Sheldon Adelson: Philanthropist, Loves Israel Israel today

From the childhood dream of coming to Israel, through investing in Zionist projects - to the establishment of "Israel Today" • The life journey of the philanthropist who fought to ensure the existence of the Jewish people

• Sheldon Adelson.

  Businessman, philanthropist and jurist

Sheldon Gary Adelson was a unique combination of businessman, philanthropist, sworn Zionist and a true fighter for Israel in the world and for ensuring the existence of the Jewish people.

His connection to Israel was formed in his youth, when his father repeatedly told him that he wanted to visit the Jewish state.

His father did not fulfill his wish - both because he did not have the means to do so and later in light of his precarious health.

So, shortly after the father's death, Adelson arrived in the country wearing the pair of shoes his father was wearing - as if closing a circle.

For Adelson, who died after a struggle with a serious illness, it was clear from an early age that the fate of the Jewish people was not self-evident.

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, he said that he often felt threatened as a child because of his Jewishness.

"We would go to school in groups because we were harassed by violent means because we were Jews," he said.

It is doubtful that the average Israeli citizen is aware of Adelson's huge investment, together with his wife Dr. Miriam Adelson, in so many areas of Israeli life and the Zionist story. His contributions and involvement in improving the lives of Israelis and Jews were extensive, including huge investment - both in the US and abroad. her.

There is no young man who does not know the "Birthright" project with the hundreds of thousands of Jewish participants who came from around the world thanks to the hundreds of millions of dollars that Adelson donated through the special fund he established with his wife.

In the medical world in Israel, he contributed greatly to the establishment of new wards in hospitals.

The special drug rehab clinic he and his wife set up in Tel Aviv and Las Vegas has changed the lives of countless addicts.

His tremendous involvement in establishing new faculties and schools in Israeli universities has given many the opportunity to receive higher education in the country, including by establishing a medical school at Ariel University in Samaria and the Entrepreneurship School at IDC Herzliya, and was among the major donors to Magen David Adom and Yad Vashem.

Adelson also played a significant role in trying to make Israel one of the few countries that succeeded in landing a spacecraft on the moon, when he donated significant sums of money to budget for SPACEIL's "Genesis" project.

Although the spacecraft apparently crashed, the Israeli flag reached the moon, and for the Jewish boy from Boston it was his little victory over the anti-Semites.

His success in creating the "Organization of the Israeli-American Community" for Israelis living abroad enabled this group of Israelis to maintain their identity and form a bridge between the United States and Israel.

This organization gained popularity and expanded at a very rapid pace in North America, and most of all managed to change the stigma of "going down."

If that wasn't enough, the organization has become a significant factor at the advocacy-advocacy level because it has succeeded in promoting pro-Israel legislation in the U.S. that prohibits boycotting the Jewish state, and a number of other laws that would hardly have progressed without Adelson's massive support for the organization and local initiatives to protect Israel.

And of course, no Israeli has not seen the newspaper "Israel Today," which changed the media map in the country and managed in less than a decade to make it the most read newspaper in the country.

Adelson's activism in promoting Zionist initiatives and bringing the hearts of the Jewish people closer not only amounted to philanthropy, but also included top-notch advocacy for Israel vis-à-vis decision-makers in the US and the global business sector to bring Israel huge investments and trade agreements that would strengthen its status as a Western business arena.

One of the major projects he undertook with Dr. Adelson was to convince the world of the righteousness of Israel's status with regard to the status of Jerusalem. His many efforts finally bore fruit in December 2017, when President Donald Trump recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, and a few months later moved the US Embassy Even during the Corona plague, he did not forget his commitment to Kibbutz Galuyot - and managed to bring immigrants from Morocco in a complex and sensitive process to the authorities in Rabat, despite the difficulties and restrictions created by the Corona plague.

He also worked tirelessly to help the Israeli economy by making souls of the Jewish state in American business forums, because he served as honorary chairman of the "Israeli-American Business Initiative" of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

"My heart is in Israel - and Israel is always in my heart. I am a sworn Zionist. I have a home in Israel, a wife and children who are Israelis. I believe in the Jewish people and in the need to strengthen ties between Jews in the Diaspora and Israel which is the home of the Jewish people," Adelson told Israel Today ".

Adelson boasted that he never took a single penny from the Israeli government or the Israeli reader, because he believed in the free market and regulatory non-intervention in the media market in which every Israeli could read the "Israel Today" newspaper anywhere and for free.

A few years ago, when he was a guest at the White House on the occasion of awarding a presidential medal to Dr. Adelson, President Donald Trump praised Adelson and his wife for their struggle for the relocation of the U.S. Embassy along with their philanthropic activities.

