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American Jewish Congress

The American Jewish Congress (AJCongress or AJC) is an association of American Jews organized to defend Jewish interests at home and abroad through public policy advocacy, using diplomacy, legislation, and the courts.[1]

American Jewish Congress
Founded1918
Registration no.13-1679610 (EIN)
PurposeAmerican Jews organized to defend Jewish interests at home and abroad through public policy advocacy - using diplomacy, legislation, and the courts.
HeadquartersNew York City
President
Jack Rosen
Vice President
Dr. Munr Kazmir
Secretary
Ben Chouake
Websitewww.ajcongress.org

History edit

The AJCongress was founded in November 1918,[2] and represented a "populist counterbalance to the American Jewish Committee (AJC), which was dominated by the wealthy and conservative German-Jewish establishment." It has established a "reputation for being politically liberal." It protested the Nazi regime.[2] Post World War II, it made "its mark as an active litigant on church-state issues and civil rights".[3] It was first proposed on August 30, 1914, by Bernard G. Richards.[2] Leaders within the American Jewish community, consisting of Jewish, Zionist, and immigrant community organizations, convened the first AJCongress in Philadelphia's historic Independence Hall. Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise, Felix Frankfurter, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, and others joined to lay the groundwork for a national democratic organization of Jewish leaders from all over the country, to rally for equal rights for all Americans regardless of race, religion, or national ancestry.[4]

In addition to its stated goal of equal rights for all, it was founded to broaden Jewish leadership and to present a unified American Jewish position at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. It became effective as a pressure group in 1928 under the leadership of Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise, who remained the president and chief spokesperson of the AJCongress until his death in 1949. The current head of the AJCongress is Jack Rosen.[5]

The 1930s edit

Throughout the 1930s, Rabbi Wise was vocal in his warnings about the dangers of Nazism. When Adolf Hitler was named Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933, Wise organized a mass protest rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City despite strong opposition by the German government, the U.S. State Department, and conservative Jewish organizations such as the AJC and B'nai B'rith. The AJCongress continued to organize protest rallies throughout the 1930s and 1940s. In August 1933, the AJCongress led a general boycott of German goods.[6]

In 1934, Daniel Marks was named head of the AJCongress. He traveled to Germany and brought 5,000 Jews to America.[citation needed]

In 1936, the AJCongress was instrumental in establishing the World Jewish Congress (WJC). Maintaining his position as president of the AJCongress, Rabbi Wise was also elected president of the WJC. During World War II, the AJCongress acted as a liaison between the U.S. government and the WJC on issues relating to rescue attempts made on behalf of European Jews.[citation needed]

The 1940s and 1950s edit

In August 1942, Rabbi Wise received a cable from Gerhart Riegner, the WJC representative in Switzerland.[7][better source needed] Riegner reported that the Nazis had planned, and were implementing, a policy to exterminate all of European Jewry; the cable also referred specifically to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. After the U.S. State Department confirmed the accuracy of the information in the cable, now known as the Riegner Telegram, the AJCongress convened a Joint Emergency Committee.[8][better source needed]

The AJCongress supported Zionism and cultural pluralism.[9] Its leadership overlapped with that of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA). As a result, the two organizations agreed to concentrate on different tasks during the war. The AJCongress dedicated itself to rescuing European Jews, while the ZOA worked to establish a Jewish state in Palestine. This arrangement continued after the war, although its significance decreased after the creation of the State of Israel in 1948.[citation needed]

The AJCongress also supported coalition politics, legislative reform, and litigation as a means of bolstering a sense of Jewish identity and community.[9] In order to further these goals, the AJCongress created the Commission on Community Interrelations (CCI) and the Commission on Law and Social Action (CLSA).[9] The CCI worked to use psychology and social engineering to combat prejudice and developed psychological studies to bolster anti-discrimination legislation.[9] The CLSA, chaired by Shad Polier, was the legal arm of the AJCongress and was modeled after the Legal Defense Fund of the NAACP.[9] The mission of CLSA was "to defend civil liberties and fight discrimination against all minority groups, based on an understanding that prejudice against any group was a threat to others."[9] One of the earliest cases the CLSA worked on was Westminster School District v. Mendez, challenging Mexican-American segregation in California schools.[9] The brief filed by the CLSA in this case was influential in future NAACP strategies.[9]

Domestically, the AJCongress was active as well in the 1940s. AJCongress lawyers successfully challenged racial and religious segregation in public schools, citing the psychological harm produced in school children.[9] These lawyers employed civil rights and Establishment Clause arguments.[9] Jewish judges in New York, unable to gain the support of their colleagues to end religion matching of probationers, turned to AJCongress lawyers to craft a legal strategy.[9] The lawyers at the AJCongress proffered an employment discrimination argument, noting that judges on the court only hired as many Jewish probation officers as there were Jewish probationers.[9] They used this argument to file a claim with New York's State Commission Against Discrimination (SCAD), which was also the first state anti-discrimination agency in the country.[9] This claim was partially successful in that it forced judges to hire probation officers without regard to religion, but still allowed matching based on religion.[9]

The 1960s and 1970s edit

Rabbi Joachim Prinz (1902–88) was president of the AJCongress from 1958 to 1966. He served as a founding chairman of the 1963 March on Washington and spoke at that event.[10]

The AJCongress was involved in legal proceedings that sometimes conflicted with other Jewish American organizations. In 1966, the AJCongress joined the New York Civil Liberties Union, the United Parents Associations, and the United Federation of Teachers in filing suit against provisions of the Federal Education Act, which would provide support to religious schools. Jewish day school educators and leaders in over 30 states and over 100 communities representing 330 Hebrew day schools insisted that the AJCongress did not speak for American Jews on religious or educational issues, and was viewed by some in the Jewish community as primarily a secular agency. The president of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America (also known as the Orthodox Union), Rabbi Joseph Karasick, said that the AJCongress "speaks for itself only and is under no circumstances to be taken as representing the American Jewish community. The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, central spokesman for this country's 3,100 Orthodox synagogues, as well as all Orthodox rabbinic bodies and every other Orthodox Jewish body, have given full support to the Federal Education Act and deem its provisions to be consonant with the principle of church-state separation."[11]

