JNF raises another $81M

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The Jewish National Fund is moving closer to its $1-billion 10-year goal, raising $81 million in its 2014 campaign, the organization announced at its annual breakfast, Oct. 29 at the Sheraton New York Times Square. 

During last summer’s Gaza war, 24,000 contributions brought in $6 million. With that money, JNF provided five Saar fire and rescue trucks, 209 mobile bomb shelters, temporary housing, and immediate wartime assistance through its numerous partners on the ground in Israel.

JNF’s Friends of Israel Firefighters division augments government spending to provide the growing and urgent need for fire and rescue equipment. In addition to new trucks and equipment, FIF helps refurbish fire stations and open new dispatch centers so that fires following rocket strikes can be extinguished immediately.

JNF donors can have their name placed on a fire truck by giving $125,000 towards the purchase of a new truck, which typically cost half a million dollars.

The breakfast’s keynote speaker, Gil Hoffman, of the Jerusalem Post, pointed out the great need fulfilled by the Sderot indoor recreation center, built by JNF in 2009.

“My son just celebrated his sixth birthday there.” Hoffman said. ”If you’ve been there, you may recall the signs on equipment saying you must be six years old to use it.”

The party was a joyful rite of passage for the six-year-olds, and Hoffman pointed out that children near the Gaza border never get a chance to play outside.

“Daily missiles are lobbed in the area. Sderot is not even a settlement, this territory is not disputed at all. Thanks to JNF, small apartment dwellers have the next best thing to a back yard,” he said. Eight-hundred  people a day enjoy this safe haven.

Hoffman discussed current issues in the Middle East.

ISIS already controls “land that is 20 times larger than Israel,” he said. “And think about this: If not for Israel destroying Syrian nuclear reactors, ISIS would have a nuclear bomb right now.”

On the plus side for Israel, he said, “frustrated young Muslims could have joined the Gaza war. Instead, they choose to kill their Muslim brothers in ISIS. And we are grateful that America destroyed the Syrian chemical weapons, which were not intended for their own civilians, but for Israelis.”

JNF remains unique among Jewish charities in its long-term vision to expand communities in the desert, water research, energy production, increasing population in Israel, making parks and playgrounds accessible to all Israelis — and, of course, planting trees.