 |
Marc Jonathan Benjamin (born 31 October 1964) is a qualified lawyer and has held various leadership positions in NGOs and Jewish communal organisations, including as Chief Executive of the Board of Deputies of British Jews from January 2005 to May 2013 and Chief Operating Officer of World ORT from January 2014 to December 2015.
Born in Croydon, South London, he attended Park Hill Junior School, Dulwich College where he was a contemporary of Nigel Farage, and Manchester University where he read law. He practiced law as a litigator in the city at Denton Hall Burgin and Warrens (now Dentons) and then Teacher Stern.
He moved into communal service in 1996, working for several years for educational and cultural charities before joining the Board of Deputies in January 2005.
He has an entry in Who's Who and the Jewish Chronicle listed him in its 'Power 100' most influential members of the UK Jewish community, noting his modernising role at the Board of Deputies and his contacts within government.
Early in his tenure at the Board of Deputies he had to respond to the controversy following the publication of photographs of Prince Harry wearing a fancy dress Nazi uniform. This episode was followed by the incident in which the then Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, called a Jewish journalist a "German war criminal" and a "concentration camp guard", which prompted the Board of Deputies to refer the matter to the Standards Board for England, along with some two dozen other complainants.
Jon Benjamin has subsequently played a leading role in issues affecting the UK Jewish community, including on the issues of faith schools, Holocaust era looted art, interfaith activity and domestic and international affairs. He has given evidence to UK Parliamentary Select and Legislative Committees, the Supreme Court and in the immigration tribunal on the issue of Jewish status.
He sat on the Charity Commission's Faiths Advisory Council and has acted as a 'critical friend' to the commission, providing advice on the Public Benefit Guidelines published in 2008. He chaired the Chief Executives' Forum for Jewish Charities and is a member of the Policy Research Advisory Group of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research and a board member of the World Council of Jewish Communal Service.
Jon Benjamin has broadcast on television and radio, and has been quoted extensively in print media in the UK and abroad.
Since leaving the Board of Deputies he has offered consultancy services to not-for-profit organisations through his consultancy, MJB Consulting and served as Chief Operating Officer at World ORT between January 2014 and December 2015. He is a member of the consultancy advisory panel of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations and served on charity sector working groups on volunteering and trustee best practice.
In June 2015 he became chairman of the Israel Guide Dog Centre - UK Friends, a registered charity in England supporting the only accredited breeding and training facilities for guide dogs in Israel. In September 2017 he was appointed a trustee of the Sir Martin Gilbert Learning Centre, a charity established to preserve the legacy of the renowned historian through history based education.
The Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA) is an American Jewish 501(c)(3) tax exempt organization that deals with community relations. It is a coordinating round table organization of 15 other national Jewish organizations, including the Reconstructionist, Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox congregational movements, as well as 125 local Jewish federations and community relations councils. The JCPA describes itself as "the representative voice of the organized American Jewish community."
The Board of Deputies of British Jews, commonly referred to as the Board of Deputies, is the largest and second oldest Jewish communal organisation in the United Kingdom, after only the Initiation Society which was founded in 1745. Established in 1760 by a group of Sephardic Jews, the board presents itself as a forum for the views of most organisations within the British Jewish community, liaising with the British government on that basis. Notably, while Lord Rothschild was President of the Board of Deputies, the Balfour Declaration was addressed to him and eventually led to the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine. It is affiliated to the World Jewish Congress and the European Jewish Congress. Its current president is Marie van der Zyl who, due to holding this position, also sits on the Executive Committee of the World Jewish Congress.
Jewish National Fund is a non-profit organization founded in 1901 to buy and develop land in Ottoman Syria for Jewish settlement. By 2007, it owned 13% of the total land in Israel. Since its inception, the JNF says it has planted over 240 million trees in Israel. It has also built 180 dams and reservoirs, developed 250,000 acres (1,000 km2) of land and established more than 1,000 parks.
Nathaniel Charles Jacob Rothschild, 4th Baron Rothschild,, is a British peer, investment banker and a member of the Rothschild banking family.