Among their most important actions was their participation on the touristic boycott by American Jews against Mexico in 1975, while Naomi B. Levine led the lawsuit when she was executive director of the American Jewish Congress.[12] This was a response to the impulse of Arab countries, the Soviet bloc, and Non-Aligned Movement countries to consider Zionism as racism in the context of World Conference on Women in Mexico City, and the following UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 which equated it with South Africa's Apartheid and was supported by the Mexican government at the time. Joint with other Jewish American organizations, the AJCongress announced the suspension of all their trips to Mexico on 28 November 1975, after 30 unanimous votes during an executive committee reunion.[13]

In late 1978 New York State's prison system reached an agreement, brokered in part by AJCongress's then-assistant executive director Marc D. Stern, "to arrange ... TV dinners ... along with packaged breakfasts and disposable utensils" to those requesting kosher food while in prison.[14]

In the 1978 Regents of the University of California v. Bakke case, the AJCongress opposed racial quota systems and exclusive consideration of race in college admissions. The AJCongress celebrated Supreme Court's decision in the case to strike down racial quotas in university admissions, seeing it as a vindication of their view that racial quotas were unconstitutional. By 2003, the organization's opposition to affirmative action had tempered. The AJCongress's legal director Marc Stern said at the time that "The Jewish community is less concerned about affirmative action than it was 25 years ago...We've all shifted."[15][16]

The 1980s and 1990s edit

Following its heyday during the 1960s, when many of its activities coincided with the larger Civil Rights Movement, a drop-off in its membership throughout the 1980s and 1990s ensued.

In the late 1990s and into the 2000s, the AJCongress experienced the defection of a number of local chapters, including those in Boston, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles. There were disputes over ideological issues and finances. Some of those chapters have since reestablished themselves as independent non-profits focused on liberal social and community issues. Finding the AJCongress had become too conservative, members of the Los Angeles chapter, for instance, created the Progressive Jewish Alliance (PJA) in 1999.[17] They sought to assert a Jewish interest in the campaigns for social justice in Southern California, which has the United States' second largest Jewish population. The Progressive Jewish Alliance expanded in February 2005 by opening a San Francisco Bay Area chapter.

In 1994 the AJC along with the Anti Defamation League launched a campaign demanding that the IRS revoke the tax-exempt status of the Holy Land Foundation (HLF). In December 2001, when President George Bush designated the HLF as a domestic terror organization, the HLF was the largest Muslim charity in the United States.[18]

The AJCongress has since regrouped and is actively engaged in constitutional issues domestically and supporting Israel and challenging anti-Semitism abroad.

2000–2010 edit

In 2004, the AJCongress led a successful effort to keep federal funds out of Catholic schools. U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler sided with the AJCongress, which argued that federal funds were being used to pay for the teaching of Catholic values through programs such as the University of Notre Dame's Alliance for Catholic Education. AmeriCorps argued that its funding was based on a program's secular activities, not religious teachings. But Judge Kessler ruled that the religious and secular activities were not sufficiently separated or monitored.[19]

The AJCongress suspended its activities and laid off much of its staff on July 13, 2010, because it had run out of operating funds due to losses in the Madoff scandal.[20][21] It disclosed that it lost roughly $21 million of the $24 million in endowments it had invested through Bernard Madoff and his firm, money that supported the AJCongress and its programs. The endowments supported about one quarter of the AJCongress' budget, which was $6.2 million in 2006. The AJCongress had connected with Madoff through Martin and Lillian Steinberg, supporters of AJCongress and friends of Madoff who invested with him, and Madoff became a trusted advisor of AJCongress on financial matters. The AJCongress increased its investments with Madoff in 2004, after it sold its New York headquarters for $18 million in 2003, and when the Steinbergs died they left approximately $17 million to the organization, which was also invested with Madoff. While the financial losses of the endowment were crippling, others noted that the AJCongress had long been in the shadow of larger American Jewish organizations such as the AJC and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). While the AJCongress focused on religious freedom in America, free speech, and women's rights, donors showed more interest in Israel and anti-Semitism.[22]

While the AJCongress had a long history of fighting aid to religious schools, the effort proved to be in conflict with Orthodox Jewish communities that were very successful in attracting government funds for students. An investigation by The Jewish Daily Forward showed that each year, tens of millions of dollars in federal Pell Grants go to yeshivas, which typically focus on Talmud study rather than secular subjects. For 2010, 63 of the 152 religious institutions that received Pell Grants were Jewish, the data shows. The Jewish schools received 53% of the $84.5 million in Pell Grant money that went to religious schools in 2010. Of the top ten Pell Grant recipients in dollar terms in 2010, six were yeshivas.[23]

2010–present edit

In 2013, the board restructured the organization; since then, it has been working on incorporating new missions that are relevant to the times. Today, the AJCongress primarily focuses on the following challenges: strengthening the bond between the U.S. and Israel; combating domestic and global anti-Semitism; combating the BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement; preventing a nuclear Iran; and promoting cooperation and trade between Israel and countries around the world.[citation needed]

Among its major programs are the International Mayors Conference, where the organization brings over 30 mayors from around the world to promote Israel back in their cities. Past participants include Mayor of New York City Bill de Blasio, President of Argentina Mauricio Macri, Premier of Taiwan William Lai, and former Prime Minister of Italy Matteo Renzi.[citation needed]

The organization opposes the BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement and asserts that fighting BDS is not only a struggle against anti-Israel activities, but a human rights issue as well.[24] To make decision makers more accessible to the Jewish community, the organization created the 500 Club and executive briefing meetings and conference calls with the decision makers and members of the Jewish community.[25]

In May 2019, the AJCongress launched the "Jewish Guide to U.S Politics", a virtual resource summarizing the stances of U.S. senators and candidates in the 2020 U.S. presidential race on issues related to the American Jewish community and Israel.[26][27] The AJCongress also created the Club 500, an executive speaking series which connects decision makers from around the world with members of the Jewish community via phone briefings.[28]

In 2019, the AJCongress spent 32.1% of its expenses on programs and 60.4% on administration, scoring 24% for its financial accountability.[29]

The First Amendment edit

The AJ Congress has been involved in hundreds of civil rights and religious freedoms cases before local and federal courts and the United States Supreme Court. Brown v. Board of Education[30] gave the AJCongress its public entrée into the field of Constitutional defense agencies.

