Local News
Gail Asper takes on new challenge as co-chair of major Hebrew University fundraising campaign
By MYRON LOVE Over the past 35 years Gail Asper has risen to the top ranks among Canadian philanthropists and as the go-to leader for high-profile fundraising campaigns. In her 30s, she notes, she chaired a successful Manitoba Theatre Centre fundraising campaign. In her 40s she was the youngest chair of our city’s annual United Way campaign. In her 50s she served for two years as chair of our Jewish community’s annual Combined Jewish Appeal. And, I am sure that most readers are aware of her herculean effortsbringing to fruition her father’s vision of a world class human rights museum in Winnipeg.
Now in her 60s, Asper has taken on a lead role in another major fundraising campaign – one of international scope – as co-chair of an upcoming Hebrew University campaign, which is set to launch in October.
“My dad (the late Israel Asper – Gail’s role model) always told me,” she recalls, “that when you are asked to do something, while you can’t guarantee success, you do the best you can.”
This year’s campaign will be a particularly significant one for Israel’s oldest and largest university. This year mark’s the Hebrew University’s 100th anniversary – and the Asper family has played a leading role in the university for almost 50 years.
Gail Asper remembers going to Jerusalem – with her father – and family – when she was in her 20s – when Israel Asper would be attending HU annual Board of Governors meetings. “I met the president of the university,” she recounts. “I got to see what the university was doing and got to know the people on the board. There were board members from all over the world, all accomplished and interesting people.. It was so glamourous.”
In 1989, her father – after more than 20 years on the board – told Gail that he was stepping down to spend more time building the still relatively new Canwest business – and suggested that she should replace him as a board member. Not only did she join the board, she also became one of the founding members of the newly formed Canadian Friends of Hebrew University Business and Professional Division, along with other now prominent community members Howard Morry and Murray Palay.
“I remember being on the phone, back in 1993, holding my baby Jonathan in one arm while going through my phone list selling tickets for our gala,” Asper says. “It was good training for being able to manage looking after my family, work and volunteering later in life.”
It wasn’t long after she joined the Hebrew U board that she moved on to join the board executive,” she notes. “We would have meetings in Israel three or four times a year. Thank goodness now for Zoom. But I really enjoyed meeting with fellow board members as well as university management and faculty.”
Asper says that she was really surprised to be asked to chair the new campaign. “Most of the major HU donors are American,” she explains. “I thought that an American chair would be more appropriate than a Canadian,” she says.
She agreed to take on the role, but insisted on having an American co-chair. The individual she chose is a prominent American trial lawyer from Los Angeles by the name of Patty Glaser.
“I have known Patty for years,” Asper reports. “We met through the Hebrew University. She is very well organized and a terrific fundraiser.”
Asper adds that she would also like to recruit an Israeli philanthropist as a third chair. “There are a lot more wealthy Israelis today,” she observes. “I think it is important to get an Israeli more involved. We identified a few prospects and narrowed it down to a HU alumnus who has been very successful.”
Asper officially takes up her new role in October 2025, coinciding with the investiture of the incoming president, Prof. Tamir Sheafer. “We don’t have many details about the 100th anniversary campaign,” she notes. “The target for the last seven-year campaign – which ended in June – was $1 billion. We co-chairs will have discussion with the new president as to our financial goal and how the funds will be distributed.”
One area that Asper suggests will be a focus of the new campaign will be Jewish philanthropists and foundations who had been supporting American and Canadian universities, but who have been told that since October 7, 2023, their donations are no longer welcome. “Others have pulled their donations because of anti-Jewish activity on campuses,” she points out. “We will be suggesting that their donations will be better spent supporting Israel’s leading universities rather than antisemitic universities in Canada and the US.”
She adds that she will be co-ordinating the Canadian contributions to the campaign with CFHU executive director (and former Winnipeg resident – while he was executive director of the Canadian Friends of the Hebrew University here) Rami Kleinmann. “In Canada, we always punch above our weight,” Asper notes.
She does admit to be disappointed that the HU’s 100th anniversary celebrations scheduled for last June had to be cancelled because of the war with Iran. “Anita Wortzman (the Asper Foundation’s executive director) and I were already in Israel,” Asper reports. “I had planned to attend every program on campus, meet the donors and scientists and scholars and learn what they are working on.”
She is looking forward to making up for some of what she missed in June with her upcoming visit to Israel in the fall and the kick-off to the campaign.
Local News
Scenes from Shalom Square 2026
Shalom Square – the Israel pavilion, is on until Saturday night, August 8. As usual, audiences have been packing the Rady JCC gym to watch entertainment provided by the Chai Folk Ensemble and Kadima Dance Troupe.
(All photos courtesy of Keith Levit)
Local News
Nakba exhbit at CMHR – you can see it right here and make your own assessment
By BERNIE BELLAN (Posted June 26, updated July 19) The Nakba exhibit at the Canadian Exhibit for Human Rights opened to the public June 27. The morning before the exhibit was set to open to the public, (it had a private opening for invited guests the evening of June 26) we received a press release from the CMHR. That press release gave a very detailed description of what was in the exhibit, along with photos (supplied by Annie Kierans of the CMHR).
