PEF Israel Endowment Funds has moved more than $2 billion since 1922, giving American donors a tax-deductible way to fund Israeli hospitals, schools and charities that have no fundraising arm of their own in the US.
PEF Israel Endowment Funds is a 104-year-old American charity that has moved more than 2 billion dollars in grants to Israeli institutions since its founding in 1922, according to PEF's own donor materials. The organization exists to solve a specific structural problem: many Israeli institutions, hospitals, universities, and social service agencies, have no legal arm in the United States and cannot themselves issue Americans a tax deduction for a donation. PEF acts as that American arm, receiving tax-deductible gifts from US donors and channeling them to Israeli charities the donor names.
What Problem Does PEF Israel Endowment Funds Solve?
An Israeli hospital, yeshiva, or nonprofit generally cannot accept a donation from an American taxpayer and offer that donor a US tax deduction, because the Israeli organization is not a US-registered charity. PEF exists to close that gap. A donor gives to PEF, a 501(c)(3) public charity registered in the United States, and recommends that PEF direct the gift to a specific approved Israeli institution. PEF takes no fee from the donor and does not select the causes itself, according to PEF's donor FAQ.
PEF invites contributions as small as 25 dollars earmarked for a named charity, and separately maintains more than 100 endowment funds with a minimum contribution of 100,000 dollars, together accounting for 127 million dollars under management alongside its general fund, according to PEF's donor FAQ. Overhead runs at approximately 2 percent of grants, funded by a three-quarter-of-one-percent administrative charge on endowed funds rather than a cut of each gift, and PEF maintains no fundraising staff of its own, relying instead on donors already committed to Israeli causes.
Who Founded PEF and When?
PEF was established in 1922 as Palestine Endowment Funds, Inc., renamed after the founding of the State of Israel. Its founders were Justice Louis Brandeis, Rabbi Stephen Wise, and Robert Szold, described by PEF as leading a group of distinguished Americans who wanted a direct channel for American donations to charitable organizations in what was then Mandatory Palestine.
PEF's 2012 annual report, marking the organization's 90th anniversary, describes itself as remaining unique in the field of Israel philanthropy, noting that in that year alone it transferred more than 70 million dollars in grants to Israeli charities. David Ben-Gurion corresponded with PEF as early as 1962, writing to then-chairman Robert Szold to press the organization to fund a scholarship program for children of new immigrants who could not otherwise afford secondary education, according to a letter PEF provided to The Jerusalem Post.
What Kinds of Institutions Does PEF Fund?
PEF makes hundreds of grants a year across nearly every area of Israeli civic life: primary and secondary education, scientific research, programs promoting understanding between religious and secular Israelis and between Arab and Jewish communities, services for women, children and families in distress, special education, veterans' programs, and relief for people with disabilities, according to PEF's own program filings.
Past recipients documented in PEF's annual reports include the PEF Children's Dental Care Program, which provides free dental treatment to children in Jerusalem, Beer-Sheva, Bat Yam and Haifa; the Eretz Hemdah Institute for Advanced Jewish Studies; the Erez Center for Education and Social Advancement in the Western Galilee; and shelters operating across Israel for women and children of all backgrounds. PEF president Geoffrey Stern has said the organization funds institutions across the ideological and religious spectrum and does not screen donors or grantees by ideology, telling the Jerusalem Post that PEF does not function as what he called a gatekeeper.
What Does PEF's Form 990 Show for FY2024?
PEF's fiscal year 2024 Form 990, covering the year ending November 2024, reports 266,697,950 dollars in revenue against 265,467,106 dollars in expenses, a net gain of 1,230,844 dollars.
| Metric | FY2024 |
|---|---|
| Total Revenue | $266,697,950 |
| Total Expenses | $265,467,106 |
| Net Income | $1,230,844 |
| Total Assets | $209,500,000 (approx.) |
| Net Assets | $207,886,282 |
| Total Liabilities | $1,590,000 (approx.) |
| Contributions Share of Revenue | 96.1% |
| EIN | 13-6104086 |
Source: PEF Israel Endowment Funds Inc, Form 990 for fiscal year ended November 2024, as hosted by ProPublica's Nonprofit Explorer.
PEF's Form 990 discloses that the organization operates a donor-advised fund, meaning donors can direct the distribution or investment of contributed funds through PEF-held accounts, a structure reported on Schedule D of its filing. Total giving through PEF has roughly doubled since October 7, 2023, according to PEF president Geoffrey Stern, while overhead has stayed below 1 percent of the increased volume.