The group advocates for removing religious symbols from public life, and thus filed a brief against allowing public displays of the menorah during Hanukkah in County of Allegheny v. ACLU.

Women's issues edit

The AJC founded its Women's Division in 1933. It operated for approximately fifty years before it was discontinued as a separate section; the organization subsequently continued its support for women's rights and feminist perspectives under the auspices of the Commission for Women's Equality (CWE), which was established in 1984.[31]

The CWE has turned its attention to the ethical, legal, and medical issues arising from research revealing that Ashkenazi Jewish women have higher-than-average frequencies of gene mutations predisposing them to breast and ovarian cancer.[citation needed]

In 1988, AJCongress hosted "The First International Jewish Feminist Conference: The Empowerment of Women" in Israel to address women's rights. More than 600 Jewish women from around the world attended, including former Congresswoman Bella Abzug and Betty Friedan. Some of the attendees visited the Kotel (Western Wall), Torah in hand and found that they were not allowed to pray in their fashion because of Orthodox restrictions on women wearing religious items, singing or reading Torah. A movement began, now known around the world as Women of the Wall, headed by Anat Hoffman. Polls show that in Israel "64 percent of the secular public, 53 percent of the traditional non-religious public, and 26 percent of the traditional-religious public support the group, Women of the Wall, and their quest to pray at the Kotel in their fashion. But their cause was unanimously rejected by the poll's ultra-Orthodox respondents", according to The Algemeiner.[32][failed verification]

The CWE most recently held a major women's conference in Tel Aviv, Israel, in May 2006, bringing notable women of achievement like Anne F. Lewis; Lynn Sherr, anchor for ABC's 20/20; Irshad Manji, author of The Trouble with Islam; Bettina Plevan, partner at Proskauer Rose and former head of the New York City Bar Association; and others to a weeklong discussion on women's accomplishment and success.[33][34] Carole E. Handler was the CWE's most recent chair.

Controversies edit

Anti-Communism edit

Fear of being accused of Communism led the AJCongress to dissociate themselves from Jewish Communists and leftists during the Second Red Scare. The major Jewish organizations at the time advocated their expulsion from the Jewish community, collaborated with security agencies, supported the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, and discouraged other Jewish organizations from supporting the Rosenberg Committee.[35] In 1953, the National Community Relations Advisory Council, which included the AJCongress, released a statement criticizing the Rosenberg Committee for allegedly causing public panic over antisemitism within the Jewish community.[36] Stuart Svonkin, author of Jews Against Prejudice, argued that the involvement of the AJCongress and other Jewish groups with McCarthyism undermined these groups' otherwise support for civil liberties. However, the AJCongress cooperated with McCarthyism to a lesser extent than the AJC and the ADL.[37]

During the 1940s, the AJCongress strongly urged the Jewish establishment to distance itself from Jewish People's Fraternal Order and the American Jewish Labor Council. The AJCongress voted to expel both groups on June 7, 1949.[38][39][40][41]

Israel Singer edit

In the fall of 2007, the AJCongress announced that it had retained the services of Rabbi Israel Singer,[42] the former secretary-general of the World Jewish Congress – who left the agency after claims of financial irregularities were levied following an investigation by New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer[43] and followed up by accusations from then-WJC President Edgar Bronfman[44] about alleged theft.

Ms. magazine edit

On January 10, 2008, the AJCongress released an official statement[45] critical of Ms. magazine's refusal to accept a full-page advertisement[46] honoring three prominent Israeli women: Dorit Beinisch (then-president of the Supreme Court of Israel), Tzipi Livni (then-minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel), and Dalia Itzik (then-speaker of the Knesset). The AJCongress press release states: "'What other conclusion can we reach,' asked Richard Gordon, President of AJCongress, 'except that the publishers − and if the publishers are right, a significant number of Ms. Magazine readers − are so hostile to Israel that they do not even want to see an ad that says something positive about Israel?' ... 'Clearly Ms. has changed a great deal from the days when AJCongress members and leaders of the AJCongress' Commission for Women's Equality − including Betty Friedan, Bella Abzug and Ms. co-founder Letty Pogrebin − were at the forefront of the Women's Movement that led to the creation of Ms. Magazine.'"[45]

Katherine Spillar, executive editor of Ms. magazine, responded to the AJCongress on Ms. magazine's website, denying an anti-Israel bias, stating that: "Ms. Magazine has been criticized for not running an ad submitted by the American Jewish Congress (AJCongress) featuring the photographs of three prominent Israeli women leaders with the statement 'This is Israel.'" She argued that the proposed advertisement was inconsistent with the magazine's policy to accept only "mission-driven advertisements from primarily non-profit, non-partisan organizations", suggesting that the advertisement could have been perceived "as favoring certain political parties within Israel over other parties, but also with its slogan 'This is Israel,' the ad implied that women in Israel hold equal positions of power with men." Spillar stated that the magazine had "covered the Israeli feminist movement and women leaders in Israel ... eleven times" in the last four years.

Religion and the Public Schools: A Summary of the Law edit

The AJCongress, which had already been publishing Religion and the Public Schools: A Summary of the Law with the name of attorney Marc D. Stern on the cover,[47] adapted it to a "looseleaf form and expanding its distribution" in 1993. Stern served as assistant executive director of AJCongress[48][49][50] and subsequently became general counsel of the AJC[51]

