I Opinion
OTHER VIEWS
Bob Aronson: Fund-Raiser, Troop Builder
I
f today were Day 1 of the
Detroit Jewish commu-
nity and you sat down to
draw up the description of the
individual you would envision
as the coordinator of its vision,
planning and daily affairs — you
would be challenged to develop
a better description than we find
today in our own Bob Aronson,
CEO of our Jewish Federation
and United Jewish Foundation.
We are blessed with world-
class lay leadership and espe-
cially those who rise to such
positions as Annual Campaign
chair or president. However,
given my 12 years as a Federation
professional, with most of those
years in the executive suite, I
can declare with confidence that
having Bob Aronson as our com-
mander in chief over these past
18 years has created a once-in-a-
generation dynamic.
Running the community is
sometimes messy business. It's
Bob's steady hand and direct
leadership approach that get it
done every day, year
after year. That does
not mean that every-
one is always happy
with the outcome, but
that's what makes a
great leader. Bob has
worked to bring out
the best in everyone,
from lay leadership to
staff, all for the fight
to meet the mission.
With his efforts,
communities have
been uplifted, from Detroit to
Kiev, from Netanya to the Central
Galilee. Lives have been changed.
Lives have been saved.
There are thousands of stories
across the world where Bob's
efforts have had a direct impact.
And although I can't relate the
stories of others, I can share a
few of my own.
When Israeli Prime Minister
Yitzkak Rabin was assassinated
in 1995, it was Bob who pulled
community leadership together
to gather our thoughts, plan for
the community's
response and begin
to understand a new
reality. I saw in Bob
that night and the
days that followed an
ability to bring calm
to the most difficult
of situations.
After being at
Federation for a few
years, I began to
understand the power
of fund development
and had a thought to raise some
funds to support U-M Hillel in
memory of my brother, Professor
Gary Davidoff. I asked Bob what
he thought, and he told me he
would think about it and get
back to me. An hour later, he
asked me to come to his office
and told me that he had raised
$10,000 for the fund, which today
provides seder meals for students
who are not able to return home
for Passover.
On 9-11, I was in Israel with
a solidarity mission. It took me
hours of random calling between
home, cell phone numbers and
the office to get through to any-
one. Bob was the first person I
reached. With all that was on his
agenda at that critical moment,
his primary focus for me was the
state of the mission participants.
As the week unfolded, it became
apparent that getting home
would be no easy task. When
we arrived at JFK, the mission
participants agreed that taking
domestic air at that moment was
still not safe and agreed to travel
by bus. As is always the case" in
an emergency, Bob marshaled
the appropriate staff resources
to arrange for every detail of our
long journey back home.
A commitment to our youth
has always been first priority for
Bob. Be it the Teen Mission pro-
gram, taking our kids to Israel
— or the Israeli camper pro-
gram, bringing Israeli children
to us. None of this would happen
without Bob's commitment to
raise the funds to continue the
programs and make them afford-
able to all. My family has partici-
pated in all aspects of these pro-
grams, and we are better people
and better Jews as a result.
Bob often takes on a military
perspective to his responsi-
bilities, understanding the
battlefield, organizing his troops,
creating and executing his plans
— all in an effort to win the
never-ending battle against the
forces that work against the
continuity of our Jewish people
around the globe.
We all owe Bob a debt we can
never repay. His personal sac-
rifice cannot be measured. His
accomplishments are too great to
be fully understood or appreci-
ated. He is truly a once-in-a-gen-
eration leader.
kids in the name of peace and
coexistence.
But while we should all be
sympathetic to appeals to help
children, some prudence about
those Palestinian adults who ask
for our money is called for. And
when such requests come from a
longtime Israel-basher and for-
mer spokeswoman for the arch-
terrorist Yasser Arafat like Hanan
Ashrawi, skepticism ought to be
the order of the day.
As it happens, Ashrawi made
a recent stop in Philadelphia to
help raise money for the Palestine
Children's Relief Fund, which
has had ties with the Holy Land
Foundation, now shut down by
the U.S. government.
In addition to speaking at a for-
mal dinner for the group, Ashrawi
was also hosted by local Jews,
including some with long records
of Jewish activism, for a fund-
raiser specifically aimed at raising
Jewish money. These )ews say
that past statements of their new
Palestinian friends are irrelevant
to the obligation to give tzedekah
as well as to build bridges for
peace.
But how can anyone trust
Palestinian charities that are
compromised by their terrorist
connections to carry out the noble
intentions of their Jewish donors?
While the impulse to help
needy kids is commendable, Jews
who are solicited need to think
carefully about the ultimate des-
tination of funds raised by such
persons and whether or not better
ways exist to help the Palestinians
in the long and short term.
One suggestion might be for
Palestinians to stop educating the
younger generations to hate Jews,
and to cease promoting terrorism
and suicide bombing as the kind
of fate a child ought to embrace.
If they did, there would be no
need for them to ask for alms
from Jews — who are, ironically
enough, the intended victims of
such violence. E
Mark Davidoff is former execu-
tive director of the Bloomfield
Township-based Jewish Federation
of Metropolitan Detroit.
The Limits of Sympathy
Philadelphia
I
n the wake of the collapse
of the peace process and
the rise of Hamas, the
debate about how to engage the
Palestinians continues to bedevil
the U.S. Jewish community.
The Israeli government, as well
as most Israelis and American
Jews, clearly believes that there
is no negotiating with a terrorist
government. Nor do many see
much purpose in a charade of
talks with Palestinian Authority
President Mahmoud Abbas.
At the same time, we are
sensitive to the humanitarian
disaster the Palestinians have
inflicted upon themselves. There
is no question that the situa-
tion in the territories is bad. The
corruption of the Palestinian
Authority helped kill whatever
business wasn't wiped out by
the conflict they have fomented.
Having destroyed their economy
by choosing war over peace time
and time again — and having
now isolated themselves from an
32 May 11 2006
international com-
munity eager to help
by voting for Hamas
— Palestinians still
turn to the world
with their hands out,
pleading for assis-
tance.
Such appeals sound
like the lament of a
child who has mur-
dered his parents and
then asks for sympa-
thy because he's an
orphan.
So, to whom do
they turn? Why, to American Jews,
of course. Who else would be an
easier mark for Palestinian hus-
tlers than those Jews whose idea
of Jewish identity is to support
any cause but that of their own
people?
Ever since the beginning of the
Oslo peace process, a certain por-
tion of American Jewry has been
flinging some of its charitable
donations down the sinkhole
that is the Palestinian economy.
Some were enticed to invest in
Palestinian busi-
nesses with the laud-
able notion that by
promoting a healthy
Arab economy, they
would not only build
a constituency for
peace but make some
cash, too. But almost
all who did so saw
their investments fall
victim to the avarice
of the Palestinian
kleptocracy or the
senseless violence of
its terrorist apparatus.
Others invested in advanced
training for Palestinians. This led
to some P.A. bureaucrats getting a
free ride at the Harvard BuSiness
School, courtesy of American
Jews, where they may have honed
their intellects but failed to apply
the principles of sound finance to
their own government's financial
skullduggery.
Now in the wake of the latest
Palestinian disaster comes a new
set of American pilgrims who
hope to feed hungry Palestinian
Jonathan Tobin is executive editor of
the Jewish Exponent in Philadelphia.