There is also a link right at the beginning of the press release that will allow you to watch the same videos that anyone attending the exhibit can watch. We reprinted what was sent to us without making one edit. We leave it to you to form your own opinion as to whether the exhibit is fair in its presentation, and whether it is lacking “context” – which is an accusation that has been levelled at the exhibit’s organizers by some representatives of Jewish organizations.
We have received many emails in reaction to the exhibit. If you have an opinion and would like to see it published on this website, you can send it to jewishp@mymts.net, but please indicate whether you would be willing to have it published on this website.
Here is what we received the morning of June 26:
Winnipeg, MB — June 26, 2026 — The Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) will open a new exhibit tomorrow that explores human rights violations related to the ongoing forced displacement of Palestinian Canadians.
Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present will be on display in the Rights Today gallery on Level 5 until 2028. Featuring personal stories told through artifacts and video testimonies, the exhibit presents Palestinian Canadians reflecting on their ongoing struggle for human rights. The small exhibit reveals enduring patterns of loss and resilience, helping visitors understand more about this contemporary human rights story.
Palestinian Canadian stories are now included alongside many other stories of forced displacement and human rights violations featured in the Museum’s galleries. Each of these stories contribute to our visitors understanding of human rights and help the Museum fulfill its mandate to foster reflection and dialogue.
Exhibition highlights
Personal stories and artifacts: Experience firsthand accounts from Palestinian Canadians sharing their journeys of displacement and memory through a series of five artifacts. Cases display artifacts like property deeds, house keys, and a traditional Palestinian embroidered dress, accompanied by short videos that deepen understanding of the impacts of displacement.
Powerful artworks: In her painting Bound Together in Gaza, Malak Mattar, a Gazan artist, captures the struggles and resilience of her generation shaped by conflict. Her work pays homage to Guernica, Picasso’s powerful masterpiece depicting civilian suffering during war.
Curfews and Closures, by Rajie Cook, bears witness to life under military occupation during the 2000–2005 Palestinian uprising, when curfews and closures were expanded and further limited basic rights and freedoms.
Cultural heritage: Discover traditional Palestinian embroidery called tatreez. Tatreez motifs and colours are tied to place, family history and regional identity. Patterns are associated with particular towns, villages or areas of Palestine. In this way, tatreez is a form of storytelling: a way of preserving memory, sustaining identity and expressing resilience across displacement and exile.
Poetry and reflection: Engage with Mahmoud Darwish’s evocative verses, inspiring personal reflection on exile, voice, and responsibility. Visitors can take a card containing Darwish’s poem and add a personal note, fostering ongoing dialogue beyond the exhibit.
Contemporary context: Witness striking images of current events in Gaza and the West Bank, connecting past displacement to ongoing struggles.
Quotes:
“No force can silence the truth we carry. Growing up in Canada, my children lived the Nakba through our stories. And now we watch it happen again, live, on our phones. When I see the images coming out of Gaza, I am not watching the news. I am watching my history repeat itself.” -Fouad Sahyoun, a Palestinian Canadian featured in the exhibit
“We developed this exhibit with a clear awareness that Palestinian Canadian voices have too often been marginalized, silenced or spoken over — and that anti-Palestinian racism affects whose stories are heard and whose suffering is recognized. That is why we intentionally centred Palestinian Canadian voices throughout the exhibit.” -Isabelle Masson, Curator of Palestine Uprooted
“Human rights matter precisely when they are inconvenient, when the question of who deserves the dignity of having their rights recognized is genuinely contested. These are the moments where having a national museum for human rights is most important.
There are people who believe this exhibit should not exist in its current form. There are people who believe it should have existed sooner. There are people who will visit this exhibit and feel that it does not say enough, and others who will feel it says too much.
We have listened to every one of these voices. We have reflected. And we have renewed our resolve to continue the difficult, sometimes contested, and often controversial work of building understanding about human rights. We are a museum grounded in Canada’s human rights framework, whose mandate requires us to bear witness to the full complexity of the human story. We are proud to open this exhibit because the story it tells will help achieve that mandate, and because this story belongs in the collective memory of Canadians.”
- – Isha Khan, CEO
Local News
Jewish Federation releases amounts to be allocated to each of its 12 beneficiary agencies
By BERNIE BELLAN I had been reporting on allocations given to the 12 beneficiary agencies of the Jewish Federation for over 11 years – until last year, when I took a break from covering our major Jewish organizations.
These past couple of months, however, I’ve gone back to looking at financial information for some of our major Jewish organizations, including the Jewish Foundation of Manitoba and Jewish Child and Family Services. (If you want to read my reports on the two Annual General Meetings held by those organizations you can find them elsewhere on this website.)
Over the years as well, I had also been adding to a table that I began to compile 12 years ago that showed comparison figures year over year for how much had been allocated by the Jewish Federation to each of its 12 beneficiary agencies. Even though I didn’t do any reporting on allocations by the Jewish Federation last year, I was able to obtain information about the 2025 allocations that I’ve reproduced in the table that you can see here. (That table only shows information for the past five years, although I do have tables showing information about allocations going back as far as 2014 that can be found on my website if anyone is interested.)