See also edit

References edit

  1. ^ . Archived from the original on December 7, 2014. Retrieved February 9, 2007.
  2. ^ a b c Landman, Isaac; Rittenberg, Louis (1939). The Universal Jewish Encyclopedia: An Authoritative and Popular Presentation of Jews and Judaism Since the Earliest Times. p. 248.
  3. ^ "AJCongress Crippled by Madoff Scandal". The Forward. February 8, 2009.
  4. ^ . Time. June 20, 1938. Archived from the original on December 12, 2007.
  5. ^ "Secretary Powell to Attend Berlin Conference on Anti-Semitism". U.S. Department of State. Retrieved November 24, 2019.
  6. ^ "AJHS | Academic Awards". American Jewish Historical Society.
  7. ^ "Background & Overview of the Riegner Report". Jewish Virtual Library.
  8. ^ "Jewish Organizations Plan for Rescue of European Jewry (April 1943)". Jewish Virtual Library.
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Katz, Elizabeth D. (2019-08-24). "'Racial and Religious Democracy': Identity and Equality in Midcentury Courts". Stanford Law Review. Rochester, NY. SSRN 3441367.
  10. ^ King, Martin Luther; Carson, Clayborne; Luker, Ralph E.; Holloran, Peter; Russell, Penny A. (August 19, 1992). The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., Volume IV: Symbol of the Movement, January 1957-December 1958. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520222311 – via Google Books.
  11. ^ "Orthodox Groups to Defend in Court Federal Aid to Parochial Schools". JTA. December 5, 1966.
  12. ^ Spiegel, Irving (1975-05-27). "JEWISH CONGRESS TO SUE ON BOYCOTT". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-01-16.
  13. ^ Katz Gugenheim, Ariela (2019). (in Spanish). Mexico: Universidad Iberoamericana/Cal y Arena. ISBN 978-607-8564-17-0. Archived from the original on 2022-04-10. Retrieved 2021-10-29.
  14. ^ "New York Agrees for First Time To Serve Kosher Food in Prison". The New York Times. November 19, 1978.
  15. ^ "Jewish Organizations Hail Court Ruling in Bakke Case; Say It Vindicates Their Stand Against Quotas". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. 20 March 2015. Retrieved 2023-04-01.
  16. ^ "Jews temper views on affirmative action". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. 29 January 2003. Retrieved 2023-04-01.
  17. ^ Cohen, Aryeh (2007). "Progressive Jewish Alliance Ed. Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnik. Detroit, 2007. 544. Gale Virtual Reference Library.". Encyclopaedia Judaica. Macmillan Reference USA, 2nd ed. Vol. 16. p. 544. Retrieved May 4, 2014.
  18. ^ Peled, Miko (2018). Injustice. The Story of the Holy Land Foundation Five. Just World Books. ISBN 978-1-68257-085-2. pp. 84,56
  19. ^ "AmeriCorps sponsor must stop funding Catholic programs" September 29, 2014, at the Wayback Machine The First Amendment Center. July 7, 2004.
  20. ^ Berkman, Jacob (July 20, 2010). . Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Archived from the original on July 24, 2010. Retrieved July 28, 2010.
  21. ^ "U.S. Jewish Group Eyes Merger With AJC After Losing Money in Madoff Scam". Fox News. July 20, 2010. from the original on October 26, 2012. Retrieved July 28, 2010.
  22. ^ "AJCongress Crippled by Madoff Scandal". The Jewish Daily Forward. January 8, 2009.
  23. ^ "Yeshivas Score Huge Pell Grant Windfall Jewish Religious Colleges Get Tens of Millions in Federal Aid". The Jewish Daily Forward. October 31, 2012.
  24. ^ "AJCongress launches campus fight against BDS". PressReader.
  25. ^ "U.S. Ambassador Friedman: Rebuilding Gaza without Abbas is 'tremendous prize' for Hamas". Haaretz.
  26. ^ "First 'Jewish Guide to U.S. Politics' launched - Jewish World". Israel National News. 30 May 2019.
  27. ^ "First 'Jewish Guide to U.S. Politics' launched". Arutz Sheva. 30 May 2019. Retrieved November 23, 2019.
  28. ^ "Israeli general warns US withdrawal from Syria is a red flag - Middle East". Israel National News. 16 January 2019.
  29. ^ "American Jewish Congress". Charity Navigator. Retrieved April 15, 2015.
  30. ^ "Brown v. Board of Ed". December 22, 2005, at the Wayback Machine
  31. ^ Svonkin, Stuart. "American Jewish Congress". Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia. March 1, 2009. Jewish Women's Archive. Retrieved October 24, 2015.
  32. ^ "AJCongress At the Wall ... a History of Support for Women". February 6, 2007, at the Wayback Machine AJC. Retrieved April 15, 2015.
  33. ^ . Archived from the original on 2006-12-15. Retrieved 2007-01-11.
  34. ^ "CWE Article". December 15, 2006, at the Wayback Machine
  35. ^ Jews And The Left: The Rise And Fall Of A Political Alliance. Monash University. p. 21.
  36. ^ "Julius and Ethel Rosenberg". My Jewish Learning. Retrieved 2023-03-31.
  37. ^ "A Jewish Feminine Mystique?". Rutgers University. Retrieved 2023-04-29.
  38. ^ "JEWISH CONGRESS UPHOLDS OUSTERS; Two Left-Wing Bodies Held by Administrative Group to Be 'Hostile to Program'". The New York Times. 8 June 1949. Retrieved 2023-04-29.
  39. ^ "⁨⁨The American Jewish World⁩, 10 June 1949⁩". National Library of Israel. Retrieved 2023-04-29.
  40. ^ "An Appeal to the American Jewish Congress Convention". Cornell University Library. Retrieved 2023-04-29.
  41. ^ "Los Angeles Jewish People's Fraternal Order". Yiddishkayt.org. 8 May 2013. Retrieved 2023-04-29.
  42. ^ "AJC Taps Israel Singer". JTA Wire, by way of the Baltimore Jewish Times, December 2, 2007.
  43. ^ Strom, Stephanie (December 31, 2004). "Spitzer Looking Into World Jewish Congress". New York Times.
  44. ^ Barkat, Amiram (March 15, 2007). "World Jewish Congress fires chairman Israel Singer in surprise move". Haaretz.
  45. ^ a b "Ms. Magazine Blocks Ad on Israeli Women". American Jewish Congress. January 10, 2008. from the original on January 13, 2008. Retrieved January 18, 2008.
  46. ^ (PDF). American Jewish Congress. January 10, 2008. Archived from the original (PDF) on October 23, 2008. Retrieved January 18, 2008.
  47. ^ Stern, Mark D. Religion and the Public Schools: A Summary of the Law (PDF). {{cite book}}: |website= ignored (help)
  48. ^ "Arthur Hertzberg, Rights Activist". Sun-Sentinel. April 19, 2006. Marc D. Stern, who is assistant executive director of the American Jewish Congress
  49. ^ Chanes, Jerome A.; Vasan, Mildred (2004). Antisemisism: A Reference Handbook. p. 156. Marc D. Stern, assistant executive director of the American Jewish Congress
  50. ^ Patrick, John J. (2006). The Supreme Court of the United States: A Student Companion. Marc D. Stern, a lawyer for the American Jewish Congress
  51. ^ "American Jewish organization weigh in on Supreme Court ruling on travel ban". Jewish Chronicle. June 28, 2018. American Jewish Committee's ... Marc Stern is the committee's general counsel

