Category: Jns

B'nai B'rith Questions Heinz Endowment On Controversial Grant

11/5/2014

B'nai B'rith International contacted The Heinz Endowments, expressing dismay and deep concern over a grant previously given to Pittsburgh eatery Conflict Kitchen, which has served anti-Israel propaganda to diners as part of it's "Palestine" campaign.

The Heinz Foundation responded, denouncing the kitchen's current campaign and clarifying the timing of its one-time $50,000 grant (given in 2013).

The release was covered in articles run on The Algemeiner and the Jewish News Service. Read highlights from those reports, below:

JNS.org:

In an Oct. 31 statement on the correspondence, B’nai B’rith International called on Heinz Endowments to go further by issuing a “public disavowal” of its $50,000 grant to Pittsburgh-based snack bar Conflict Kitchen, which sells sandwiches wrapped in paper bearing anti-Israel slogans.

[...]

Conflict Kitchen, located near Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh, says it aims to use its menu to teach students about conflict between the U.S. and the countries it features in its cuisine selection.

The information spread via the anti-Israel food wrappers includes quotes defending terrorism against Israel. One wrapper reads, “How can you compare Israeli F-16s, which are some of the best military planes in the world, to a few hundred homemade rockets?”

The Algemeiner:

The head of Heinz Endowments, a foundation chaired by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s wife Teresa Heinz, wrote a letter to a Jewish organization that criticized the anti-Israel activity of one of the foundation's recently revealed grant recipients.

[...]

“I want to be especially clear that [Conflict Kitchen’s] current program on Palestine was not funded by the endowments and we would not fund such a program, precisely because it appears to be terribly at odds with the mission of promoting understanding. … [Heinz Endowments] emphatically does not agree with or support either the anti-Israel sentiments quoted on Conflict Kitchen’s food wrappers or the program’s refusal to incorporate Israeli or Jewish voices in its material,” Oliphant wrote.

JNS: Mariaschin Praises U.S. Religious Freedom Envoy Nominee

8/15/2014

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The position for United States ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom is likely to be filled by Rabbi David Saperstein, in a move that was praised by B'nai B'rith International Executive Vice President Daniel S. Mariaschin.

Saperstein, one of the most influential rabbis in the United States, currently serves as the director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. If he is approved, he will fill a position that has sat vacant for almost a year.

Jewish and Israel news, JNS.org, wrote an article on the nomination, including extensive quotes from Mariaschin.

Read an excerpt of the article below:

[...]

Daniel Mariaschin, executive vice president of B’nai B’rith International, called the nomination an “outstanding choice” and noted the decades during which he has witnessed Saperstein’s work on religious freedom.

“I think David got nominated to this position because of his experience, his expertise, his caring, his sensitivity to these issues, and his being able to speak out,” Mariaschin said. “The commendatory part of this here is that someone who was so deserving and who can do so much good, has been nominated for the position.

"David is very well connected internationally and his reputation, his writings, his speaking—all of those things are known in so much of the world in which we operate and we’re going to operate, so I think that’s a big plus.”

[...]

B’nai B’rith’s Mariaschin said a new religious freedom ambassador “is going to be welcomed in a lot of places, and in those places where religious freedom is being abridged, they should know that they’re going to have in our [ambassador] someone who is keeping a very close eye on what they’re doing.” In particular, Mariaschin noted the proliferation of violence against Christians at the hands of the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria terrorist group, as well as religious persecution in Africa, South Asia, and Iran.

“There are many [instances of religious persecution], it’s almost as if you don’t know where to start, and unfortunately the list is long and it is growing longer,” he said.

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B'nai B'rith Questions Heinz Endowment On Controversial Grant

JNS.org:

The Algemeiner:

JNS: Mariaschin Praises U.S. Religious Freedom Envoy Nominee

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