Looking at the figures for this coming year though, a couple of things stand out: For one, there will be no allocation for Aleph Bet Child Life Enrichment, just as there wasn’t one last year either. This comes after having received allocations for as long as I’ve been covering the allocations committee, so that might require some further investigation to find out why Aleph Bet Enrichment is no longer receiving an allocation. Secondly, there will be a small allocation for the Irma Penn School of Jewish Learning – as there was last year also, after a multi-year absence of the school applying for allocations. The Irma Penn School used to advertise in The Jewish Post & News when it was active, but I don’t recall seeing anything about it the past two years. At one time it was very popular among adults. It would be worth looking into how it functions these days. (Over to you, Myron. You used to write about the Irma Penn School.)
Also, the report of the Allocation Committee says: “The Jewish Learning Institute resumed their participation in the Allocations process after a hiatus of a few years to enhance their revitalized programming.” But the Jewish Learning Institute did receive funding in 2025 and 2024, so it’s not clear why the report says there was a “hiatus of a few years.” No big deal, really.
It’s always been interesting for me – and I’m sure for you, too, to look at trends: Which beneficiary agencies have been receiving the largest increases in allocations year over year or, as the case may be, the smallest increases in funding – relative to what other agencies received?
According to the report of the allocations committee, “The 2025-26 Combined Jewish Appeal Campaign raised $7,224,856 this year.”
That amount is $660,577 more than what was raised in the 2024-25 campaign, which was $6,864,279. While a portion of what was raised goes toward beneficiary agencies, another portion goes to Israel, another portion is to cover operating expenses of the Federation, and another portion goes to replenishing the Federation’s emergency fund, which was badly depleted during Covid.
Insofar as how much each of the beneficiary agencies receives,, each year the allocations committee of the Jewish Federation meets during the course of the year to decide how to allocates funds to the 12 beneficiary agencies of the Federation.
The allocations are to be given to the respective agencies on September 1.
The total amount allocated to the Federation’s beneficiary agencies is $95,700 more than what was allocated last year, and $193,600 more than what was allocated in 2024. There will be a total of $3,050,000 allocated in 2026, compared to $2,954,300 in 2025, and $2,856,400 in 2024. Interestingly, the total amounts allocated in 2023 and 2022 were higher than what were allocated in 2024 and 2025, but the allocation to Gray Academy in 2022 was exceptionally high – $974,000, compared with $900,000 this year. In 2022 Gray Academy was still dealing with the fallout from Covid and the huge increases in costs that arose from having to resort to online teaching.
As well, until this year, the most ever allocated by the Jewish Federation to its beneficiary agencies was also in 2022 – when the community was still in the grip of the Covid crisis and total allocations were $3,003,000. At that time the Federation tapped into an emergency fund that it had on hand – and totally depleted that fund.
In its report the allocations committee went into some detail explaining its methodology and how certain criteria were given special attention when it came to determining allocations.
Each of the agencies had representatives appear before the committee. Those representatives were given 15-20 minutes to make presentations to the members of the committee and answer a series of questions pertaining to eight different criteria.
Here, in summary, are the main criteria the report cites as “priorities” when it came to deciding how much to allocate to agencies:
- Social isolation and lack of belonging: “Longing for belonging,” a desire for a
stronger sense of connection to the Jewish community and Jewish identification. - Seniors Isolation: Does this program address the problem of seniors’ isolation?
- Teen Program Continuity Gaps: Gaps in programming continuity limit teen
leadership opportunities. Peer connection programs across this demographic
must be prioritized. - Building Jewish Identity and Connection: Strengthening Jewish identification
ensures every program builds Jewish community through authentic Jewish content
and context. - Poverty and Financial Barriers to Participation: Financial challenges can prevent
community members’ full participation in Jewish life. - Accessibility and Inclusion for People with Disabilities: People with cognitive or
physical challenges face barriers to full participation in Jewish life. - Exclusionary or Unwelcoming Environments: Language and practices may
unintentionally exclude interfaith families, LGBTQ+ individuals, Jews of color, and
others. - Data on Participation and Community Needs: Do you have data available on who
participates in programs, who is underserved, and what impact programs have?
Even after having subjected each of the agencies to that sort of rigorous scrutiny, however, the fact remains that the sizes of the increases given to each agency were quite consistent with what had been given in previous years.
Here, for instance, are the increases that have been given to some of the agencies for the past three years:
Gray Academy – 2026 increase over 2025: $30,000; 2025 increase over 2024: $30,000
Gwen Secter – 2026 increase over 2025: $19,000; 2025 increase over 2024: $11,500
JCFS – 2026 increase over 2025: $30,000; 2025 increase over 2024: $25,000
Rady JCC – 2026 increase over 2025: $18,000; 2025 increase over 2024: $10,000
What it all boils down to, I would suggest, is that the allocations each of those agencies received are consistent with what they had received in previous years, notwithstanding the supposedly rigorous criteria that the allocations committee says it adopted in reviewing the presentations given by each agency.