External links edit

  • Official website  

american, jewish, congress, confused, with, american, jewish, committee, this, article, needs, additional, citations, verification, please, help, improve, this, article, adding, citations, reliable, sources, unsourced, material, challenged, removed, find, sour. Not to be confused with American Jewish Committee This article needs additional citations for verification Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources Unsourced material may be challenged and removed Find sources American Jewish Congress news newspapers books scholar JSTOR August 2021 Learn how and when to remove this template message The American Jewish Congress AJCongress or AJC is an association of American Jews organized to defend Jewish interests at home and abroad through public policy advocacy using diplomacy legislation and the courts 1 American Jewish CongressFounded1918Registration no 13 1679610 EIN PurposeAmerican Jews organized to defend Jewish interests at home and abroad through public policy advocacy using diplomacy legislation and the courts HeadquartersNew York CityPresidentJack RosenVice PresidentDr Munr KazmirSecretaryBen ChouakeWebsitewww wbr ajcongress wbr org Contents 1 History 1 1 The 1930s 1 2 The 1940s and 1950s 1 3 The 1960s and 1970s 1 4 The 1980s and 1990s 1 5 2000 2010 1 6 2010 present 2 The First Amendment 3 Women s issues 4 Controversies 4 1 Anti Communism 4 2 Israel Singer 4 3 Ms magazine 5 Religion and the Public Schools A Summary of the Law 6 See also 7 References 8 External linksHistory editThe AJCongress was founded in November 1918 2 and represented a populist counterbalance to the American Jewish Committee AJC which was dominated by the wealthy and conservative German Jewish establishment It has established a reputation for being politically liberal It protested the Nazi regime 2 Post World War II it made its mark as an active litigant on church state issues and civil rights 3 It was first proposed on August 30 1914 by Bernard G Richards 2 Leaders within the American Jewish community consisting of Jewish Zionist and immigrant community organizations convened the first AJCongress in Philadelphia s historic Independence Hall Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise Felix Frankfurter U S Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis and others joined to lay the groundwork for a national democratic organization of Jewish leaders from all over the country to rally for equal rights for all Americans regardless of race religion or national ancestry 4 In addition to its stated goal of equal rights for all it was founded to broaden Jewish leadership and to present a unified American Jewish position at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 It became effective as a pressure group in 1928 under the leadership of Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise who remained the president and chief spokesperson of the AJCongress until his death in 1949 The current head of the AJCongress is Jack Rosen 5 The 1930s edit Throughout the 1930s Rabbi Wise was vocal in his warnings about the dangers of Nazism When Adolf Hitler was named Chancellor of Germany on January 30 1933 Wise organized a mass protest rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City despite strong opposition by the German government the U S State Department and conservative Jewish organizations such as the AJC and B nai B rith The AJCongress continued to organize protest rallies throughout the 1930s and 1940s In August 1933 the AJCongress led a general boycott of German goods 6 In 1934 Daniel Marks was named head of the AJCongress He traveled to Germany and brought 5 000 Jews to America citation needed In 1936 the AJCongress was instrumental in establishing the World Jewish Congress WJC Maintaining his position as president of the AJCongress Rabbi Wise was also elected president of the WJC During World War II the AJCongress acted as a liaison between the U S government and the WJC on issues relating to rescue attempts made on behalf of European Jews citation needed The 1940s and 1950s edit In August 1942 Rabbi Wise received a cable from Gerhart Riegner the WJC representative in Switzerland 7 better source needed Riegner reported that the Nazis had planned and were implementing a policy to exterminate all of European Jewry the cable also referred specifically to the Auschwitz Birkenau concentration camp After the U S State Department confirmed the accuracy of the information in the cable now known as the Riegner Telegram the AJCongress convened a Joint Emergency Committee 8 better source needed The AJCongress supported Zionism and cultural pluralism 9 Its leadership overlapped with that of the Zionist Organization of America ZOA As a result the two organizations agreed to concentrate on different tasks during the war The AJCongress dedicated itself to rescuing European Jews while the ZOA worked to establish a Jewish state in Palestine This arrangement continued after the war although its significance decreased after the creation of the State of Israel in 1948 citation needed The AJCongress also supported coalition politics legislative reform and litigation as a means of bolstering a sense of Jewish identity and community 9 In order to further these goals the AJCongress created the Commission on Community Interrelations CCI and the Commission on Law and Social Action CLSA 9 The CCI worked to use psychology and social engineering to combat prejudice and developed psychological studies to bolster anti discrimination legislation 9 The CLSA chaired by Shad Polier was the legal arm of the AJCongress and was modeled after the Legal Defense Fund of the NAACP 9 The mission of CLSA was to defend civil liberties and fight discrimination against all minority groups based on an understanding that prejudice against any group was a threat to others 9 One of the earliest cases the CLSA worked on was Westminster School District v Mendez challenging Mexican American segregation in California schools 9 The brief filed by the CLSA in this case was influential in future NAACP strategies 9 Domestically the AJCongress was active as well in the 1940s AJCongress lawyers successfully challenged racial and religious segregation in public schools citing the psychological harm produced in school children 9 These lawyers employed civil rights and Establishment Clause arguments 9 Jewish judges in New York unable to gain the support of their colleagues to end religion matching of probationers turned to AJCongress lawyers to craft a legal strategy 9 The lawyers at the AJCongress proffered an employment discrimination argument noting that judges on the court only hired as many Jewish probation officers as there were Jewish probationers 9 They used this argument to file a claim with New York s State Commission Against Discrimination SCAD which was also the first state anti discrimination agency in the country 9 This claim was partially successful in that it forced judges to hire probation officers without regard to religion but still allowed matching based on religion 9 The 1960s and 1970s edit Rabbi Joachim Prinz 1902 88 was president of the AJCongress from 1958 to 1966 He