Michael Abraham Levy, Baron Levy, is a Labour Party peer. He is a former chartered accountant and was chairman and CEO of a large independent group of music companies. He now acts as a consultant for a number of companies and is also chairman of a finance company.
The United Synagogue (US) is a union of British Orthodox Jewish synagogues, representing the central Orthodox movement in Judaism. With 62 congregations, comprising 40,000 members, it is the largest synagogue body in Europe. The spiritual leader of the union is the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth – a title that bears some formal recognition by the Crown, even though his rabbinical authority is recognised by only slightly more than half of British Jews.
Victor Olufemi Adebowale, Baron Adebowale, is the former Chief Executive of the social care enterprise Turning Point, current Chair of the NHS Confederation and was one of the first individuals to become a People's Peer.
The Community Security Trust (CST) is a British charity whose purpose is to provide safety, security, and advice to the Jewish community in the UK. It provides advice, training, representation and research.
Sir Maurice Victor Blank is an English businessman and philanthropist. He is the former Chairman of Lloyds TSB and the current Chairman of several educational and charitable organisations including the Social Mobility Foundation, UJS Hillel and Wellbeing of Women.
The Israel lobby in the United Kingdom is a term sometimes used to describe individuals and groups which seek to influence the foreign policy of the United Kingdom in favour of bilateral ties with Israel, Zionism, Israel, or the policies of the Israeli government. Such individuals and groups may seek to influence politicians and political parties, the media, the general public or specific groups or sectors.
The Jewish Leadership Council is an organisation in the United Kingdom, founded in 2003, whose declared aim is to forward the interests of the organised Jewish community in Britain. The council was founded by its first chairman, then president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, Henry Grunwald, and a number of other senior UK Jewish leaders. The council acts as an umbrella group for various Jewish community organizations, charities, Zionist and pro-Israel advocacy groups.
Samuel Hayek is a British-Israeli businessman who has been chairman of JNF-UK since August 2008. Hayek was chairman of the Likud youth department.
The Jewish Community Council of Victoria Inc (JCCV) is the main representative body for Victorian Jewry, representing 52 Jewish community organisations and over 60,000 Victorian Jews. The JCCV's mission is to represent the Victorian Jewish community, the largest Jewish community in Australia, and deal with matters that affect its status, welfare and interests. The JCCV was established in 1938 as the Victorian Jewish Advisory Board. It has been known as the Jewish Community Council of Victoria since 1989 and became an incorporated entity in 2000.
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry, or ECAJ, is an official peak national body representing the Australian Jewish community. It is the umbrella organisation for over 200 Jewish organisations across Australia. It is the Australian affiliate of the World Jewish Congress, the worldwide umbrella organisation of Jewish communities. It is also affiliated with the Commonwealth Jewish Council, the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress, the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, and the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture.
Danny Rich is a Labour councillor in the London Borough of Barnet. He was, until 2020, the Senior Rabbi and Chief Executive of Liberal Judaism in the United Kingdom.
The Scottish Council of Jewish Communities (SCoJeC) is the democratic representative body of all the Jewish communities of Scotland. The Council was founded in 1999 in response to Scottish devolution, with the principal aim of providing the Jewish community of Scotland with a single voice in dealings with the Scottish Parliament and Government, other communities, and other statutory and official bodies.
Sir Stuart James Etherington, is a British charity executive and former social worker. From 1994 to 2020, he was chief executive of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, with the membership base increasing from 400 to over 14,000. He was previously the chief executive of the Royal National Institute for Deaf People. He received a knighthood in 2010 in recognition of his work for the voluntary and community sectors.
Harris Bokhari is the founder and a trustee at the Patchwork Foundation, for which he won the Diversity Champion of the Year Award in early 2018. The Patchwork Foundation is a charity that aims to "promote and encourage the positive integration of disadvantaged and minority communities into British democracy and civil society."
Laura Marks OBE is an inter-faith social activist, policy adviser, writer and media commentator. Marks has founded and chaired social organisations including Mitzvah Day International and the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust.
Israel Finestein QC MA (1921–2009), an English barrister and Deputy High Court Judge, was a leader and historian of British Jewry. His writings analysed the history of divisions amongst the Jews of England; in varied roles he worked for communal change and reconciliation.