No, this is not another – or an outdated – plug to vote for delegates to the Zionist Congress. That ship has sailed – or at least the crew has been recruited.
Now there is a major new potential crisis in the Jewish world that we have the opportunity to help resolve.
According to news stories that are not getting adequate attention in the general and Jewish world, President Trump is weighing the idea of issuing an executive order that would forbid nonprofit organizations from making grants outside of the United States, G-d forbid – which, if implemented, would devastate the economic support for Torah and other charitable entities in Israel (not to mention Ukraine and other countries) that rely most substantially on such support.
Were this support to be eliminated, many of these institutions would lose their abilities to function as they do now, or even close to the way they do now, without even considering potential funding cuts by local government in Israel.
Inactivity on our part is not an option. Head-shaking and hand-wringing are not the kinds of options or actions that will help. Communications to President Trump, one way or another – or, better still, in all possible ways – can help. Ideally, we should try to get the message across, in a positive way, with someone we know who has the president’s ear. In addition, I recommend that we all try to contact the president by mail, email, and phone, and ask everyone we know who shares our concerns to do the same.
Here is a template or proposed text:
Dear President Trump,
I support and commend your efforts to eliminate waste and corruption in government, though I also recognize that decent and reasonable people may differ on the details of the implementation.
I also support the concept of not using taxpayer dollars to support controversial programs abroad that do not necessarily advance the interests of our country either directly or indirectly. I believe that private citizens – and foundations – should be the ones to pay for activities, especially abroad, in this category.
Precisely for this reason, I was and remain deeply concerned upon reading that you are considering an executive order that would restrict private foundations from spending the money earned by their founders to support educational, medical, and charitable entities abroad. Many of these entities benefit U.S. soldiers and American employees working remotely, as well as people who were born in America, helped to build America by hard work, and then went to retire in another country (such as Israel) and use their resources instead of ours.
Please do not issue such an executive order, or, if you issue such an executive order, please restrict it to apply only to money to countries that are not allied with our country. If you will have already issued such an order by the time you see this communication, please consider revoking it or limiting it as suggested above or in some other way.
Thank you very much, and may G-d bless America and all people who promote and share its values.
The White House can be reached at www.whitehouse.gov/contact; comments to phone number: (202) 456-1111; switchboard: (202) 456-1411.
On a personal note, I have written a number of articles during the current Daf Yomi cycle on the daf and current events. One can’t help but observe that, by definition, the daf is studied around the world every day. The yeshivot and other entities in Israel have potential positive and constructive effects on virtually every day of the year. A communication we can write even once can impact every Jewish community in Israel every day of the year, one way or another – or more. It should be our solemn mission to do what we can while it can still make a difference, to save the Jewish character of the country of Israel and to prevent devastating repercussions to many of its vital institutions.
