Year end is fast approaching, and with it comes an opportunity to look back and assess… Did I do all I wanted to do over the past 12 months? Did I accomplish my goals? Stick with my New Year’s resolutions? Make the world better in some small way?
Year end is a chance to set and re-set goals, and one place to start might be with tzedakah. In a year full of darkness for Israel and the Jewish people, we can all bring a bit of light and hope. Please consider making a gift to the 2025 UJFT Annual Campaign.
Your gift will bring light to the families of hostages and hostage survivors in Israel, as well as those displaced families seeking to rebuild their lives. Your gift will take care of elderly Jews in Ukraine – now heading in to their third winter of war (which promises to be the worst one yet, with an electrical grid so heavily degraded by repeated Russian attacks).
Your gift will help college students dealing with intimidation and threats from the disgusting antisemitic “protests” taking place on college campuses throughout the country. Your gift will help fund increased security throughout the Jewish community of Tidewater, hardening our physical locations and providing training against possible threats. And your gift will help bolster the local programs and services we fund right here at home, which make this the community we love.
When you look back on this year… this sad, shocking, frightening, and maddening year… will you be satisfied with your actions? Please consider a gift of support for the Jewish community at home and around the world through the Federation’s Annual Campaign.
To make a gift, call UJFT’s campaign department at 757-965-6115, email pmalone@ujft.org, or visit jewishVA.org. If you received a pledge card in the mail earlier this year, now is a great time to fill it out and return it. And if you receive a phone call from one of our callers in the coming days and weeks, please say yes. You’ll be touching more lives than you can imagine.
Here’s looking forward to a better year ahead for all of us. Am Yisroel Chai!
Amy Zelenka is chief development officer for United Jewish Federation of Tidewater. She may be reached at
azelenka@ujft.org.