served as a founding chairman of the 1963 March on Washington and spoke at that event 10 The AJCongress was involved in legal proceedings that sometimes conflicted with other Jewish American organizations In 1966 the AJCongress joined the New York Civil Liberties Union the United Parents Associations and the United Federation of Teachers in filing suit against provisions of the Federal Education Act which would provide support to religious schools Jewish day school educators and leaders in over 30 states and over 100 communities representing 330 Hebrew day schools insisted that the AJCongress did not speak for American Jews on religious or educational issues and was viewed by some in the Jewish community as primarily a secular agency The president of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America also known as the Orthodox Union Rabbi Joseph Karasick said that the AJCongress speaks for itself only and is under no circumstances to be taken as representing the American Jewish community The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America central spokesman for this country s 3 100 Orthodox synagogues as well as all Orthodox rabbinic bodies and every other Orthodox Jewish body have given full support to the Federal Education Act and deem its provisions to be consonant with the principle of church state separation 11 Among their most important actions was their participation on the touristic boycott by American Jews against Mexico in 1975 while Naomi B Levine led the lawsuit when she was executive director of the American Jewish Congress 12 This was a response to the impulse of Arab countries the Soviet bloc and Non Aligned Movement countries to consider Zionism as racism in the context of World Conference on Women in Mexico City and the following UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 which equated it with South Africa s Apartheid and was supported by the Mexican government at the time Joint with other Jewish American organizations the AJCongress announced the suspension of all their trips to Mexico on 28 November 1975 after 30 unanimous votes during an executive committee reunion 13 In late 1978 New York State s prison system reached an agreement brokered in part by AJCongress s then assistant executive director Marc D Stern to arrange TV dinners along with packaged breakfasts and disposable utensils to those requesting kosher food while in prison 14 In the 1978 Regents of the University of California v Bakke case the AJCongress opposed racial quota systems and exclusive consideration of race in college admissions The AJCongress celebrated Supreme Court s decision in the case to strike down racial quotas in university admissions seeing it as a vindication of their view that racial quotas were unconstitutional By 2003 the organization s opposition to affirmative action had tempered The AJCongress s legal director Marc Stern said at the time that The Jewish community is less concerned about affirmative action than it was 25 years ago We ve all shifted 15 16 The 1980s and 1990s edit Following its heyday during the 1960s when many of its activities coincided with the larger Civil Rights Movement a drop off in its membership throughout the 1980s and 1990s ensued In the late 1990s and into the 2000s the AJCongress experienced the defection of a number of local chapters including those in Boston Philadelphia and Los Angeles There were disputes over ideological issues and finances Some of those chapters have since reestablished themselves as independent non profits focused on liberal social and community issues Finding the AJCongress had become too conservative members of the Los Angeles chapter for instance created the Progressive Jewish Alliance PJA in 1999 17 They sought to assert a Jewish interest in the campaigns for social justice in Southern California which has the United States second largest Jewish population The Progressive Jewish Alliance expanded in February 2005 by opening a San Francisco Bay Area chapter In 1994 the AJC along with the Anti Defamation League launched a campaign demanding that the IRS revoke the tax exempt status of the Holy Land Foundation HLF In December 2001 when President George Bush designated the HLF as a domestic terror organization the HLF was the largest Muslim charity in the United States 18 The AJCongress has since regrouped and is actively engaged in constitutional issues domestically and supporting Israel and challenging anti Semitism abroad 2000 2010 edit In 2004 the AJCongress led a successful effort to keep federal funds out of Catholic schools U S District Judge Gladys Kessler sided with the AJCongress which argued that federal funds were being used to pay for the teaching of Catholic values through programs such as the University of Notre Dame s Alliance for Catholic Education AmeriCorps argued that its funding was based on a program s secular activities not religious teachings But Judge Kessler ruled that the religious and secular activities were not sufficiently separated or monitored 19 The AJCongress suspended its activities and laid off much of its staff on July 13 2010 because it had run out of operating funds due to losses in the Madoff scandal 20 21 It disclosed that it lost roughly 21 million of the 24 million in endowments it had invested through Bernard Madoff and his firm money that supported the AJCongress and its programs The endowments supported about one quarter of the AJCongress budget which was 6 2 million in 2006 The AJCongress had connected with Madoff through Martin and Lillian Steinberg supporters of AJCongress and friends of Madoff who invested with him and Madoff became a trusted advisor of AJCongress on financial matters The AJCongress increased its investments with Madoff in 2004 after it sold its New York headquarters for 18 million in 2003 and when the Steinbergs died they left approximately 17 million to the organization which was also invested with Madoff While the financial losses of the endowment were crippling others noted that the AJCongress had long been in the shadow of larger American Jewish organizations such as the AJC and the Anti Defamation League ADL While the AJCongress focused on religious freedom in America free speech and women s rights donors showed more interest in Israel and anti Semitism 22 While the AJCongress had a long history of fighting aid to religious schools the effort proved to be in conflict with Orthodox Jewish communities that were very successful in attracting government funds for students An investigation by The Jewish Daily Forward showed that each year tens of millions of dollars in federal Pell Grants go to yeshivas which typically focus on Talmud study rather than secular subjects For 2010 63 of the 152 religious institutions that received Pell Grants were Jewish the data shows The Jewish schools received 53 of the 84 5 million in Pell Grant money that went to religious schools in 2010 Of the top ten Pell Grant recipients in dollar terms in 2010 six were yeshivas 23 2010 present edit In 2013 the board restructured the organization since then it has been working on incorporating new missions that are relevant to the times Today the AJCongress primarily