build a 13-story, $100 million mosque/Islamic Center near Ground Zero in lower Manhattan, JFJ leadership supported Rauf's plan. JFJ President and CEO Simon Greer characterized opponents of the mosque project as "shrill voices of division" who were guilty of "fear-mongering" and "scapegoating."
JFJ receives funding from George Soros's Open Society Institute, which gave the organization $150,000 in 2009 and $200,000 in 2010.
MSNBC: Jews for Jesus Head Defends Speech
September 9, 2008
http://www.jewsforjesus.org/about/news/20080910
.."Jews For Jesus has sometimes been criticized by mainstream Jewish political leaders, some of whom consider it offensive and anti-Semitic."
"What we see in Israel, the conflict that has spilled out throughout the Middle East, really which is all about Jerusalem, is an ongoing reflection of the fact that there is judgment," David Brickner told an audience at Wasilla Baptist Church that included Palin [Palin did not know who the speakers were to be].
Brickner told NBC News that Palin's pastor is a strong supporter of his mission.... “Larry Kroon is a supporter and friend of Jews for Jesus,” he said, “and a personal friend of mine.”
Larry Kroon, who has been the presiding pastor at Wasilla Bible for the last 30 years, declined to describe Ms. Palin's beliefs or the role she plays in the church, but suggested that she is more of a back-bencher than a leading light.
Palin's Alaska Church Damaged in Suspicious Fire
Published December 13, 2008
Israeli newspapers have vetted the Republican candidate for veep. “Palin displays an Israeli flag in her office window despite the tiny Jewish population in her state. Republicans say, ‘That says it all.’ An online video interview of Palin that is currently making the rounds appears to put to rest liberal rumors that she is no friend of Israel,” notes a recent article in Israel Today. “In the interview with Alaska HDTV, an Israeli flag is clearly seen hanging near the window of Palin’s office.”..."Israel National News blogger Tamar Yonah points out that these appearances of the Israeli flag are made more significant by the fact that the video “was not made by a Jewish organization, nor is (Palin) speaking before a Jewish audience or catering to any Jewish vote.”
The Jerusalem Connection had this to add about Palin:
Sarah Palin is the liberal's worst nightmare. The Medianite's attacks on her have been and will no doubt continue to be vicious. Let's face it, they are desparate to see her defeated. Therefore God's people must undergird her in prayer -- for God's protection, for wisdom, discernment and uncommon courage. She is indeed a "Game Changer."
Great info - thanks.
Simon Greer on MSNBC (VIDEO EMBEDDED at site)
Wednesday night, Simon Greer, president and CEO of Jewish Funds for Justice, discussed Sarah Palin’s “blood libel” comment on MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann.
http://www.jewishjustice.org/simon-greer-msnbc
http://www.jewishjustice.org/foxaction
They’ve been planning to “take action” since November -
http://www.jewishjustice.org/story/2010-11-16/rupert-murdochs-protocols
http://www.jewishjustice.org/fox
Thanks - that says it all!