We raise four cups of wine to you with gratitude and thanks

Gerald Leisner was one of the great towering figures of South African Jewry. He raised money to build almost every major Jewish institution in the country, including the Holocaust & Genocide Centre in Johannesburg. It was a worthy life’s work of passion.

I once told Gerald that he had “the worst job in the world”. Of course, just like Gerald, all of our community “jobs”, including mine, are “unpaid” and occasionally unappreciated. Gerald grinned widely, and softly told me that his was “the best job in the world”. He had never asked for any money for himself, and he had built institutions for our community that would last generations.

I wish I was as good a human as Gerald. I have spent much of this year asking people for money and advertising to keep the SA Jewish Report alive and flourishing.

Mendel Kaplan, who contributed unfathomable amounts of his own wealth to support our community, taught me two lessons. He told me that when you have a good cause, don’t insult people by not asking them to be part of it and don’t insult them by asking for too little money. “Phew”, that’s easier said than done.

I’ve hated every moment of asking people for money to support the SA Jewish Report, but at the same time, I realised how valued and appreciated the publication is in all of its forms – its newspaper; newsletter; website; JRLive webinars; and WhatsApp groups.

To the thousands of people who gave us some of their hard-earned cash because they appreciate what we do for the community, I’m both enormously grateful and immensely inspired.

Some people gave us R18, and some gave us hundreds of thousands. I consider the R18 as meaningful as the sizeable donations because it shows that even people with limited resources genuinely care and appreciate what we do. And that’s part of the magic of the SA Jewish Report. We’ve built a community that really values and cares about each other, about South Africa, and about Jewish life in this country.

As part of our campaign, we also conducted a survey asking people how they felt about the work we did. Over the next few weeks, we will publish the results but as a sneak preview, more than 92% of our readers rate our content as good or excellent, while more than 91% rate us above eight on a scale from zero to 10. On how we cover events in South Africa, Israel, and the Jewish world, 4% of readers think we don’t understand the community, while more than 90% believe that we do. A total of 5.4% think we are too left leaning, and 8.8% think we are too right leaning. The vast majority consider us centrist and a platform for all credible voices.

Over the past few months, a few people have tried to use the SA Jewish Report as an instrument to attack others with whom they disagree. We have always told them to attack ideas and offer alternatives, but we won’t tolerate our platform being used for divisive vitriolic personal attacks. We aren’t that sort of publication, and we’re very proud of that.

The one message that has been repeatedly given to me by donors is that South African media is in crisis. It’s subject to a specific narrative, and G-d help you if you stray from the woke, politically correct, pro jihadist, Hamas supporting agenda. We’ve seen some of the largest media houses in South Africa deliberately de-platform Jewish journalists because they are “Zionist”; refuse to allow a right of reply to ridiculously biased articles; and deliberately manipulate stories either by covering only one side or excluding positive stories completely. Peta Krost, the editor of the SA Jewish Report, hates it when I say it, but in South Africa, the Fourth Estate has been captured.

Last week, the SA Jewish Report broke the news that the South African consul general in Los Angeles, Thandile Sunduza, had been expelled by the Trump administration after receiving an award from the Los Angeles branch of the vehemently anti-Israel Council on American-Islamic Relations and the LA branch of Jewish Voice for Peace to celebrate South Africa’s genocide campaign against Israel at the International Court of Justice. Needless to say, the story was picked up by international media but not in South Africa. South African media is broken.

It is abundantly clear that the SA Jewish Report is the only source for unbiased, credible journalism about Israel, the South African Jewish community, and the Jewish world in our country. It needs to be supported and nourished. We believe that’s why so many stood up to support us to ensure that our voice isn’t silenced. We’re not cowards about standing up against antisemitism, racism, bigotry, and anti-Zionism in our land. And our readers and donors are brave and bold in ensuring that our community has a credible voice.

We approach Pesach this year with enormous gratitude, grateful that we were freed from bondage in Egypt, grateful that we live freely in a free land, grateful that we have a community that inspires us every day, and grateful for the enormous support we have received from so many of you.

We have the most vibrant Jewish community in the world, and we hope that the SA Jewish Report is both a product of and reflects the diverse tapestry that constitutes Jewish life in South Africa.

As we close our fundraising campaign for 2025, please remember that we can always do with your advertising and support. I blush a little when I slip that in and think of the immortal words made popular by the movie Glengarry Glen Ross, “Always be closing.”

I hope in some way I’ve done Mendel Kaplan and Gerald Leisner proud.

Wishing you a chag Pesach sameach.

Howard Sackstein

Non-executive chairperson: SA Jewish Report

לְשָׁנָה הַבָּאָה בִּירוּשָלָיִם

L’shana haba’ah b’Yerushalayim (Next year in Jerusalem)

To donate, go to: bit.ly/sajrdon
Banking details: SA Jewish Report Holdings NPC
Absa Bank Business Cheque Account Account
No: 41-0467-8169 Branch Code: 63-20-05

To advertise in the SA Jewish Report contact
Britt Landsman
082 292 9520 or britt@sajewishreport.co.za