Rabert Loup, the incoming United Jewish Appeal national chairman, who is visiting Israel for high level talks prior to taking office May 20, does not see Israel’s peace with Egypt as a potential problem for UJA’s fundraising efforts.
On the contrary, he told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in an interview here, “some of Israel’s problems are going to grow as a result of shrinking borders. United States Jewry has got to understand that our partnership, through the UJA, is not based on war or peace–but on a desire to enhance the quality of Jewish life, both in Israel and in the U.S.”
Loup, a builder from Denver, Colo., sees Project Renewal as becoming increasingly focal in UJA compaigning. It represents, he said, “the opportunity for our generation, for those who were not able to contribute towards Israel’s birth, to be part of Israel’s rebirth.”
The twinning of diaspora communities with target areas in Israel — city suburbs or development towns–“gives a connection that we haven’t had before between Jews in Israel and abroad… people in the U.S. and elsewhere becoming deeply involved…are meeting and working with Israelis directly,” Loup said.
TURNED ON ABOUT PROJECT RENEWAL
Project Renewal is moving forward now after years of teething pains usually ascribed to the Israeli bureacracy. Loup said the UJA side of the operation was not blameless, either. “It look us time to get our act together,” he remarked.
Now, however, UJA missions are coming back “very turned on about Project Renewal,” and the UJA’s efforts are directed at getting this enthusiasm on the part of people who have visited and seen with their own eyes transmitted to the broader American community.
He stressed that UJA’s basic policy is still not to accept pledges for Project Renewal that could come as a substitute for regular UJA giving. In practical terms that means that a contributor’s Project Renewal gift will not be accepted unless a pledge is first made to the current campaign–and that gift is in line with past years’ giving.
Loup acknowledged that UJA went through a weak patch during the mid and late 1970’s (after the Yom Kippur War year high) when receipts were not matching inflationary increases. But recent years have seen enormous efforts invested, he said, and the results are good and getting better. The latest projection for the 1982 campaign is that it will bring in some $580 million, Loup said.
A CHANGING MOOD IN THE JEWISH AGENCY
He envisaged tough discussions during this spring and summer over the Jewish Agency’s budgetary problem. The Agency is facing huge debt-service charges, and is having to sell off assets.
Loup and UJA executive vice chairman, irving Bernstein, told JTA they were confident that diaspora leadership was already playing an enhanced role in managing Agency policy–and this trend would markedly grow in the future. “There is a changing mood in the Agency today,” Bemstein said. “You will see a changed Jewish Agency.”
Loup and Bernstein stressed that with money tight, the UJA and Keren Hayesod top leadership would be demanding streamlining and budget-effectiveness in the Agency– and would be in a position to ensure that improvements were forthcoming.
Loup flatly refused to be drawn by Israeli journalists into pronouncements on Israeli policy matters–especially towards any overt or implied criticism of the Begin government. It is “not the role” of the top UJA leadership, he stressed to Israeli interviewers, to become embroiled in Israeli policy issues.
To JTA, Loup expressed concern at encountering repeatedly in Israel the view that UJA’s contribution (some $300 million for Israeli social welfare and education) was minor in comparison with U.S. government aid to the Jewish State.
The true perspective, he asserted with vigour, was that U.S. government officials, Congressment and Senators, regarded the UJA compaign as an expression of the American Jewish community’s commitment to Israel. If UJA giving dropped significantly, Washington would immediately conclude that the level of that commitment was falling, Loup said.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