Who Leads PEF Today?
Geoffrey Stern serves as PEF's president, a role in which he has corresponded directly with grantee organizations for decades, according to letters PEF has posted on its own website. Grantees writing to Stern range from the Israel Parkinson Association, which operates 15 branches nationwide staffed largely by patients and their families, to Mesila, which provides financial rehabilitation services to Israel's Haredi community, and Lasova, which runs soup kitchens in Tel Aviv, Akko and Carmiel alongside homeless shelters, according to correspondence archived on pefisrael.org.
Stern has also overseen PEF's support for Nishmat's academic advancement program for Ethiopian-Israeli women, which began as an effort to help students reach high school matriculation and has since expanded into college placement, workforce development and leadership training, according to program updates PEF has published. The organization answers to a board of volunteer trustees who periodically conduct site visits to Israel to review grantee institutions firsthand, according to PEF's donor FAQ, with no officer or trustee compensated for travel tied to those visits.
Penina (Penny) Waga served as PEF's Executive Director for more than 25 years before her death on February 27, 2013, according to a tribute posted on PEF's own website. The tribute describes donors who maintained decades-long relationships with Waga, and grantee organizations that continued to ask after her wellbeing years into her retirement, a pattern of long executive tenure common among staff at small, donor-facing American organizations that channel money to Israeli causes.
What Has Congress Asked About PEF's Grantmaking?
Since March 2025, the House Judiciary and Foreign Affairs Committees have examined whether grants distributed through PEF and several other nonprofits, including federal funds routed through USAID and the State Department under the Biden administration, helped finance protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's 2023 judicial reform plan. A committee memo alleged PEF moved more than 884 million dollars to over 1,000 Israeli organizations between 2021 and 2024, and a later memo raised questions about donor-advised funds obscuring final recipients.
PEF president Geoffrey Stern gave his first public interview in response, telling the Jerusalem Post the inquiry followed more than a century of low-profile operation, that PEF does not screen grantees by ideology, and that donor confidentiality prevents him from naming who funded any specific grant. Stern told the Jerusalem Post that the only government-traceable money the committee identified reaching PEF totaled 187,000 dollars, against roughly 1 billion dollars in grants the committee itself credits PEF with moving to Israel over the period reviewed. "We have not received any funds from USAID," Stern said, adding that Congress controls its own budget and does not need a tax-deductible charity to spend abroad. The underlying allegations trace to a February 2023 column by Caroline Glick, now an adviser to Netanyahu, followed by reporting from the Washington Free Beacon and Israel Hayom.
Frequently Asked Questions About PEF Israel Endowment Funds
What is PEF Israel Endowment Funds?
PEF Israel Endowment Funds is a U.S. 501(c)(3) public charity (EIN 13-6104086), founded in 1922, that lets American donors direct tax-deductible gifts to Israeli institutions that have no US-based fundraising arm of their own.
Who founded PEF?
PEF was founded in 1922 as Palestine Endowment Funds, Inc. by Justice Louis Brandeis, Rabbi Stephen Wise, Robert Szold, and a group of other American Zionists.
How much money has PEF distributed?
PEF has distributed more than 2 billion dollars in grants since 1922, according to its own donor materials, and reported 266,697,950 dollars in revenue in fiscal year 2024 alone, according to its Form 990.
What kinds of organizations does PEF fund?
PEF funds hundreds of Israeli charities each year spanning education, medical care, disability services, and programs serving both religious and secular, and Arab and Jewish, communities, across the ideological spectrum.
Who leads PEF?
Geoffrey Stern serves as PEF's president. Penina (Penny) Waga served as Executive Director for more than 25 years until her retirement, and died in February 2013.
Why has Congress examined PEF?
Since March 2025, House committees have asked whether PEF's grants, including funds that may have originated as federal money, helped finance Israeli protest groups involved in the 2023 judicial reform demonstrations. PEF has said it does not screen grantees by ideology.
Sources
Financial figures are drawn from PEF Israel Endowment Funds Inc's Form 990 for fiscal year 2024, as hosted on ProPublica's Nonprofit Explorer. Founding and institutional history draw on PEF's own donor FAQ, website, and 2012 annual report, published on pefisrael.org. Reporting on the congressional inquiry draws on the House Judiciary Committee's memos to members and reporting from The Jerusalem Post, which conducted PEF president Geoffrey Stern's first public interview on the matter.