focuses on the following challenges strengthening the bond between the U S and Israel combating domestic and global anti Semitism combating the BDS Boycott Divestment and Sanctions movement preventing a nuclear Iran and promoting cooperation and trade between Israel and countries around the world citation needed Among its major programs are the International Mayors Conference where the organization brings over 30 mayors from around the world to promote Israel back in their cities Past participants include Mayor of New York City Bill de Blasio President of Argentina Mauricio Macri Premier of Taiwan William Lai and former Prime Minister of Italy Matteo Renzi citation needed The organization opposes the BDS Boycott Divestment and Sanctions movement and asserts that fighting BDS is not only a struggle against anti Israel activities but a human rights issue as well 24 To make decision makers more accessible to the Jewish community the organization created the 500 Club and executive briefing meetings and conference calls with the decision makers and members of the Jewish community 25 In May 2019 the AJCongress launched the Jewish Guide to U S Politics a virtual resource summarizing the stances of U S senators and candidates in the 2020 U S presidential race on issues related to the American Jewish community and Israel 26 27 The AJCongress also created the Club 500 an executive speaking series which connects decision makers from around the world with members of the Jewish community via phone briefings 28 In 2019 the AJCongress spent 32 1 of its expenses on programs and 60 4 on administration scoring 24 for its financial accountability 29 The First Amendment editThe AJ Congress has been involved in hundreds of civil rights and religious freedoms cases before local and federal courts and the United States Supreme Court Brown v Board of Education 30 gave the AJCongress its public entree into the field of Constitutional defense agencies The group advocates for removing religious symbols from public life and thus filed a brief against allowing public displays of the menorah during Hanukkah in County of Allegheny v ACLU Women s issues editThe AJC founded its Women s Division in 1933 It operated for approximately fifty years before it was discontinued as a separate section the organization subsequently continued its support for women s rights and feminist perspectives under the auspices of the Commission for Women s Equality CWE which was established in 1984 31 The CWE has turned its attention to the ethical legal and medical issues arising from research revealing that Ashkenazi Jewish women have higher than average frequencies of gene mutations predisposing them to breast and ovarian cancer citation needed In 1988 AJCongress hosted The First International Jewish Feminist Conference The Empowerment of Women in Israel to address women s rights More than 600 Jewish women from around the world attended including former Congresswoman Bella Abzug and Betty Friedan Some of the attendees visited the Kotel Western Wall Torah in hand and found that they were not allowed to pray in their fashion because of Orthodox restrictions on women wearing religious items singing or reading Torah A movement began now known around the world as Women of the Wall headed by Anat Hoffman Polls show that in Israel 64 percent of the secular public 53 percent of the traditional non religious public and 26 percent of the traditional religious public support the group Women of the Wall and their quest to pray at the Kotel in their fashion But their cause was unanimously rejected by the poll s ultra Orthodox respondents according to The Algemeiner 32 failed verification The CWE most recently held a major women s conference in Tel Aviv Israel in May 2006 bringing notable women of achievement like Anne F Lewis Lynn Sherr anchor for ABC s 20 20 Irshad Manji author of The Trouble with Islam Bettina Plevan partner at Proskauer Rose and former head of the New York City Bar Association and others to a weeklong discussion on women s accomplishment and success 33 34 Carole E Handler was the CWE s most recent chair Controversies editAnti Communism edit Fear of being accused of Communism led the AJCongress to dissociate themselves from Jewish Communists and leftists during the Second Red Scare The major Jewish organizations at the time advocated their expulsion from the Jewish community collaborated with security agencies supported the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg and discouraged other Jewish organizations from supporting the Rosenberg Committee 35 In 1953 the National Community Relations Advisory Council which included the AJCongress released a statement criticizing the Rosenberg Committee for allegedly causing public panic over antisemitism within the Jewish community 36 Stuart Svonkin author of Jews Against Prejudice argued that the involvement of the AJCongress and other Jewish groups with McCarthyism undermined these groups otherwise support for civil liberties However the AJCongress cooperated with McCarthyism to a lesser extent than the AJC and the ADL 37 During the 1940s the AJCongress strongly urged the Jewish establishment to distance itself from Jewish People s Fraternal Order and the American Jewish Labor Council The AJCongress voted to expel both groups on June 7 1949 38 39 40 41 Israel Singer edit In the fall of 2007 the AJCongress announced that it had retained the services of Rabbi Israel Singer 42 the former secretary general of the World Jewish Congress who left the agency after claims of financial irregularities were levied following an investigation by New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer 43 and followed up by accusations from then WJC President Edgar Bronfman 44 about alleged theft Ms magazine edit On January 10 2008 the AJCongress released an official statement 45 critical of Ms magazine s refusal to accept a full page advertisement 46 honoring three prominent Israeli women Dorit Beinisch then president of the Supreme Court of Israel Tzipi Livni then minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel and Dalia Itzik then speaker of the Knesset The AJCongress press release states What other conclusion can we reach asked Richard Gordon President of AJCongress except that the publishers and if the publishers are right a significant number of Ms Magazine readers are so hostile to Israel that they do not even want to see an ad that says something positive about Israel Clearly Ms has changed a great deal from the days when AJCongress members and leaders of the AJCongress Commission for Women s Equality including Betty Friedan Bella Abzug and Ms co founder Letty Pogrebin were at the forefront of the Women s Movement that led to the creation of Ms Magazine 45 Katherine Spillar executive editor of Ms magazine responded to the AJCongress on Ms magazine s website denying an anti Israel bias stating that Ms Magazine has been criticized for not running an ad submitted by the American Jewish Congress AJCongress featuring the photographs of three prominent Israeli women leaders with the statement This is Israel She argued that the proposed advertisement was inconsistent with the magazine s policy