Trump noted that Dr. Adelson and her husband are working tirelessly to make the world a better place, with daily concern for the future of the Jewish people. "In 2006, Miriam and her husband Sheldon established a medical research fund to reduce and eradicate life-threatening diseases.

"The couple also supports Jewish schools and Holocaust memorial organizations, and helps American Jews visit the Holy Land," the president noted. 

Trump said that the Adelson couple's relentless efforts to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, as part of their activities for Israel and the rapprochement of the two countries, were part of the overall consideration of the decision.

Well done on this move.

They worked tirelessly to make it happen.

"Jerusalem is the capital of Israel," Trump said.

Adelson was born on August 4, 1933 in Boston, USA. His father, Arthur Adelson, emigrated from Lithuania as a teenager. His mother, Sarah Tonkin, came to the United States from Britain.

His family was a poor man in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston.

He shared a room with his sister and two brothers, and sometimes slept on the floor due to lack of space.

His father worked as a taxi driver while his mother ran a knitting shop adjacent to their home.

In one of his speeches, Adelson said his father taught him that he had to work hard from a young age, and "that there is always someone poorer than me, and we have a duty to share with those who are poorer. I follow in my father's footsteps and care about my community."

Already at the age of 11, he actually began his career as an entrepreneur and businessman when he obtained a loan through his uncle - $ 200 - to get a newspaper stand at a street corner in Boston, in the amount of 5 cents per newspaper.

Gradually he accumulated more and more corners to sell newspapers by taking out loans, and eventually managed to almost fulfill his childhood dream - setting up a candy store.

He even managed to set up an entire network of candy vending machines, which became a hit at a number of large factories in the Boston area.

Even when these factories closed during the summer months, he continued the sales activity, turning his trucks into ice cream trucks and placing them on the beach.

He served two years in the land arm of the U.S. Army, then enrolled in courses in finance and economics at City College of New York in light of growing interest in the business arena on Wall Street.

He has established a number of different businesses in diverse fields, from banking and mortgages, to hotels and tourism and computers.

One of the moves that propelled him forward and put him one level above the rest was his decision in the 1970s to form, along with other partners from his state of Massachusetts, a company called Interface Group, which held a computer fair called Comdex in Las Vegas every year.

The increased preoccupation with the computer field was considered revolutionary at the time, and put it on the map and raised Adelson's horn around the world.

In the late 1980s he also bought the Sands Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas and turned it into the famous Venetian Hotel.

The hotel and casino has been turned into a comprehensive facility that also contains a huge convention center and a shopping and dining center, and in fact its anchor in the city through the new Las Vegas Sands Company.

At the time, it was the only U.S. privately owned and managed conference venue in the United States.

The unique style of the complex - then considered groundbreaking because of the combination of tourism and business - became a hit and helped change the image of Las Vegas from a city of amusement and tourism to a city of conferences and businesses.

From then until his death he became identified with the city probably more than any other businessman.

The model that combines a hotel and casino with a conference and shopping center has worked very successfully, and he even established the Palazzo Hotel next to the Venetian and expanded this model to his business even outside of Las Vegas: in Singapore and Macau.

Adelson soon became one of the richest people in the world (number 19 in the last global Forbes ranking) and was close to being the richest Jew in the world.

This status never detached him from the much responsibility he felt for his many employees and was considered an employer who cared deeply about their needs.

For example during the Corona crisis, his hotels were forced to close for a long time, but he insisted on paying the workers' salaries and taking them on paid leave even though he did not have to.

He has won many accolades in the United States and around the world for this act, which was exceptional in scope.

At the American political level, he constantly worked to advance candidates who supported Israel.

Although in his youth he identified with the Democratic Party because it was the Party of Minorities and Immigrants, he argued that the values ​​of the Democrats went too far left, especially with regard to Israel.

And while he opposed some of what the Republican Party promotes (such as health insurance), he was ultimately convinced that Republican candidates should be vigorously pursued to ensure Israel's well-being and in recent years has been among the Democratic Party's harshest critics of the nuclear deal with Iran. .

His wife, Dr. Miriam Adelson, is a doctor who was born in Israel and grew up in Haifa, and is a world-renowned expert in drug rehab. The two met in the late 1980s on "Blind Date" and got married in 1991 and since then the two have worked together in every possible field.

He has often said that it is a pity that he did not marry Dr. Adelson much earlier. The two are promoting initiatives to prevent the legalization of drugs, among other things in light of a family tragedy. Adelson leaves behind six children from both marriages.