to accept only mission driven advertisements from primarily non profit non partisan organizations suggesting that the advertisement could have been perceived as favoring certain political parties within Israel over other parties but also with its slogan This is Israel the ad implied that women in Israel hold equal positions of power with men Spillar stated that the magazine had covered the Israeli feminist movement and women leaders in Israel eleven times in the last four years Religion and the Public Schools A Summary of the Law editThe AJCongress which had already been publishing Religion and the Public Schools A Summary of the Law with the name of attorney Marc D Stern on the cover 47 adapted it to a looseleaf form and expanding its distribution in 1993 Stern served as assistant executive director of AJCongress 48 49 50 and subsequently became general counsel of the AJC 51 See also editCongress Weekly Lillie ShultzReferences edit AJCongress Website Archived from the original on December 7 2014 Retrieved February 9 2007 a b c Landman Isaac Rittenberg Louis 1939 The Universal Jewish Encyclopedia An Authoritative and Popular Presentation of Jews and Judaism Since the Earliest Times p 248 AJCongress Crippled by Madoff Scandal The Forward February 8 2009 Jews v Jews Time June 20 1938 Archived from the original on December 12 2007 Secretary Powell to Attend Berlin Conference on Anti Semitism U S Department of State Retrieved November 24 2019 AJHS Academic Awards American Jewish Historical Society Background amp Overview of the Riegner Report Jewish Virtual Library Jewish Organizations Plan for Rescue of European Jewry April 1943 Jewish Virtual Library a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Katz Elizabeth D 2019 08 24 Racial and Religious Democracy Identity and Equality in Midcentury Courts Stanford Law Review Rochester NY SSRN 3441367 King Martin Luther Carson Clayborne Luker Ralph E Holloran Peter Russell Penny A August 19 1992 The Papers of Martin Luther King Jr Volume IV Symbol of the Movement January 1957 December 1958 University of California Press ISBN 9780520222311 via Google Books Orthodox Groups to Defend in Court Federal Aid to Parochial Schools JTA December 5 1966 Spiegel Irving 1975 05 27 JEWISH CONGRESS TO SUE ON BOYCOTT The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved 2023 01 16 Katz Gugenheim Ariela 2019 Boicot El pleito de Echeverria con Israel in Spanish Mexico Universidad Iberoamericana Cal y Arena ISBN 978 607 8564 17 0 Archived from the original on 2022 04 10 Retrieved 2021 10 29 New York Agrees for First Time To Serve Kosher Food in Prison The New York Times November 19 1978 Jewish Organizations Hail Court Ruling in Bakke Case Say It Vindicates Their Stand Against Quotas Jewish Telegraphic Agency 20 March 2015 Retrieved 2023 04 01 Jews temper views on affirmative action Jewish Telegraphic Agency 29 January 2003 Retrieved 2023 04 01 Cohen Aryeh 2007 Progressive Jewish Alliance Ed Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnik Detroit 2007 544 Gale Virtual Reference Library Encyclopaedia Judaica Macmillan Reference USA 2nd ed Vol 16 p 544 Retrieved May 4 2014 Peled Miko 2018 Injustice The Story of the Holy Land Foundation Five Just World Books ISBN 978 1 68257 085 2 pp 84 56 AmeriCorps sponsor must stop funding Catholic programs Archived September 29 2014 at the Wayback Machine The First Amendment Center July 7 2004 Berkman Jacob July 20 2010 AJCongress shutters quickly pays debts slowly Jewish Telegraphic Agency Archived from the original on July 24 2010 Retrieved July 28 2010 U S Jewish Group Eyes Merger With AJC After Losing Money in Madoff Scam Fox News July 20 2010 Archived from the original on October 26 2012 Retrieved July 28 2010 AJCongress Crippled by Madoff Scandal The Jewish Daily Forward January 8 2009 Yeshivas Score Huge Pell Grant Windfall Jewish Religious Colleges Get Tens of Millions in Federal Aid The Jewish Daily Forward October 31 2012 AJCongress launches campus fight against BDS PressReader U S Ambassador Friedman Rebuilding Gaza without Abbas is tremendous prize for Hamas Haaretz First Jewish Guide to U S Politics launched Jewish World Israel National News 30 May 2019 First Jewish Guide to U S Politics launched Arutz Sheva 30 May 2019 Retrieved November 23 2019 Israeli general warns US withdrawal from Syria is a red flag Middle East Israel National News 16 January 2019 American Jewish Congress Charity Navigator Retrieved April 15 2015 Brown v Board of Ed Archived December 22 2005 at the Wayback Machine Svonkin Stuart American Jewish Congress Jewish Women A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia March 1 2009 Jewish Women s Archive Retrieved October 24 2015 AJCongress At the Wall a History of Support for Women Archived February 6 2007 at the Wayback Machine AJC Retrieved April 15 2015 AJCongress Release Archived from the original on 2006 12 15 Retrieved 2007 01 11 CWE Article Archived December 15 2006 at the Wayback Machine Jews And The Left The Rise And Fall Of A Political Alliance Monash University p 21 Julius and Ethel Rosenberg My Jewish Learning Retrieved 2023 03 31 A Jewish Feminine Mystique Rutgers University Retrieved 2023 04 29 JEWISH CONGRESS UPHOLDS OUSTERS Two Left Wing Bodies Held by Administrative Group to Be Hostile to Program The New York Times 8 June 1949 Retrieved 2023 04 29 The American Jewish World 10 June 1949 National Library of Israel Retrieved 2023 04 29 An Appeal to the American Jewish Congress Convention Cornell University Library Retrieved 2023 04 29 Los Angeles Jewish People s Fraternal Order Yiddishkayt org 8 May 2013 Retrieved 2023 04 29 AJC Taps Israel Singer JTA Wire by way of the Baltimore Jewish Times December 2 2007 Strom Stephanie December 31 2004 Spitzer Looking Into World Jewish Congress New York Times Barkat Amiram March 15 2007 World Jewish Congress fires chairman Israel Singer in surprise move Haaretz a b Ms Magazine Blocks Ad on Israeli Women American Jewish Congress January 10 2008 Archived from the original on January 13 2008 Retrieved January 18 2008 This is Israel PDF American Jewish Congress January 10 2008 Archived from the original PDF on October 23 2008 Retrieved January 18 2008 Stern Mark D Religion and the Public Schools A Summary of the Law PDF a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a website ignored help Arthur Hertzberg Rights Activist Sun Sentinel April 19 2006 Marc D Stern who is assistant executive director of the American Jewish Congress Chanes Jerome A Vasan Mildred 2004 Antisemisism A Reference Handbook p 156 Marc D Stern assistant executive director of the American Jewish Congress Patrick John J 2006 The Supreme Court of the United States A Student Companion Marc D Stern a lawyer for the American Jewish Congress American Jewish organization weigh in on Supreme Court ruling on travel ban Jewish Chronicle June 28 2018 American Jewish Committee s Marc Stern is the committee s general counselExternal links editOfficial website nbsp Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title American Jewish Congress amp oldid 1171712088, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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